FAIRSTED
The Imperial Gazetteer of England & Wales...., by John Marius Wilson. circa 1866
FAIRSTED, a parish in Witham district, Essex; 2¼ miles SW of White Notley r. station, and 4 WNW of Witham. Post-town, White Notley, under Witham. Acres, 1,853. Real property, £2,620. Pop., 351. Houses, 70. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Rochester. Value, £424. Patron, the Bishop of Rochester. The church is ancient.
Transcribed by Noel Clark
KELLY'S DIRECTORY OF ESSEX 1933
FAIRSTED (or Fairstead) is an undulating parish, about 3 miles east of the road from Chelmsford to Braintree, 4 miles north-west from Witham. station on the L. and N. Eastern railway, 3 miles south-west from White Notley station on the Witham and Braintree branch, and 3 north-west from Hatfield Peverel station on the London and North Eastern railway, 6 south from Braintree, 9 north from Chelmsford, in the Maldon division of the county, Witham hundred and petty sessional division, Braintree rural district, Braintree and Dunmow county court district, rural deanery of Witham, archdeaconry of Colchester and Chelmsford diocese. The church of St. Mary and St. Peter is an ancient building of flint, in the Norman style, consisting of chancel, nave, north porch and a western tower with lofty shingled spire, containing 4 bells, one of which is of pre-Reformation date: the spire was reshingled and repaired in 1913, at a cost of £235: on the chancel wall is a monumental slab to Joshua Blowers, rector of this church in 1656, and Elizabeth, his second wife: the chancel, which is entered from the nave by a fine brick arch of early date, retains piscina and sedilia; and there is a very ancient, oaken chest, about 9 feet long and 2 feet wide, cut out of solid timber and bound with iron; the oak benches of the nave, carved with the linen pattern, are of the 16th century: there are traces of a rood loft: the chancel was restored in 1881: in 1888 a pulpit of caned oak was erected as a memorial to the Rev. Richard Marsh White, a former rector: in 1890 the nave and tower were completely restored, the western gallery removed and the tower arch opened; during the restoration various mural paintings were discovered, including, over the chancel arch (1) Our Lord’s Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, (2) The Last Supper, (3) The Betrayal, (4) Our Lord being crowned with thorns, (5) Incidents on the way to Calvary: the wall at the south-east corner is in scribed with a “Bidding Prayer” for James I.: there are 120 sittings. The register dates from the year 1538. The living is a rectory, with the vicarage of Terling annexed, joint net yearly value £761, in the gift of Lord Rayleigh, and held since 1933 by the Rev. Arthur Sumner Wetherall M.A. of Keble College, Oxford, who resides at Terling. The rectors of this parish can he traced to the year 1390. The poor have the interest of £200, bequeathed in the year 1828 by Mr. James Carter, now invested in the 2 ½ per Cents in the names of the Charity Trustees, and producing £5 for coals or blankets, distributed in Christmas week. Warley Hall, now a farm house, was formerly moated, and according to tradition had an attached chapel, called “Lady Wydelin’s Chapel.” The principal land owners are Lord Rayleigh, who is lord of the manor, Lt.-Col. A. Vickers and Philip Hutley esq. J.P. The soil is mixed; subsoil, clay and gravel. The chief crops are wheat, barley, turnips, peas and beans. The area is 1,963 acres; the population in 1931 was 269 in the civil and of the ecclesiastical parish in 1921, 262
FULLER STREET is a hamlet, 4 miles west of the church. RANKS GREEN is 2 miles north.
Letters through Chelmsford. The nearest M. O. & T. office is at Terling