MESSING
KELLY'S DIRECTORY OF ESSEX 1933
MESSING, anciently written “Messinges,” and “Methings," is a village and parish on the northern borders of Tiptree Heath, part of which was within this parish, 2½ miles east from Kelvedon station on the main line of the London and North Eastern railway, 5 south east from Coggeshall, 9 south-west from Colchester and 45 from London, in the Colchester division of the county, Lexden hundred, Witham petty sessional division, Lexden and Winstree rural district, Colchester, Clacton and Halstead joint county court district, rural deanery of Witham, archdeaconry of Colchester and Chelmsford diocese. The church of All Saints is an ancient building of flint with stone dressings, in mixed styles, and consists of chancel, nave, transept, and an embattled western tower (built about 1830 by the Rt. Rev. Robert Eden, Bishop of Moray and Ross, once a curate of this parish, in memory of a Mr. Griggs, a former squire of the parish) of red brick, containing a clock and bells: the chancel is lined with oak panelling of the time of James I. and has a restored piscina: the oak panelling was restored by the Earl of Verulam in 1897, and is believed to have been originally the panelling in the old hall: the east window is filled with stained glass, supposed to be by Van Linge: an effigy of wood, assumed to represent Sir William de Messing, founder of the church, formerly occupied a recessed arch in the north wall, but has been unfortunately destroyed: there remains the brass figure of a lady, date c. 1530, the inscription of which is missing; and an inscription only to John Porter, yeoman, ob. April 29th, 1600: the font is finely carved: in 1897 a chiming apparatus was attached to the bells in commemoration of the Diamond Jubilee of Her Majesty Queen Victoria: 180 sittings in this church are free ; outside the church there is a fine Celtic cross, inscribed with names of the men of the parish who gave their lives in the Great War, 1914-18. The register dates from the year 1558. The living is a vicarage, net yearly value with residence, in the gift of the Earl of Verulam, and held since 1921 by the Rev. William Goldsborough Whittam M.A. of Cains College, Cambridge, hon. C.F. Here is a Congregational chapel, erected in 1864, and a Salvation Army hall erected in 1906, seating 140 persons. The charities consist of 40s to the poor, to be given about the 26th of April, and 40s left by Handmeek Chibborne for a sermon on "Mortality," to be preached anually about same date, being the anniversary of his death; he was a great benefactor to the church, and presented the communion plate, the stained east window and the antique candlesticks. "Messing" is supposed by antiquaries to be derived from Saxon words signifying “The Great Cow Pasture.” while an alternative spelling "Methings" is said to mean "The Field of Trampling," on account of a bloody engagement fought here between Queen Boadicea and the Romans; a large farm called "Harborough Hall" probably took its name from being the site of the encampment; curious Roman jars have occasionally been dug up. There was formerly a family seat belonging to the Luckyns, through whom, from the Chibborne family, the property came to the Earl of Verulam. Messing Park, the property and residence of Capt. John E. C. Eaton M.A., D.L. is pleasantly situated in a park of 110 acres a short distance from the village. John Edward Newman Sherwood esq. J.P. is lord of the manor and principal landowner. The soil is gravel and clay; subsoil, the same. The chief crops are wheat, beans and barley. The area is 2,615 acres; the population in 1931 was 929 in the civil parish, and of the ecclesiastical parish in 1921, 648. By Local Government Board Order 22,363, March 24 1889, a detached part of Great Wigborough, known as Squashes Corner, was transferred to this parish, and by the same order a detached part of Messing was added to Inworth for civil purposes
Post & Tel. Call Office. Letters from Kelvedon, Essex. The nearest M. O. & P. office is at Tiptree
Carrier to Colchester.—Turney, from Tiptree, passes through daily, except thurs
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