Hatfield Broad Oak, Essex

Description
Hatfield Broad Oak or Hatfield Regis, an ancient town and a parish in Essex. The town stands on an eminence, on both sides of which are rivulets which united form Pincey Brook, 4 1/2 miles E from Sawbridgeworth, and 5 1/2 SE from Bishops Stortford. It was formerly a market-town, and had a fair on 5 Aug. The Takeley station on the Dunmow branch of the G.E.R. is in the parish, but is 3 miles N from the town. There is a post and money order office under Harlow; telegraph office, Hatfield Heath. Acreage, 8810; population, 1747. The manor belonged anciently to the Crown, was given after the Conquest to the De Gemons, passed to the Bruces, the Bohuns, the Staffords, the Riches, and the Barringtons, and belongs now to the family of Lowndes. The seat occupied by the Bruces and that occupied by the Barringtons are now farmhouses, and the former is moated and belongs to the Earl of Roden. Barrington Hall was begun about 1740, but not completed till 1864, and is now the seat of the Lowndes family. Down Hall, the seat of Lord Rookwood, and Gladwyns are good mansions. A Benedictine priory was founded in the parish in 1135 by Aubrey de Vere, and sold at the dissolution to T. Noke-the great tithes were given to Trinity College, Cambridge. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of St Albans; net value,, £180 with residence. Patron, Trinity College, Cambridge. The church is a fine building of stone chiefly in the Perpendicular style, has a lofty tower with eight bells, and contains a fine effigies of Robert de Vere, third Earl of Oxford, and a library formed about 1700. The vicarages of Bush End and Hatfield Heath are separate benefices.