Welcome to this website about the community of Chrishall in Essex.
Chrishall is a small village on a hilltop in the very north west of Essex, close to the borders of Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire, in the East of England. This website is particularly aimed at the local community and the genealogist who perhaps has never visited Chrishall and wishes to visualise the kind of community whence his or her ancestor came. It is run by…
“I stumbled accidentally across some aspects of its history, and began to learn and think more about it, but then – as I studied the records – people began to rise up out of them. Where before I had seen only names on lists, individual characters began to shake their shoulders and stand up. It was as though these dead were being awakened, resurrected. They seemed close, as though they had something to say.”
(quote from In a Country Churchyard by Ronald Fletcher. Although this quote refers to Westleton in Suffolk, we hope you come to feel the same about Chrishall charcters and history.)
Jubilee Celebrations!
Jubilee Celebrations!Chrishall Archive will be celebrating the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee with an exhibition, launching some new village history walks and raffling a delicious hamper of goodies.
Do call in and see us.
2022 Opening Times
2022 Opening TimesWe will be opening Chrishall Archive on the following dates. Do call in for a chat and we might even rustle up a cup of tea and a biscuit if you’re lucky!
Recent updates to existing content:
- March 2022:
- February 2022:
- Keepers Cottage with some memories
- Update and more information on Church Road Garage
- December 2021: updates to the following:
Ethel Fanny Everett
Above is Mullion Cottage at the top of Church Road as you might not have seen it before. Mullion used to be two cottages with a shop in the middle. The shop at the time of this photograph was Hicks’ Butchers, and the Hicks family lived in the cottage on the right of...
A Poor Law Cupid
This lovely news story was found in The Daily News, Perth and published on 26 November 1903. Two disappointed lovers brought together In September last an old lady, accompanied by her daughter, called at the house of the relieving officer at Saffron Walden, England,...
Church Road Garage
The cottage, now called The Gate, was for many years the village garage. It gets it’s current name because it was originally one of the several public houses or ‘beerhousees’ in the village. We know this unfortunately because there was a murder there in 1900. However...
Music in the Church
Before the Church had an organ, singing was accompanied by William Cranwell on clarinet, and two of his brothers, John on the bass viol and Clear on the viola or violin.
Pictured left is the little stool that William used to sit on to play his clarinet.
Spooky Tales
Spooky tales? It seems that Chrishall was the place that MR James based his ghost story “The Story of a Disappearance and an Appearance”, according to several sources including this one. A copy can be purchased from Amazon if you are feeling brave!
