THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB. 211
RAMBLE IN THE LAMBOURNE, HAINAULT FOREST
AND CHIGWELL DISTRICT (760TH MEETING).
SATURDAY, 2ND MAY, 1936.
A very pleasant meeting in the above countryside was attended by
some forty-five members and conducted by the Hon. Excursions Secretary.
Assembled at Abridge at half-past ten o'clock on a fine though sunless
morning, the party was met by the Rev. A. F. Gardiner, vicar of Lam-
bourne, and led by him by field path to the parish church of St. Mary
and all Saints, where his interesting description of the fabric, its architec-
tural history and its associations, was listened to with attention. Mr.
Gardiner has made the church his profound study during his incumbency,
and the thanks of the party, voiced by the Hon. Secretary on leaving,
were sincere and merited.
From the church a walk through the fields brought the party to
Lambourne End, and thence a bridle path led to the lower, northern end
of Hainault Forest, which was traversed from end to end. Lunch was
taken in the Forest, whilst watching the birds, chiefly willow-warblers
and chaffinches, fitting from tree to tree about us, anxious but not
daring to approach near enough to seize the crumbs thrown to them.
Leaving the Forest at its southern end, Chigwell Row was reached,
and thence a lane brought the visitors to Pettitt's Hall, the home of our
member, Mr. D. Lloyd Howard. The house is quite a recent erection,
but the gardens were kindly thrown open to the party and a pleasant
half hour was spent in inspecting the flowering shrubs and trees, now at
their best, and in admiring the charming views obtained from here over
the Roding valley to the Epping Forest ridge.
A further walk across the fields brought us to Rolls Park, which was
inspected by kind permission of the tenant, Mr. Spearman. The "Harvey
Room" has its walls arranged in a number of square and oval panels,
framed in richly ornamented plaster, each panel containing an oil portrait
of some bygone member of the celebrated family which owned the
mansion from the early seventeenth century down to the present time.
To the visitors assembled in this historic room our member, Dr. Curnock,
read a highly interesting account of the individuals portrayed. He
said :—
Rolls is of very great interest as being for over two hundred years the
home of members of the Harvey family. It was built about 1600 for
Eliab Harvey, a younger brother of William Harvey, the discoverer of
the circulation of the blood. The house passed through the hands of the
descendants of Eliab Harvey down to Admiral Sir Eliab Harvey, G.C.B.,
who died in 1830. With him the male line of the family of Harvey
became extinct. Admiral Harvey had a daughter, Louisa, who married
William Lloyd, of Aston.
Lieut.-General Sir Francis Lloyd, G.C.B., a descendant, lived here until
his death a few years ago, and his wife, Lady Lloyd, lived here until
within the last year or two.
The house is of two storeys with attics, the walls are partly timber-
framed and partly of brick, and the roofs are tiled. The kitchen block
in the middle of the house was built c. 1600, and late in the seventeenth