order. Bruhl, a few months after his second presentment for hedging and ditching, was
presented for felling an oak pollard and four other trees adjoining his land on the edge of
Lords Bushes, but apparently again no order was made (22).
The most insidious threat at this time, not only to Lords Bushes but to the whole of
Epping Forest, were the enclosures, and presentments for this offence figure heavily in
the court records in the nineteenth century (22). The courts themselves virtually
surrendered to the enclosures by passing a resolution that they would not interfere with
small encroachments on the sides of public roads, or lanes, or in any other places within
the legal boundaries of the Forest where the deer did not usually depasture, but that
encroachments without the consent of the Lord of the manor or where deer usually
depastured were to be thrown open. Lords Bushes in the eighteenth and nineteenth
century illustrates well this relaxed attitude towards enclosure.
In 1779, Thomas Nicholson, publican of the Bald Faced Stag, was presented before
the court for enclosing a piece of ground from the Forest (probably near the junction of
what is now Knighton Lane and the High Road) and he was ordered to throw down the
enclosure by the court. Obviously he failed to do so for six years later in 1785 and again
in 1786 he was ordered to throw down the enclosure, finally doing so on his fourth
presentment late in 1786; but a further complication had arisen for Thomas Priest, a
blacksmith, had built his Smithy Shop on the site enclosed by Nicholson and he in 1787
was ordered to take down the Smiths shop. Yet again the limited power of the court is
illustrated by Thomas Priest (still a blacksmith) appearing in court in 1800 where it is
recorded that he "do continue the inclosure of ground" this time 60 rods of land from
Lords Bushes upon which he had built a cottage, nothing obviously came of further
orders to disenclose for in 1803 the court decided thet Priest could lawfully continue the
enclosure of ground, the enclosures not being considered "prejudicial to his majesties
vert and venison" (22).
There were other encroachments in Lords Bushes at this time, mainly in the north
west corner. Land now occupied by houses, bungalows, the ambulance station, the
cottage (which was to become the cottage hospital in 1868), Buckhurst Hill House, Holly
House (now a private hospital) and Knighton Lane itself are all built on land that once
was part of Lords Bushes (further evidence of this is provided by the oak and hornbean
pollards which protrude from the pavement along Knighton Lane!).
In 1843, John Hatherhill, Keeper of the Loughton Walk, recorded numerous minor
enclosures around the Bald Faced Stag but also more substantial ones of 5, 31/2 and 1
acres (22). Overall probably in excess of 16 acres were lost to the enclosures from Lords
Bushes, we know this because today, its area is approximately 92 acres, while in 1797 the
property of James Hatch of Chigwell was assessed (22), including Lords (then Lodge)
Bushes and was found to have an area of 108 acres — assuming the same unit of
measurement was used (and used accurately) it thus seems likely that at least 16 acres
were lost.
The Buckhurst Hill we see today, centred on Queens Road, was farmland in the
early 1800's, with just the Bald Faced Stag, Kings Place, Monkhams Farm and the odd
cottage as the only habitations. The extension of the Great Eastern Railway from
Woodford to Loughton in 1856 preceded the rapid development of this area as a London
suburb (71). First Queens and Princes Roads were developed but it was not until the
1930's that Forest Edge, Broadfield Way and part of the Knighton Estate were built on,
effectively making Lords Bushes and Knighton Wood a suburban island of woodland.
The house I an now writing this essay in was part of the mid-Victorian development
of Buckhurst Hill; built probably in 1864 on land enclosed from Lords Bushes by the
Lord of the manor of Chigwell, James Mills, who had "purchased" the Forestal rights
from the Crown in 1858 (71). The land was "enclosed with other parts of such waste [i.e.
Lords Bushes] by said J. Mills as Lord of the said manor with the consent of the Homage
according to the Custom of said manor", so reads the Abstract of title. James Mills had
probably instituted the manorial Court Customary in order to make it appear the
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