Great Yeldham is a village in north

Essex Essex () is a 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 River Thames to the south, and Grea ...

, England, about from the Suffolk border. Great Yeldham is situated along the busy main A1017 road (formerly A604) between Braintree and Haverhill. The village is where the infant River Colne is joined by a stream from near Stambourne and another that has flowed via

Toppesfield __NOTOC__ Toppesfield is a village and civil parish in the Braintree district of Essex, England. The village is approximately north from the county town of Chelmsford, and west from the village of Great Yeldham. The parish contains the hamlet ...

. The river flows via

Colchester Colchester ( ) is a city in Essex, in the East of England. It had a population of 122,000 in 2011. The demonym is Colcestrian. Colchester occupies the site of Camulodunum, the first major city in Roman Britain and its first capital. Colch ...

on its 39-mile journey to the sea. Great Yeldham contains the "Great Oak", an old preserved oak tree in the centre of the village, which is claimed to have been recorded in William the Conqueror's

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 manus ...

of 1086. In 1967 Great Yeldham elected a Communist councillor, June Cohen, to the surprise of many in the area.

Agriculture

From the 1950s to the 1970s Great Yelham was home to the Whitlock Bros, manufacturers and exporters of Dinkum Diggers (tractors with backhoes and fronthoes, often known these days as 'JCB's). In 1972 Whitlock Bros. was taken over by Hymac, and production subsequently moved to Rhymney in Wales. The Great Yeldham plant closed, resulting in many job losses. The land around Great Yeldham is principally used for arable farming and some livestock rearing. From the early 1950s until the mid-1980s Great Yeldham was also known for its apple and strawberry farm called Lark Hill Farm, to which people came from miles around to pick their own fruit.

Transport

Until 1962 it was served for passenger traffic by Yeldham railway station on the

Colne Valley and Halstead Railway The Colne Valley and Halstead Railway (CVHR) is a closed railway between Haverhill, Suffolk and Chappel and Wakes Colne, Essex, in England. History A railway in the Colne Valley was first proposed in 1846 when the Colchester, Stour Valle ...

line between Chappel and Wakes Colne and Haverhill. The line crossed what was called Station Road at a

level crossing A level crossing is an intersection where a railway line crosses a road, path, or (in rare situations) airport runway, at the same level, as opposed to the railway line crossing over or under using an overpass or tunnel. The term a ...

. The road has since been renamed 'Toppesfield Road'.

References

External links

St. Andrew's Primary School (Great Yeldham) WebsiteWebsite for St. Andrew’s Church, Great Yeldham, part of the Upper Colne Valley Parishes
Villages in Essex Braintree District {{Essex-geo-stub