Stifford is an area 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 ...

in the town of Grays in

Thurrock Thurrock () is a unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area with Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough status in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Essex, England. It lies on the north bank of the River ...

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. Historically a single

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

, the area was broken up by the construction of the A13 in the 1900s and is now divided by the road into three communities, the

urban area An urban area is a human settlement with a high population density and an infrastructure of built environment. Urban areas originate through urbanization, and researchers categorize them as cities, towns, conurbations or suburbs. In urbani ...

s of South Stifford and Stifford Clays and the small village of North Stifford. In 1931 the parish had a population of 2188. On 1 April 1936 the parish was abolished to form Thurrock.

Origin of name

The place name Stifford is first recorded in

Domesday 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 ...

as ''Stiforda'' and means "path ford". The ford was across the Mardyke which flows through North Stifford before joining the Thames at

Purfleet Purfleet-on-Thames is a town in the Thurrock unitary authority, Essex, England. It is bordered by the A13 road to the north and the River Thames to the south and is within the easternmost part of the M25 motorway but just outside the Greater ...

. Stifford gives its name to the Stifford Clays housing estate built in the late 1950s.

North Stifford

The original parish church (St Mary the Virgin) is located within North Stifford. The church is originally 12th century with later 13th, 14th and 19th century alterations and extensions, and is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

. The church contains several interesting medieval

monumental brass A monumental brass is a type of engraved church monument, sepulchral memorial once found through Western Europe, which in the 13th century began to partially take the place of three-dimensional church monument, monuments and effigy, effigies carve ...

es. William Palin who was rector between 1834 and 1882 wrote the earliest local histories devoted solely to the Thurrock area - ''Stifford and its Neighbourhood'' (1871) and ''More about Stifford and its Neighbourhood'' (1872). Palin was followed in 1980 by ''The Stifford Saga'' by Doreen Dean and Pamela Studd and in 2012 ''The Idyll in the Middyl'' by Cliff and Jan Cowin. The North Stifford Village sign was unveiled on 1 July 2011The Idyll in the Middyl by Cliff and Jan Cowin
publishers web site
(2012)

South Stifford

South Stifford is a small residential area in the town of Grays which separates the town centre from West Thurrock and

Lakeside Shopping Centre Lakeside Shopping Centre (commonly referred to as Lakeside) is a large Out-of-town shopping centres in the United Kingdom, out-of-town shopping mall, shopping centre located in West Thurrock, Essex just beyond the eastern boundary of Greater Lon ...

. It serves as a residential hub for the people who work at the local factories and surrounding retail areas, however it has recently been overshadowed by the huge housing estate of Chafford Hundred.

Education

South Stifford has one primary school, Stifford Primary School.

References

{{Thurrock parishes Former civil parishes in Essex Thurrock