Great Leighs 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 below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...

, now in the parish of

Great and Little Leighs Great and Little Leighs is a civil parish in the City of Chelmsford in Essex, England. The parish includes the villages of Great Leighs and Little Leighs. In 2011 the civil had a population of 2,709. The villages was mentioned in the Domesday B ...

, 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 Southend-on-Sea and Colchester. It is located north-east of Londo ...

district of

Essex Essex () is a Ceremonial counties of England, county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the Riv ...

, England, halfway between

itself and Braintree. In 1931 the parish had a population of 728.

History

Great Leighs is the location of arguably the oldest Inn in England. The Castle was called the St. Anne's Castle until its temporary closure for refurbishment at Easter 2015. It was on the junction of Main Road and Boreham Road. Another Pub, the Dog & Partridge, is at the other end of the village, on Main Road. The full history of The Castle has been lost. However, it is mentioned in 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 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

of 1086 and claims to be the oldest licensed premises in England, as it served ale to the pilgrims travelling to

Thomas Becket Thomas Becket (), also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket (21 December 1119 or 1120 – 29 December 1170), was an English nobleman who served as Lord Chancellor from 1155 to 1162, and the ...

's tomb in the 12th Century. It has been an alehouse since the Middle Ages although at some point it was an hermitage. The current state of the exterior is due to a fire over a hundred years ago which destroyed the original thatched roof, which was replaced with tiles. Inside, timbers date back hundreds of years. Down in the cellars are remains of tunnels, which reputedly linked the inn with the nearby Leez Priory, and Great Leigh's church. At The Castle, various references can be read on the walls that tell more of the history. Local folklore also tells that the inn is haunted by the troubled spirit of a witch burned at the stake and buried beneath a stone at the nearby crossroads. In December 2009, a £730,000 project to renovate the Village Hall was completed. It was aided by money associated with a new housing development within the village, extensive fund raising and help from funding bodies and Essex County Council. The incumbent priest during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, Andrew Clark, kept a voluminous diary of the war detailing activities, opinions and rumours in the village and nearby. An edited version of the diary was published in 1985 under the title ''Echoes of the Great War''. In the 2014 BBC series ''Britain's Great War'' Jeremy Paxman visits St Mary's Church, Great Leighs, and he describes the early loss of Captain Alan Tritton and brothers Privates Richard (Dick) and Arthur Fitch. He speaks with their niece, Valerie Frost. There is a spring by the side of the road at Cole Hill on Boreham Road, near Great Leighs Church. It once had a lion's head over the outlet. On 1 April 1949 the parish was abolished and merged with

Little Leighs Little Leighs is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Great and Little Leighs, in the Chelmsford district in the English county of Essex. In 1931 the parish had a population of 158. On 1 April 1949 the parish was abolished and ...

to form "Great and Little Leighs", part also went to Little Waltham.

Racecourse

In 2008, Great Leighs became home to the first new racecourse in 80 years, when the nearby Essex County Showground was converted into a state-of-the-art horse-racing venue.

Great Leighs Racecourse Chelmsford City racecourse, originally known as Great Leighs Racecourse, is a thoroughbred horse racing venue located in Great Leighs near Chelmsford, Essex, England. When it opened in April 2008, it was the first entirely new racecourse in the ...

held its first race meeting on 20 April 2008 and staged its first meeting fully open to the public from 28 to 29 May 2008. However, the course had its temporary licence revoked on 16 January 2009 and did not see racing again until 11 January 2015.

References

External links

Great and Little Leighs Parish Council

Leighs Village Hall

Churches at the Leighs and Lt. Waltham

* ttps://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1368867 Great Leighs War Memorial, including video clip from the BBC series "Britain's Great War"
Great Leighs St Mary on Essex Churches
{{authority control Villages in Essex Former civil parishes in Essex