248
THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
Saints' Church, Ulting, the junction of the river Ter, the Paper Mill, Little
Baddow Mill, Sandford Mill, and Barnes Mill, Springfield, and concerning most
of these places the "Skipper" had a fund of information to communicate.
The first halt was made at a small eyot, where many river-side plants were
gathered in profusion, Dr. Taylor and Dr. Pearl affording information to those
unfamiliar with field botany.
At Beeleigh Lock the following paper was read :—
Notes on the History of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation.
By E. A. FITCH, F.L.S.; &c.
All our Essex rivers rise in the north-western portion of the county. This
somewhat peculiar physical feature is due to the outcrop of the chalk in that
district. A four-mile radius from Radwinter Church (near Saffron Walden)
includes the sources of the Blackwater, the Chelmer, the Stour, the Colne, and
the Cam. The Stort is reached in seven miles. With the exception of the Cam,
these Essex rivers take a southerly or south-easterly course, and are mostly con-
tained within the county.
The Blackwater rises at Crawney Wood, Debden, and to the north-west of
Wimbish Green, joined by two other brooks, or "burns," as it trends round
Radwinter Hill. It then flows through the Sampfords (the "Sandy" Ford) and
the Bardfield*, receiving many smaller tributaries in this district and Wethers-
field, and at Shalford (the "Shallow" Ford) is its first mill. Then on past
Panfield, which derives its name from the river Pant, to Bocking and Stisted.
The high road crosses it at Blackwater, thence to Coggeshall, and by Feering to
Kelvedon, where it is crossed by the railway a few yards before the railway
station, and by the high road over a single span bridge, with five small arches
for flood water, built in 1788. The old seven-arched bridge, now much dilapi-
dated, still remains, situated a short distance to the south-eastward. Morant
gives "Easterford" as an alias of Kelvedon, as in John Norden's map (1594),
and says "Easterford denotes the more eastern ford, which it is in regard to
Rivenhall water, now covered with a bridge, and to that at Wickham mills"
(Hist. of Essex, ii., 150). The river now turns sharply in a south-westwardly
direction, and flows past the Braxteds to Witham meads, the high road running
almost parallel with it, where it receives the important affluent known as Pod's
Brook, which is fifteen miles in length, and has five mills on its stream. The
Blackwater now passes below Wickham Bishops, through Langford (the "Long"
ford) nearly to Beeleigh Mill, which is on the Chelmer. It then flows parallel
with its sister river almost to Fullbridge, when it turns northwards and flows in
a semicircle round the Little Marsh and Potman Marsh, joining the common
estuary at Heybridge Creek, just at the back of Maldon East Railway Station,
a little more than half-way from Fullbridge to the Hythe, Maldon. The tide
flows up under the stone bridge (Heybridge High Bridge) to Heybridge Mill.
This bridge at the end of the Causeway was doubtless the one solitary bridge
over the river when the Chelmer only took the water from Beeleigh Mill, the
flood water going into the Blackwater channel; and even to-day in the old leases
of the Maldon wharf property it is described as on "the bank of Beeleigh Mill-
stream." Fullbridge was then a shallow ford ; now the tide rises about seven feet
at ordinary tides, and to ten feet at spring tides. The whole river is doubtless
a much cleaner cut channel than formerly.
The river Chelmer rises about two mil's to the north of Thaxted, less than
one mile south-east of the Blackwater, and these rivers almost join about one
and a half miles above their common estuary ; in fact they interchange their
waters here commonly in flood times. Running round Thaxted the Chelmer runs
through Tilty, where it receives a rather large but nameless brook on either side.
Between Great and Little Easton there is its first mill, and at this point its
channel is within a mile of the source of the Roding. Traversing Easton Park,
through Church End, Dunmow, the silvery streak approaches almost to Felstead
where it receives the Stebbing brook, on which are two mills, through the