Great Braxted

Braxted Park, formerly called Braxted Lodge, is a country house in the Queen Anne style set in a landscaped 2,000 acre park near the village of Great Braxted, Essex. In the Domesday Book of 1086, Eudo Dapifer is shown as owner of the manor. All Saints' Church, originally built in about 1115 and restored in the 18th century, also lies within the park grounds. The property, recorded as a 'deer park' in 1342, was held by a series of Essex families including those by the names of Anesty, Montchensy, Valence, Hastings, Grey, Montgomery, Ayloff and Maynard. The lands were purchased by Thomas Darcy in 1650 from the estate of the then Countess of Pembroke. Braxted Lodge was built on the property in 1680 by Darcy's son. During his ownership, the property was enlarged and landscaped, with several large man-made ponds being added, including one that is now visible from the main house and is referred to as 'the lake'. In 1745, the estate was purchased from the Darcy family by Peter Du Cane, Sr. of nearby Coggeshall, a wealthy cloth merchant, trader and businessman descended from noble Huguenot ancestors by the name of 'Du Quesne'. Having moved the family to Essex, where he had become High Sheriff and Member of Parliament for Colchester, Du Cane ultimately settled the family at Braxted Park in 1751. Du Cane, a director of the Bank of England and the East India Company, reconstructed and enlarged the house around 1760, assisted by Isaac Ware, Thomas James and Robert Taylor (architect). Du Cane thoroughly landscaped and upgraded the property, more than doubling its size.The property passed to Peter Du Cane (II), then 62, when his father died at the age of 90 in 1803. He accomplished even more improvements and alterations to the building and grounds, bringing the main house and gardens largely to their present state. Peter Du Cane (III) inherited the property in 1823 and continued to add to the holdings, including the restoration of the church (including the building of the Du Cane Family crypt) and the addition of several other buildings.In 1841, Charles Du Cane acceded to the property on the death of his cousin Peter, who had by then already formally changed its name to 'Braxted Park'. Member of Parliament for Maldon from 1852 to 1854 and for Essex North from 1857 to 1868, Du Cane served as civil Lord of the Admiralty for two years. Sir Charles was appointed Governor of Tasmania from 1868 to 1874 and died on the estate in 1889. Braxted Park was acquired by Sir William Boulton, 1st Baronet, from the Du Cane family in 1919. The Boulton Baronetcy of Braxted Park was created in 1944. The Boulton family sold the estate to The Plessey Company in 1947. Sir Allen George Clark, chairman of the company, and his descendants have been its occupants to the present day. At present there is a disused Victorian school on the Estate. This was built for the use of the children of the Parish.

Shut Heath Wood is a 20.2-hectare (50-acre) nature reserve Essex. It is managed by the Essex Wildlife Trust.Over half this site is managed as farmland, and the rest is ancient oak woodland also has coppiced sweet chestnut and hornbeam, with an understorey of ash, elder and hazel. Invertebrates include damselflies, dragonflies, glow-worms and wood ants. Common blooms found on the reserve in the summer include bluebells, bugles, cuckoo flowers, wood anemones, primroses, dog violets, and wood sorrels.There is access by a footpath from Tiptree Road.

Great Totham is a village and civil parish in Maldon district, Essex, England, and midway between Chelmsford and Colchester. The village includes the Island of Osea in the Blackwater estuary and is separated into two parts, north and south. The north side and the south side are about a mile and a half apart, distributed along the B1022. The parish contains the hamlet of Totham Hill.

Tiptree Priory was a small Augustinian priory in Great Braxted, Essex, England and afterwards the name of the 16th century house built on the ruins. The priory was founded in the 12th century by the local Tregoz family as a community of Augustinian Canons Regular. The priory church was dedicated to Saints Mary and Nicholas.The priory was suppressed in 1525 as part of the Dissolution of the Monasteries by Henry VIII and granted initially to Cardinal Wolsey. In 1526 he granted it to Cardinals College, Oxford (now Christ Church) and then to his college at Ipswich. On Wolsey's downfall in 1530 it reverted to the Crown, who granted it to Edward Huddlestone. It was acquired in 1547 by Thomas Darcy, whose grandson Brian (High Sheriff of Essex in 1585) built the present house c.1570. This house was built in red brick in two storeys. The priory church was demolished. After passing down in the Darcy family for several generations, the property was sold and afterwards passed through a succession of unrelated hands.

Tiptree Heath is a 25 hectare biological Site of Special Scientific Interest south-west of Tiptree in Essex, England. It is managed by the Essex Wildlife Trust together with the Friends of Tiptree Heath.This is the largest surviving area of heathland in Essex, and has a number of plants rare in the county. It is dominated by heather and bent grass. There is also an area of secondary woodland with oak, birch and aspen, and a stream with several species of fern on its banks. A small herd of Dexter cattle help to control the growth of invasive scrub.The site straddles the B1022 Maldon Road.

Tiptree Heath is a hamlet in the Colchester district, in the county of Essex, England. Nearby settlements include the villages of Tiptree, Great Totham, Great Braxted and Little Totham. For transport there is the B1022 road which the hamlet is on, and the B1023 and A12 roads. There is a nature reserve called Tiptree Heath Nature Reserve.

Wickham Bishops is a village and civil parish in the Maldon district of Essex, England. It is located around three miles north of the town of Maldon and around two miles south-east of Witham, in whose post town it lies. The place name Wickham Bishops is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Wicham, meaning 'dwelling place with a (dairy) farm'. Bishops refers to the fact that the land belonged to the Bishop of London. Other references note the historic name of Wycham Episcopi.

Kelvedon is a village and civil parish in the Braintree District of Essex in England, between Chelmsford and Colchester. It had a population of 4,717 in 2001, reducing to 3,587 at the 2011 Census. It is now home to several businesses including Knight Group and Lysanda. Brockwell Meadows Local Nature Reserve is south-east of the village between a housing estate and the River Blackwater.

Little Braxted is a village and civil parish located near the town of Witham, in the Maldon district, in the county of Essex, England. The population of the civil parish at the 2011 Census was 170. According to the Census there were 84 males and 86 females living in the parish in 2011. Little Braxted has a small medieval church dedicated to St Nicholas, which was extensively decorated in the Victorian era. Little Braxted has one pub, The Green Man.Lawrence Washington was rector of St Nicholas's Church following his ejection from the somewhat better endowed All Saints Purleigh also in Essex. In the 1870s Little Braxted was described as having:Acres, 563. Real property, £1,173. Pop., 111. Houses, 23. The property is divided among a few. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Rochester Value, £118. Patrons, Trustees of Sir W. B. Rush. The church is good.

Rivenhall End is a hamlet in the civil parish of Rivenhall near Witham in the Braintree District in the English county of Essex. It is near the village of Rivenhall. For transport there is the busy A12 nearby and Witham railway station.

Brockwell Meadows is a 4.3 hectare Local Nature Reserve in Kelvedon in Essex. It is owned by Kelevdon Parish Council and managed by the Council together with a group of local residents called the Brockwell Group.This site has water meadow, woodland, a pond and hedgerows. The River Blackwater runs along the eastern boundary.There is access from Riverside Way.

Inworth railway station was on the Kelvedon and Tollesbury Light Railway, serving the village of Inworth, Essex. The station was 2 miles 75 chains (4.73 km) from Kelvedon (Low Level) station.The station was opened in 1904. It was closed, along with the rest of the line, on 7 May 1951.