Braintree, Essex

For other uses, see Braintree.

Braintree
Bocking Windmill
Braintree  Braintree shown within Essex
Population	42,394
OS grid reference	TL7522
District	Braintree
Shire county	Essex
Region	East
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	BRAINTREE
Postcode district	CM7, CM77
Dialling code	01376
Police	Essex
Fire	Essex
Ambulance	East of England
EU Parliament	East of England
UK Parliament	Braintree
List of places: UK • England • Essex

Braintree is a town of about 42,000 people and the principal settlement of the Braintree district of Essex in the East of England. It is 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Chelmsford and 15 miles (24 km) west of Colchester on the River Blackwater, A120 road and a branch of the Great Eastern Main Line.

Braintree has grown contiguous with several surrounding settlements: Braintree proper lies to the south of Stane Street, and Bocking lies to the north. The two together can be referred to as Braintree and Bocking, although many people refer to them together as "Braintree"^{[citation needed]}.

Braintree is twinned with the French town of Pierrefitte-sur-Seine.

Braintree, Massachusetts, United States, was named after the town in 1640.

Origin of the name

The origin of the name Braintree is obscure. One theory is that Braintree was originally Branoc's tree, Branoc apparently being an old personal name. Another theory is that the name is derived from that of Rayne, which was actually a more important settlement in Norman times. Braintree, Essex was also called Brantry and Branchetreu^{[citation needed]} in the Domesday Book and this means "town by the river". It has been clearly established that the Brain is not associated with any Brid. Britain has been established to be named after Brit or the word origin of Brutus a legendary founder of London. The River Braint is another possible origin. "Tree" comes from the Saxon suffix, more usually spelt "try", denoting a big village. In many early American Colonial documents, it is referred to as Branktry. The name "Braint" is well attested as a river name in Britain, there is a river of that name in Anglesey, and it may be conjectured that it was name of the blackwater in pre Saxon times, although there is an even likely Celtic name in "Bran" also used widely for rivers, derived from the British word for a Crow and usually thought to refer to the dark or crow-black appearance of such a river, making it a good fit for a river now called "blackwater". Here again, the reference to a river would indicate that Braintree literally means "town (or village) by the river". The Suffix to either Braint or Bran is the common Britonnic "Tre" widely found in Wales and Cornwall, but also noted in towns such as Daventree, with the meaning of initially a farm or settlement later a town.

History

Braintree dates back over 4,000 years when it was just a small village. When the Romans invaded, they built two roads; a settlement developed at the junction of these two roads but was later abandoned when the Romans left Britain. The town was recorded in the Domesday Book of 1085 when it was called Branchetreu and consisted of 30 acres (120,000 m²) in the possession of Richard, son of Count Gilbert. Pilgrims used the town as a stop-over, the size of the town increased and the Bishop of London obtained a market charter for the town in 1190. The town prospered from the 17th century when Flemish immigrants made the town famous for its wool cloth trade. In 1665, the Great Plague killed 865 of the population of just 2,300 people. The wool trade died out in the early 19th century and Braintree became a centre for silk manufacturing when George Courtauld opened a silk mill in the town. By the mid 19th century, Braintree was a thriving agricultural and textile town, and benefited from a railway connection to London. The wealthy Courtauld family had a strong influence on the town, supporting plans for many of the town's public buildings such as the town hall and public gardens established in 1888.

Geography

Braintree lies in north Essex, about 40 miles (64 km) from London, with factories and housing to the south and rural areas to the north, where arable crops are grown. It lies about 150 feet (46 m) above sea level. Essex is rather flat on the whole, and the Braintree area is no exception; however, there is a general downward trend in the height of the ground from the northwest towards the coast to the southeast. Two rivers flow through Braintree in this direction. Pod's Brook approaches the western side of the town, forms a natural boundary between Braintree and the neighbouring village of Rayne about two miles (3 km) to the west. Pod's Brook becomes the River Brain as it passes under the Roman road, before running through the southern part of Braintree. The River Pant (or Blackwater) runs roughly parallel to it, through the north of Bocking and away to the east of the town. The Brain eventually flows into the Blackwater several miles away, near Witham.

Culture, media and sport

Braintree Town Football Club, known as "The Iron", have made much progress in recent years and were promoted to the Conference South as champions of the Isthmian League in 2006. The 2006–2007 season saw them just miss out on a second successive promotion to the Conference National. Having finished in third place, they went down 1-0 in the Conference South play-off final. Braintree continued their good form during season 2007-2008. After a slow start and a change of first team manager, they took 60 points from their last 30 games to finally secure fifth place and another tilt at the play-offs. This fine form continued in the 2010/2011 when they were promoted to the Conference Premier as champions.

Braintree has its own museum, which contains displays relating to the history of the town. It is named after John Ray and has a number of relatively famous patrons, including the Essex-born artist, Jennifer Walter and Lesley Killin, an influential member of Essex Council of Education (the ECE).

There is a cinema on the outskirts of the town. Opposite the cinema, there is also a bowling alley and various restaurants, together with numerous public houses and bars in the town centre.

Braintree's local newspapers are the Braintree and Witham Times, Essex Chronicle and Evening Gazette.

The Braintree and Bocking Carnival takes place each June. The event starts with a procession of floats through the town centre, finishing at Meadowside. Events, including a fair and sideshows, continue throughout the afternoon at Meadowside until around 10pm.

Braintree Musical Society perform two shows a year (in April and October) at The Institute at Bocking End.

The world famous recording artists, The Prodigy, originated in Braintree.

A new community radio licence for east Braintree has been awarded to Carolina FM. The station commenced broadcasting on 10th July 2009.

Education and schools

Braintree has four secondary schools: Felsted School Independent Co-Educational, Gosfield School Independent Co-Educational, Alec Hunter Humanities College Humanities College, Notley High School Technology College (which is also the location of the Braintree Sixth Form) and Tabor Science College. Post 16 education is provided by Felsted School, Gosfield School, Braintree College and Braintree Sixth Form

Economy, industry and commerce

Freeport is a shopping area on the outskirts of Braintree, described as a "designer outlet village". It has approximately 90 departments where designer brands sell surplus stock for lower than the recommended retail price. Freeport also has its own railway station, namely Braintree Freeport railway station, which is the first stop on the journey from Braintree to London Liverpool Street via Witham.

Transport

Braintree has two railway stations, Braintree and Braintree Freeport next to the Freeport shopping area. Trains depart from Braintree station to Witham, where the Braintree branch line joins the Great Eastern Main Line to London Liverpool Street. Service frequency is approximately once an hour during the daytime. Nowadays the track terminates at Braintree. However, it used to continue westwards, as the Bishop's Stortford-Braintree Branch Line, through the village of Rayne, to Great Dunmow, but this section of the route was closed and has been disused for decades (although has now become part of a country walk and cycle route, known as Flitch Way).

Neighbouring villages

Villages in the Braintree area include Black Notley, White Notley, Great Notley Garden Village (a recent construction), Cressing, Felsted, Rayne and Panfield.

Notable residents

• Louie Spence - flamboyant dance teacher from Pineapple Dance Studios, was born and raised in Braintree.
• Rupert Everett - British actor born in Norfolk, 1959, spent a short time as a child in Braintree and frequented the former Embassy Cinema (now closed and occupied by Wetherspoons).
• Malcolm McFee, (1949–2001), British actor born in Forest Gate, Newham, played Peter Craven in Please Sir! 1968-1971 and The Fenn Street Gang 1972-1973. Also was landlord of the Wagon & Horses, South St.for a while in the '90s.
• Lawrence D. Hills founded the Henry Doubleday Research Association headquarters and test site at Bocking, and also developed the Bocking 14 strain of comfrey, which has properties of particular interest to organic gardeners.
• John Ray (1627–1705) - naturalist, born in nearby Black Notley, is perhaps the most talked about local person, among historians.
• The Courtauld family was one of the most prominent families of Braintree and Bocking during the 19th century. Their highly successful silk business made them very rich, and provided much employment in the area. They were very major benefactors to Braintree & Bocking, e.g. Town Hall, Corner House, Leahurst Hostel, William Julien Courtauld Hospital, land and buildings for the High School, Public Gardens...
• Sir Evelyn Wood, (1838–1919) - British Field Marshal, Victoria Cross recipient.
• Katherine Parnell - younger sister of Sir Evelyn Wood, and wife and downfall of Irish Nationalist leader, Charles Parnell.
• The Prodigy - famous dance music group, are probably Braintree's best known export in recent years. The band's leader Liam Howlett was not only educated at Alec Hunter Humanities College, but was also the cause of much indignation among some residents when he criticised the town in an interview for the music magazine Q. He reportedly used "an abusive term." He and fellow band member Keith Flint moved out of the town around 1998, to live in seclusion in a small village five or six miles (10 km) to the west. Now living just outside of Harlow, Essex.
• Barry Douglas Lamb - avant-garde/experimental composer and musician, lived in Braintree following the demise of the insane picnic from 1989–1993. Although this appears to have been a period of very little musical output on his part, there is an unofficial recording from the period called "Braintree - the concubine harvester".
• Steve Harley - singer/composer and founder of Cockney Rebel, lived in Bradford Street, Braintree, from 1969 to 1971. He worked as a reporter for the Braintree and Witham Times under his real name Stephen Nice. The novelist Jay Merrick, author of Horse Latitudes, worked on the newspaper at the same time under his real name John Thompson.
• Andrew Phillips, Baron Phillips of Sudbury, noted politician and lawyer in the field of civil liberties lived in Bradford Street, Braintree for much of the 1980s
• Giles Long MBE - triple Paralympic Gold medallist and former World Record holder in the 100m Butterfly lived in Braintree from 1979 to 1994, briefly returning in 2007. He swam for Braintree and Bocking Swimming Club 1986 to 1996.
• Next of Kin - pop group who had two top 40 hits in 1999.
• The ancestors of US Founding Father John Adams emigrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony from Braintree.
• James Challis - astronomer, was born in Braintree 12 December 1803.

Source materials on Bocking

Hoffman, Ann. (1976) Bocking Deanery: The Story of an Essex Peculiar.

H. G. Wells, in his What Is Coming? A European Forecast (1916), in the fourth chapter, "Braintree, Bocking, and the Future of the World," uses the differences between Bocking and Braintree, divided, he says, by a single road, to explain the difficulties he expects in establishing World Peace through a World State.

“

If the curious enquirer will take pick and shovel he will find at any rate one corresponding dualism below the surface. He will find a Bocking water main supplying the houses on the north side and a Braintree water main supplying the south. I rather suspect that the drains are also in duplicate. The total population of Bocking and Braintree is probably little more than thirteen thousand souls altogether, but for that there are two water supplies, two sets of schools, two administrations. To the passing observer the rurality of the Bocking side is indistinguishable from the urbanity of the Braintree side; it is just a little muddier.

”

Efficiency, perhaps the supreme virtue for Wells (and others in the Fabian Society), meant someone in authority preventing waste and inefficiency at every level from water mains to wars. The difficulty of establishing it at the local level was a reflection of the difficulty of establishing it at the global level. In that same chapter he mentions his friend but ideological foe, G. K. Chesterton, who would have been delighted by those same local differences (particularly if it included the beer in the pubs) and whose 1904 novel, The Napoleon of Notting Hill, praises them. Wells wanted to end war by establishing an authority that could ban any difference between people that might lead to disagreements and perhaps war. Chesterton wanted to reduce the likelihood of war by reminding people that a healthy love for your country meant respecting the love others have for their country. In the December 31, 1910 issue of Illustrated London News he wrote:

“

You cannot make men enthusiastic for the mere negative idea of peace; it is not an inspiring thing. You might make them enthusiastic for some positive bond or quality that bound them to others and made their enemies their friends. You may get Tommy to love Jimmy; you cannot get Tommy to love the mere fact that he is not quarrelling with Jimmy. So it would be far easier to make an Englishman love Germany than to make him love peace with Germany. Germany is a lovable thing; peace is not. Germany is a positive thing; one can like its beer, admire its music, love its children, with their charming elf-tales and elf-customs, appreciate the beaming ceremony of its manners, and even (with a brave effort), tolerate the sound of its language. But in the mere image of a still and weaponless Europe there is nothing that men will ever love, either as they can love another country or as they can love their own.

”

Further reading

Published histories of Braintree & Bocking include:

• May Cunnington & Stephen Warner:'Braintree & Bocking'(1906);
• W. F. Quinn: A History of Braintree & Bocking (Lavenham Press, 1981);
• Michael Baker: The Book of Braintree & Bocking (Barracuda Books, 1981, Baron Books 1992);
• John Marriage: Braintree & Bocking A Pictorial History (Phillimore, 1994).

See also

• Blake House Craft Centre

External links

• Activ Braintree online guide for the Braintree Area
• Blackwater Valley Action Group
• Braintree & Bocking 2nd Scout Group
• Braintree and Bocking Carnival
• Braintree, Whitham and Halstead Care Trust
• braintree arts theatre
• Braintree Bowmen Archery Club
• Braintree District Council
• Braintree Rivers Rotary Club
• Braintree Sixth Form
• Braintree Theatre School
• Braintree Town Football Club
• Braintree Town Netball Club
• Enjoy Braintree District; places to stay, arts, museum, culture events
• Freeport Braintree website
• Friends of Bocking Blackwater group
• Lions Club of Braintree
• Notley High School
• Tabor Science College website
• The College at Braintree, Colchester Institute
• The daysoff Guide to Braintree
• Thisisessex
• Transport Strategy for North Essex
• Weather Forecast for Braintree

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