Buttsbury is a village and former

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

(once an ancient parish) now in the parish of

Stock Stocks (also capital stock, or sometimes interchangeably, shares) consist of all the Share (finance), shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporatio ...

, in the

Chelmsford Chelmsford () is a city in the City of Chelmsford district in the county of Essex, England. It is the county town of Essex and one of three cities in the county, along with Colchester and Southend-on-Sea. It is located north-east of London ...

district of

Essex Essex ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East of England, and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, the North Sea to the east, Kent across the Thames Estuary to the ...

, England. Its name is a contraction of Botulph's Pirie, a major saint who died in 680. It is sometimes surmised that the name refers to a tree under which St Botolph preached. In fact, it derives from a pear-tree orchard belonging to one Botulf in the area of present-day Perry Street. In 1931, the civil parish had a population of 1709.

Location

It is centred on minor roads between the towns of

Ingatestone Ingatestone is a village and former civil parish in Essex, England, with a population of 5,409 inhabitants at the United Kingdom 2021 Census, 2021 Census. Just north lies the village of Fryerning; the two now forming the parish of Ingatestone ...

and

Billericay Billericay ( ) is a town and civil parish in the Borough of Basildon in Essex, England. It lies within the London Basin, east of the City of London. The town was founded in the 13th century by the Stratford Langthorne Abbey, Abbot of West Ham, ...

. The parish technically starts immediately north of the old centre of Billericay and extends around the south, west and north sides of Stock. The 14th-century church of St Mary is positioned at the crossroads on a hill, which overlooks

Ingatestone Hall Ingatestone Hall is a Grade I listed 16th-century manor house in Essex, England. It is located outside the village of Ingatestone, approximately south west of Chelmsford and north east of London. The house was built by Sir William Petre, a ...

in the distance. Within Buttsbury, th
River Wid
ref name="geograph.org.uk"> flows crossing the
Buttsbury Wash
'.

History

Early history

The village of Buttsbury and the surrounding land dates back to Saxon times.

St Botolph Botolph of Thorney (; also called Botolph, Botulph or Botulf; later known as Saint Botolph; died ) was an English abbot and saint. He is regarded as the patron saint of boundaries, and by extension, of trade and travel, as well as various aspec ...

, who died in 680AD, is said to have preached under a pear tree in the area of Buttsbury - an impossibility because St. Botolph was never in central Essex. The land was owned by a Saxon family named Bond or Bodis; the Saxon Settlement was called Cinga from 'inga' - the folk - a name taken from the Gegingas who first settled the Wid Valley (cf. Ingatestone and other -ing ending adjacent villages). After the

Norman Conquest The Norman Conquest (or the Conquest) was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Normans, Norman, French people, French, Flemish people, Flemish, and Bretons, Breton troops, all led by the Du ...

of 1066, Buttsbury came under Norman rule and was entered into the

Domesday Book Domesday Book ( ; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...

of 1086 as 'Cinga'; the land was then owned by Henry De Ferrers. The nearby church of

St Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under various titles such as virgin or queen, many of them mentioned in the Litany of Loreto. ...

was given to the Nunnery of St Leonard-atte-Bow in 1190. By 1219, Buttsbury was called ''Botolfvespire''. Under Norman rule in 1231, the parish of Buttsbury was referred to Ginges & Ginges Laundry in 1236, consisting of several manors. It is likely that the parish took its name from th
Blunts
family, who had properties in nearby Billericay; alias Ging - Joyberd - Laundry, being the largest manor in the parish. These manors embraced most of Stock and part of nearby Billericay, still called Buttsbury. In 1295, Buttsbury was recorded as having a watermill called ''Wluesdon'' on the river Wid, near present-day Buckwyns' Farm by a bridge called ''Wolvesdonebrigge''. In 1351, the bridge had fallen into disrepair and became unusable; the case went to court in Chelmsford. Sir Robert Baucon, who was responsible for the upkeep of the bridge, owned land in Buttsbury where the modern sixteenth-century Buttsbury Bridge is situated today on the Stock to Buttsbury road and in a different location to 'Wolvesdonebrigge'. Today, the village of Buttsbury consists of houses, farms and St Mary's Church. Suggestions for the isolated position of the church and the disappearance of the village it served are that the village was cleared to make way for sheep or, more likely, the

Black Death The Black Death was a bubonic plague pandemic that occurred in Europe from 1346 to 1353. It was one of the list of epidemics, most fatal pandemics in human history; as many as people perished, perhaps 50% of Europe's 14th century population. ...

of the 14th century decimated the local population and the survivors eventually moved elsewhere for higher wages and better working conditions.

Agriculture

Since the early medieval period, the land of Buttsbury has been mainly agricultural, with some remaining areas of woodland. Of working adult men in 1831, 84, a clear majority, worked in agriculture. The other three working sectors were: manufacturing (0 men), retail and handicraft (43) and other (13). This remained the situation by 1881, by which time 18 of the women residents were domestic servants.

Population

In 1848, in the Whites Directory of Essex, Buttsbury had 521 inhabitants and consisted of 2021 acres of land; its houses were intermixed with the houses of Stock. In the early 1870s, Buttsbury had 531 residents divided across 109 houses. A wave of early 20th-century building was coupled with better general health, especially lower infant mortality rates. Between 1911 and 1921, the population rose from 697 to 863, notwithstanding

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

in that period. In the following ten years, it rose to 1,709.

Modern history

On 1 April 1936, what remained of the parish was almost entirely subsumed into Stock and Billericay. The parish still exists and consists of a small area around St. Mary's Church.

References

External links

{{authority control Villages in Essex Former civil parishes in Essex Stock, Essex