VILLAGE SIGNS OF ESSEX by Ken Savage, VSS Member

The county of Essex was late in discovering the virtues of the village sign, but having done so is intent on making up for lost time. Only a handful of signs existed in the county prior to the 1970’s but now there are over 250 and the number is steadily increasing. Signs are to be found, not only in the rural villages of the north but also in the large towns and, albeit in smaller numbers, amidst the concrete sprawl of the Thames estuary.

In the picturesque villages in the north of the county the signs depict scenes which reflect the character of the relevant villages. The signs at Felsted, Dedham, Hatfield Broad Oak and Finchingfield are amongst those which show the timber-framed houses to be seen in the village, whilst the signs at Berden, Little Bentley and Tilbury-juxta-Clare have agricultural scenes which represent the farming which predominates in the surrounding areas.

Signs in the larger places generally incorporate the coat of arms of the town and indeed heraldic arms are a feature of many signs in the county. The signs at Colchester and Chelmsford do not even include the name of the town in the design, the presumption being perhaps that the visitor should know his whereabouts without being told! Braintree and Great Dunmow, however, make no such assumption and helpfully include the town name! Arms included in the design of village signs are almost invariably of their historic Lords of the Manor and a visit to the local church (if unlocked) or the library is often necessary to determine the names of the families concerned. There are a number of such signs in the county, particularly attractive examples being those at Birch, Colne Engaine, Danbury, the three Layer villages and the two Wigboroughs.

The landed families, of course, lived in their castles, manor houses and later stately homes which they built for themselves. Perhaps the most regionally important building shown on a sign is Castle Hedingham, which was built in the 12th-century by the de Vere family, Earls of Essex and remained an important military and administrative centre for several centuries. The sign at Faulkbourne includes the eponymous hall in its design, this a 15th-century manor house built by Sir John Montgomery, but much altered by later owners, the Bullock family. Layer Marney Towers consists of a brick gatehouse and flanking towers which were built by Henry 1st Lord Marney in the early 16th-century. They were intended as the entrance to a large property, which was never built due to Henry’s death in 1523 and his son only two years later. Even, the gatehouse is impressive, though, and is seen to good effect on the Layer Marney sign. Of course, Lords of the Manor did not have to live within the confines of the parish and in earlier times the monasteries and other ecclesiastical establishments owned large areas of land within the county. For this historical reason the signs at Tillingham and Wickham St.Paul include the dome of St.Paul’s Cathedral in their designs, as the Dean & Chapter continues to own much land in the respective parishes. Another village with ‘towers’ is Mistley, but in this case they are the remnants of a Georgian church which was built in 1735 and remodelled later in the century by Robert Adam. When a new church was built in the 19th-century the central section was pulled down, but the towers remain as a distinctive landmark to visitors arriving either by road or river.

Mistley stands on the estuary of the river Stour and has long been a flourishing small port, served by the sailing barges which once carried much of the area’s trade up the rivers and well into the hinterland. A typical barge is shown on one side of the Mistley sign, appropriately enough as two such vessels have recently recommenced commercial operations out of the port. Elsewhere, commercial activities have ceased, but a few have survived, owned by enthusiasts and available for pleasure charters. The barges are remembered on several signs, including Beaumont-cum-Naze, Great Wakering, Kirby-le-Soken and Tillingham.

Commercial activities in the county were not confined to barge traffic, as Harwich and Maldon were important ports for ocean-going vessels in earlier years, with the former also a naval base from the time of Henry VIII. Maldon’s traffic is now confined to pleasure craft, but Harwich continued to flourish, particularly after the Great Eastern Railway built a branch to the town in 1854 and commenced steamer services to the continent in 1863. The company transferred its base to nearby Parkeston in 1883 after a dispute with the local authority and services to Holland, Germany and Scandinavia still depart daily from the port. The first continental service is recalled on the Parkeston sign, whilst the Harwich sign depicts one of the ships which were once based at the port.

Sailing vessels of a different kind are depicted on the signs of Brightlingsea, Rowhedge, and Wivenhoe, villages on the Colne estuary which in the 19th and early 20th-centuries were bases for the large yachts which were owned by wealthy individuals who raced them against others of their peer. These races were the forerunners of the Americas Cup, in which one of the British entries in the 1937 competition was the Endeavour II, crewed by men from Tollesbury and remembered both by a window in the church and by its inclusion in the design of the village’s sign.

The railways were important in improving transport links within the region in the 19th-century, although the lack of any heavy industry meant that fewer lines were constructed than elsewhere in the country. Nevertheless the Great Eastern’s main line from London to Ipswich and Norwich which ran through the county brought some industry to places like Chelmsford and Colchester, as well as providing much faster passenger transport. The Great Eastern main line is represented on the sign at Hatfield Peverel, which still has a station served by stopping services. These also call at Ingatestone, but the village has preferred to depict an earlier form of transport on its sign, namely the stagecoaches which once changed horses in the village on their journeys between London and Norwich. From the main line the railway company threw off branch lines to serve the smaller towns in the area, many of which were closed as part of the ‘Beeching cuts’ of the 1960’s. Some still survive, at least in part, and are represented on the signs at Bures Hamlet, which is served by the branch to Sudbury, and White Notley on the Braintree branch, amongst others. The London, Tilbury & Southend Railway Company built its lines to serve places along the Thames estuary, resulting in the development of Southend as a holiday resort and Tilbury as a deep-sea port. The lines have also been important in providing transport into London for the heavy commuter traffic which has grown up during the 20th-century, particularly with the construction of ‘new towns’ and considerable extensions of the old ones as London ‘overspill’ projects after World War II. However, of the places along the line which have village signs, the railway is represented only on that of East & West Horndon. (The joint sign for East & West Horndon has now been replaced by one for West Horndon only. It no longer shows the railway station, but does show the Railway Hotel instead.)

Villages which have a connection with a famous historical character usually include some reference to him or her on their village sign. The characters represented on Essex signs are, however, relatively few and in some instances not particularly well-known. For instance the sign at Aldham includes a bust of the Rev.Philip Morant, an 18th-century historian who published a History of Essex in 1768. In similar vein, the sign at Black Notley features John Ray, a botanist and founder member of the Royal Society who published details of previously unrecorded plants in his Historia Plantarum of 1686. Mr.and Mrs.Andrews, who lived in the parish of Bulmer, achieved immortality through being painted by Thomas Gainsborough rather than for any deed which they themselves accomplished, but are nevertheless represented on the sign of their home village. Of perhaps more ephemeral fame is Francis Crittall who founded the company which makes metal window frames! He moved his factory to Silver End in 1926 and built houses and shops for his workers, which have since become a separate community. His coat of arms has been reproduced on the village sign, which was erected in 1986 to commemorate the 60th-anniversary of the creation of the village.

There are, however, some rather more well-known characters represented on signs around the county. Chronologically the earliest of these is Boudicca, who is represented on the Upshire sign by the obelisk which commemorates the spot where she supposedly took poison and died. Cnut, the Viking who conquered East Anglia and later became king of all England, is represented on the signs at Ashingdon and Canewdon, the latter being where he camped prior to the battle at nearby Ashingdon in 1016, which he won and thus laid the foundations for his subsequent enthronment. Roydon, in the west of the county, depicts Henry VIII and Sir Thomas More, the former because his son, later Edward VI, was born in the village and the latter because he married Jane Colte in the parish church. The sign at Sible Hedingham reproduces the fresco in Florence Cathedral of Sir John Hawkwood, a 14th-century soldier who was born in the village and after fighting for Edward III against the French, became a mercenary who fought for various Italian city-states and eventually became the head of the Florentine army. Lastly, a rather more poignant depiction is that of Captain Oates on the sign at Gestingthorpe. The Oates family were notable 19th-century explorers who lived in the village (when they weren’t exploring!) but the Captain achieved his lasting fame by the manner of his death rather than his explorations; leaving the ill-fated expedition of Captain Scott to the Antarctic in 1912 in a vain attempt to allow the remainder of the party to survive.

The above is just a small sample of the many attractive signs to be found in the county. Information on all the county’s signs are contained in the Town & Village Signs of Essex booklets produced by VSS member, Ken Savage and a good proportion of them in the History through Village Signs books published by another VSS member, Graham Lovell. See elsewhere on this website for details.