The woodland flora of the Forest of Writtle and surrounding area
examples separate Birch Spring (Highwood) from College Wood (Fryerning) and Furness Wood
(Coptfold) from Writtle Park land now occupied by Writtle Park Wood and Hockley Shaw. Visitors
to Stoneymore will find it crisscrossed with woodbanks as at one time it was split into two, namely
Great and Little Stoneymore (formerly Handley) Woods. Where the woods abut both Mill Green
Common and - according to an estate map of 1600-01 - 'the reserved 'way1 leading, by freelandes,
towards Monkes' there are two parallel woodbanks, which in places are as little as 5-10 yards
apart. The area between was presumably the original 'way1 referred to above. Alternatively, the
outer bank could represent a later encroachment onto the adjoining 'freelances' and common but I
find it hard to believe that such an enormous amount of work would have been contemplated for so
little gain. There is nothing quite like the contemplation of a woodbank for creating empathy with
the workers of the past.
An aspect of the Forest in medieval times that does not pertain today is the number of Beeches,
particularly Beech pollards, that were present at that period. This species is no longer native to the
area but in the fourteenth century it was evidently one of the commonest trees in both parks and
possibly elsewhere as well. 119 beeches were pollarded in 1397-98, realising the grand sum of two
pounds sixteen shillings and six pence, and smaller numbers in other years (Rackham 1989 p. 79-
80). Wood from these and other pollards was to remain an important source of income until the end
of the eighteenth century as there is a record of 625 pollards "fall'd off Edney Common" in 1794
(Rackham 1989 p.79-80). but this practise was already becoming unfashionable and the numbers
fell into steady decline thereafter. The Chapman and Andre map of 1777 shows that the western
two-thirds of Writtle Park had already been converted to farmland and most of the trees felled.
Today there are few pollarded trees remaining in any of the area's woodlands, apart from Horsfrith,
but Pedunculate Oak, Ash and Horbeam pollards are still fairly common in adjacent hedgerows.
Even here, though, they arc no longer managed properly and arc becoming increasingly top heavy,
a few each year being toppled by winter gales or dying either of old age or drought. A retired farm
worker told me several years ago that a few beech pollards were still present in the park until the
1914-1918 war but I have been unable to confirm this. Sadly, the remaining mature standards (most
of which appear to have been planted for ornament) nearly all succumbed to drought in the 1990s.
Although pollarding was the preferred method of harvesting in the medieval period there are also,
according to Oliver Rackham, frequent records relating to the sale of both standard trees (including
36 ashes felled in Horsfrith for making hoops in 1406-07), under-wood - including 6.3 acres in
Horsfrith in 1397-98 - (Rackham 1989 p.79-80) branch-wood and wood from storm damaged
trees. Avesage (a tax on pigs) was raised on 327 swine at Writtle in 1397 but many other people
seem to have allowed their pigs to forage for acorns and beechmast illegally each autumn - when
there was mast available - and the combined effects of four hundred or more rooting snouts would
doubtless have had a considerable impact (at least partially beneficial) on the woodland flora at
that time. Clay was also dug commercially and there arc a number of old pits in Parson's Spring,
while at Mill Green Common it was able to support a thriving pottery at nearby Potters' Row Farm
for several centuries.
With the arrival of the Petres in the sixteenth century records become increasingly more detailed
and there are reports of some major transactions, including the felling of 1500 timber trees in 1639
and the sale of between 6800 and 8500 cubic feet of timber from Coppice Spring in 1802 (Rackham
1990). William, the fourth Baron Petre, got into trouble during the Civil War (he supported the
wrong side) but escaped with his head intact, being fined three thousand pounds instead, to be
raised by the sale of under-wood and decayed trees. He subsequently complained that the
Parliamentary Commissioner in charge of this work was over enthusiastic, implying that a sum
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Essex Naturalist (New Series) 20 (2003)