Some Essex elephants
Bill George 11 Sterry Road, Barking. Essex 1G11 9SJ William-george@lineone.net
Background:
Essex is an important county for elephant remains for several reasons. Firstly, one of the
earliest accounts of a UK fossil vertebrate is from Walton-on-the-Naze. This was re-
corded some 800 years ago! Secondly, one of the first mastodons found came from
Harwich beach in 1811. Thirdly, Ilford is one of the richest sites for elephant remains in
this country. This short note aims to give a brief indication of some of these early finds,
explain their occurrence, the species found, their date and location.
Some Early Finds:
There are numerous accounts of elephant remains being found in Essex. Unfortunately
it is not always possible to say if these are finds of elephants or mammoths. Accordingly
the table below should be used with caution. Some references are even vaguer and
rather quaint. For example the chronicler Ralph, who was Abbot of Coggeshall, 1207-
1218 wrote "In the time of King Richard, on the sea shore, in a village called Edulfmesses
[Walton] were found two teeth of a giant, of such prodigious bigness, that two hundred
of such teeth as men have now a daies might be cut out of one of them. These I saw at
Cogshal, and handled with great admiration" (Wymer 1985 p. 259; George 1997a p. 3).
More "giant's bones" were found at Walton at the beginning of the reign (1558-1603) of
Queen Elizabeth (Camden 1695 p. 351). 150 years later, in more enlightened times, the
"learned and ingenious" alchemist, the Reverend Robert Rich procured at Wrabness
upon the River Stour, in the summer of 1701, and sent to Mr. John Lufkin. apothecary,
of Colchester "diverse bones of an extraordinary bigness, which were found at fifteen or
sixteen foot beneath the surface of the earth, in digging for gravel to mend the roads
with". Lufkin identified them as elephant bones and concurred with Joshua Childrey,
who earlier concluded such remains were "buryed by their loving masters the Romans"
(Lufkin 1701 p. 924; George 1997b). Peter Collinson informed the Gentleman's Maga-
zine for May 1757 " From Mersey Island, in Essex, were sent me a large grinder, and
part of a thigh-bone; these were found with the entire [elephant] skeleton, which was
destroyed by the country people". The great Essex County Historian, Philip Morant,
had no hesitation in attributing elephant remains from Harwich, Walton and Wrabness
to the Roman period. In fact, he declared they arrived in this country in AD 43 as part of
the emperor Claudius's invasion force (Morant 1768 Vol. 1 p. 502). Further elephant
remains were collected from Walton in 1803 and 1805 (George 1997a pp. 3-4). Parkinson
(1811 pp. 335-336) records that Dr. Henry Menish acquired a mastodon tooth from the
beach at Harwich, which had been washed out of the Pliocene Red Crag. Many finds of
elephant remains were attributed to the action of the Biblical flood until the 1820s.
Many elephant specimens were collected from Ilford and Grays in the nineteenth cen-
tury. One of the Essex Field Club's first publications was an amusing paper by Henry
Walker entitled "A Day's Elephant Hunting in Essex". This was based on a lecture he
had given to the Club on 29* May 1880 (Walker 1881). In the twentieth century fine
8 Essex Field Club Newsletter No. 52, January 2007