COLNE ENGAINE
THE parish of Colne Engaine (2,478 a. or 1,003
ha.), (fn. 61) which takes its name from the 13th-
century lords of its principal manor, lies on the
river Colne between Earls Colne and Halstead,
10 miles north-west of Colchester. (fn. 62) The
roughly rectangular parish is bounded on most
of the south by the Colne, except on the south-
west where it extends south of the river, and on
all other sides by field boundaries; by the 16th
century there were two detached areas, one in
White Colne and one between White and Wakes
Colne. (fn. 63) The part of the parish south of the
Colne, almost entirely belonging to Parley
Beams farm, was administratively in Stansted in
Halstead until the early 18th century or later. (fn. 64)
Boundary disputes with White Colne in 1805
and 1806 and with Earls Colne between 1836
and 1838 may have encouraged the fairly regular
perambulations between 1800 and 1837. (fn. 65) In
1882, under the divided parishes Act, a detached
part of White Colne (39 a.) was added to Colne
Engaine, but the two detached parts of Colne
Engaine (67 a. and 21 a.) were transferred to
White Colne, reducing the parish to 2,430 a. or
983 ha. (fn. 66) In 1985 part of Colneford hill was
transferred from Colne Engaine to White Colne,
and land at Countess Cross and Colne Park from
White Colne to Colne Engaine, increasing the
area of Colne Engaine to 987 ha. (fn. 67)
The land reaches 65-70 m. in the northern
half of the parish, rising to a high point of 71 m.
just east of Booses green, and falls to c. 25 m.
along the Colne. The slope is cut by two small
tributaries of the Colne which have created a
rolling landscape of steep hills and valleys. The
eastern stream was known in 1998 as the Peb
brook, a back-formation from the adjoining
parish of Pebmarsh. The higher ground, includ-
ing the main areas of settlement around the
church and Colne Engaine green, Buntings
green, and Booses green, is boulder clay. Along
the Colne and its tributaries are bands and larger
areas of Kesgrave sand and gravel, but only along
the Colne and the Peb brook are there bands of
alluvium. (fn. 68) The parish, which contains woods of
small-leaved lime and hornbeam, is within the
Colne Valley Special Landscape Area, and the
part along the north bank of the Colne is also
within a nature conservation zone. (fn. 69)
Woodland clearance has left several greens or
tyes. Ases tye, later Asteys or Buntings green,
was recorded from 1400; French's (later Tot-
man's) green, from 1461, and Langley, Golding-
tons, and Gores (later Parsons or Booses) greens
from 1526. (fn. 70) Gaines or Street green north of the
church was not recorded until 1612, but was
presumably much older. (fn. 71) Half of Colneford
green, later White Colne green, was in Colne
Engaine until 1985. By 1600 Goldingtons green
was being identified with Asteys green, although
it may earlier have been a separate green a little
further south; any traces of that probably disappeared when the road through it was closed in
1833. (fn. 72) Langley green was being encroached on
by 1682, and most of it was inclosed by a neighbouring farmer in 1850. (fn. 73) By 1876 only parts of
Colne Engaine, Booses, Buntings, and Langley
greens survived. (fn. 74) In 1964 J. L. Beaumont, lord
of Little Colne manor, claimed manorial rights
over Colne Engaine or Street and Booses greens;
in 1966, under the Commons Registration Act,
Goldingtons or Asteys (formerly Langley) and
Buntings greens were registered as common
land, Booses and Street greens as village greens. (fn. 75)
The Halstead-Colchester road runs through
the extreme south-west corner of the parish. A
network of minor roads, including those to
Pebmarsh, Bures, and Halstead, converges on
the church and nearby green and links the farms
and greens to each other. A road to Pebmarsh
was called Pellesden street in 1515; (fn. 76) it or
another road to Pebmarsh was repaired by the
parish in 1758. (fn. 77)
Figure 19:
Colne Engaine c. 1650
Two road bridges and a footbridge cross the
Colne, and the parish boundary, to Earls
Colne. (fn. 78) In 1624 the lord of Bromptons manor
was responsible for the repair of a cart bridge
called Bromptons bridge, (fn. 79) presumably over the
brook beside the manor house.
Evidence of possible Roman settlement has
been found at Countess Cross, near the church,
and near Knight's Farm. (fn. 80) In 1066 there were
32 recorded tenants; in 1086, a total of 38. (fn. 81)
Minor names, like Westhey or western inclosure
used as a surname in 1269, and Hamstall and
Bridgewick fields recorded in 1501 and 1502,
suggest scattered farmsteads. (fn. 82) A 12th- or 13th-
century settlement has been excavated at Black
Bats, east of the modern village, where the frame
of an early 14th-century aisled hall survives in
No. 1 Brickhouse Road. There is evidence for
other small medieval settlements or farms at the
north end of Brickhouse Lane and at Booses
green. (fn. 83) The parish was called Little Colne in
1086 and 1327, presumably to distinguish it
from Earls Colne. In 1377 only 109 people paid
poll tax, implying that the population, although
higher than those of Wakes and White Colne,
was one of the lowest in the hundred. (fn. 84)
The population seems to have grown in the
late 16th century and the early 17th when several
cottages were built on the waste. (fn. 85) Epidemics
between 1637 and 1639, in the winter of 1647-8,
and in 1670, 1681, and 1686, as well as the small-
pox recorded in 1651 and 1652, (fn. 86) presumably
reversed that growth. Although 33 households
were assessed for hearth tax in 1671 and a
further 35 were exempt, only 80 adults were
reported in 1676. (fn. 87) Rectors estimated the popu-
lation at c. 40 families in 1723 and at 453 persons
in 1766, and reported 76 houses or cottages in
the parish in 1790. (fn. 88) The population rose from
523 in 1801 to 685 in 1841, then fell to 501 in
1901. It rose again to 583 in 1911, then remained
fairly steady until it rose from 581 in 1961 to
888 in 1971. By 1981 it was 947, and in 1991 it
was 925. (fn. 89)
Some farms, like Nightingales, Munns, and
Peverels, may take their names from 14th-
century landowners. (fn. 90) The surviving 17th-
century and earlier houses are mainly of two
storeys, timber-framed, and plastered. Night-
ingales in Brickhouse Lane, incorporates, in
much late 20th-century work, the eastern two
bays and central stack of a three-bay late 16th-
or early 17th-century house. Peverels, north of
Countess Cross, incorporates a three-roomed,
later 16th-century house, with chamfered
beams, flat joists and a brick stack between the
central and east bays; it may have been built by
Roger London (d. 1570) or his son Roger. (fn. 91) It
was raised and reroofed in the 19th century
when a parallel range was added on the north.
A third parallel range was added in the 1980s.
Orchard House, Pebmarsh Road, comprises
three bays of a long-jettied house built c. 1500
with a later, unjettied, range of three bays at
right angles to it. Goldington's Cottage, near
Buntings Green, of one storey with attics, was
probably built in the late 15th century or the
earlier 16th as a hall-house with an in-line
storeyed north-east end. In the late 16th century
or the 17th the hall was floored and a stack was
inserted, probably into the cross-passage. The
service end was later demolished. The house has
been greatly altered in the 20th century. The
Grove, Booses green, formerly the Gores from
its 15th-century owner Thomas Gore, bore the
modern date 1684, although it appears to date
from c. 1600. It was extended in the 18th, 19th,
and 20th centuries by the Sewell family who
have owned it since c. 1750. (fn. 92) The Croft, a 16th-
century house on the west side of the Green,
was adapted as the parish workhouse in the 18th
century, and was encased in white brick and
greatly enlarged by the Pudney family in the
19th century. (fn. 93) The nearby Burches Farm, of
four bays and two storeys, was built in the mid
16th century; it has a fragmentary crown-post
roof and a large, now subdivided, west room
which has chamfered joists with lamb's tongue
stops. The main, south front was given sash win-
dows and a porch in the early 19th century. A
north-east wing was added in the late 19th cent-
ury or the early 20th.
Knights Farm, Buntings green, may derive its
name from Henry Knight (fl. 1300), (fn. 94) but the
surviving house is of the early 17th century. (fn. 95)
The house was doubled in size in the 18th cent-
ury, perhaps by James Brown, its tenant in 1770.
His grandson Isaac Baker Brown carried out
early 19th-century improvements, including the
new, white brick, facade on the south front. (fn. 96)
The house was further altered and extended by
Miss K. M. Courtauld and her successors
between 1878 and c. 1950. In 1602 the later Elms
Hall, (fn. 97) near Langley green, comprised three
ranges of buildings round a courtyard open to
the south. Parts of that structure, with a 17th-
century house and dairy in the east range and
north-west corner, were probably incorporated
into the 18th-century house of the same plan,
perhaps built by Thomas Baker (fl. 1788). (fn. 98)
About 1810 a broad staircase hall was built on
the courtyard, most of the south-west part of the
west wing was rebuilt over a cellar, and a brick
facade was added to the south front, probably
by Isaac Brown and his wife Mary Baker. (fn. 99) The
neighbouring Mayflower House was built as a
lobby-entrance house in the early 17th century (fn. 1)
and was restored and extended c. 1985.
Nineteenth-century buildings include several
brick cottages, some of them probably built by
1867 when a few new, brick, cottages were
reported, (fn. 2) and two or three larger houses round
the church. Outside the village are The Lodge,
Mill Lane, built in 1848, (fn. 3) and Countess Cross
House, (fn. 4) in White Colne until 1985.
Abbot's Shrubs, near the western boundary
of the parish, was built in 1927 by Miss K. M.
Courtauld; its large grounds contain some very
rare trees and plants. (fn. 5) Other 20th-century build-
ing has created a nucleated village round the
church and the nearby green. Council houses
were built in Green Road in 1950. From 1963
onwards new residential streets were developed
off Station Road, Brook Street, and Green Farm
Road. In the 1980s land in the village left vacant
by the closure or departure of building and haul-
age firms was infilled. (fn. 6)
The village was served by carriers to
Colchester in the mid 19th century. (fn. 7) The Colne
Valley and Halstead Railway was built through
the parish in 1858, with a station just across the
boundary in Earls Colne. The line closed to
passenger traffic in 1961 and to goods traffic in
1965. (fn. 8) R. H. Johnson started a bus service to
Halstead in 1932, and in 1937 Eastern National
began a Saturday service through the parish to
Colchester. (fn. 9)
In 1924 water was supplied from 17 different
sources, at least three of them polluted. Miss
K. M. Courtauld paid for a water works in 1930,
but by 1936 the supply was inadequate and pol-
luted. In 1938 Colne Engaine was connected to
the Earls Colne mains. (fn. 10) The builders Pudney
and Co. had a private electricity supply by 1905
and the village hall had electric light in 1922,
but the East Anglian Electric Supply Co. Ltd.'s
mains did not reach the parish until 1932. (fn. 11) Part
of Colne Engaine was connected to the Earls
Colne drainage system in 1938. (fn. 12)
A victualler kept a disorderly alehouse in
1689, and another between 1691 and 1695. (fn. 13)
There were two licensed inns in 1766, the Three
Cups and the Five Bells. (fn. 14) The Five Bells, some-
times called the Bells in the earlier 19th century,
was still open in 1997. (fn. 15) A friendly society met
there from 1840 to 1855 or later. (fn. 16)
A village hall in Station Road just below the
church, given by Miss K. M. Courtauld, was
opened in 1922. The adjoining land was bought
by the parish as a recreation ground. (fn. 17) There
was an agricultural society in the parish in
1848. (fn. 18) The 15 clubs and societies in the parish
in the 1970s had been reduced to 10 by c. 1990,
including a dramatic society, football club, and
history society. (fn. 19)
The Essex historian William Holman died in
the church porch in 1730. (fn. 20) During the Second
World War there was an army camp at Colne
Park; bombs fell on the parish and a German
plane crashed there in 1940. (fn. 21)