h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It's not all white stilettos and footballers' wives - so who can tell us more about the history, culture and unique character of Essex?

Paully

Typical, as soon as I move away from it you start researching it, cuh.

In the south east, on the east coast of England, in the west of East Anglia, Essex is the county of the East Saxons. It borders on the east side of Greater London - the borough of Havering - the M25 marks this border, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Suffolk (the river Stour forms part of the border), and on the other side of the Thames that marks the south border of the county is Kent (A667839). On the east side is the English Channel and North Sea.

Interesting towns

Colchester, oldest recorded town A1066510
Chelmsford A844995
Harwich - port on the north sea A550838
Manningtree - England's smallest town (with Mistley has the notorious Mathew Hopkirk (witchfinder general) as a resident, now dead in a forgotten grave somewhere, previously burning witches on the word of children)
Southend
Walton on the Naze, suffers from erosion from the sea
Tilbury - port on the Thames Estuary - you can see Kent from here! Still has some of its defences from WW2
Chipping Ongar - defined as " The disgust and embarrassment (or 'ongar') felt by an observer in the presence of a person festooned with kirbies (q.v.) when they don't know them well enough to tell them to wipe them off, invariably this 'ongar' is accompanied by an involuntary staccato twitching of the leg (or 'chipping')" in DNA's 'Meaning of Liff'. Is also known for Greensted Church, the oldest wooden church in the world. - nearly one thousand years old.
Stansted - home to an airport, cunningly called 'London Stanstead' despite being at least 30 miles from anywhere useful in London. A778160

I will probably add some more stuff at some point. Maybe... Epping Forest for example...

Best things to come out of Essex - Billy Bragg, Phill Jupitus, and Tiptree Preserves!

And me!

And me, of course.

http://www.thisisessex.co.uk/ - a website dedicated to the *cough*hole*cough* I came from.

More interesting though is the Peasants' Revolt of 1381, which started in Essex. Wat Tyler and John Ball led the peasants in their revolt which started in Brentwood, Essex and quickly spread throughout the whole county and down to Kent. Though they failed to get the poll tax revoked, no-one did it again until Henry VII.

During the Spanish Armada invasion Essex held a strong garrison manned by 12,000 at Tilbury. It is here that Queen Elizabeth made her famous speech describing her as having the appearance of a woman but the heart of a King. This defeat has often been seen as Spain's last great stand and the beginning of England as a worthy world empire.

Earl of Essex, Robert Devereux was the last traitor to be hung at Tower of London in 1565. Born in Wanstead, he was given the post of controlling Ireland but came back to England in order to pursue a job he had lusted after for many a year. He was put under house arrest for the crime and later refused to come to court, he tried to lead a rebellion against the government for 12 hours but was eventually caught and hung on a specially crafted platform in 1601.

Essex's crest was instated only in 1932 but has been used as a sign of Essex since probably the 1500s. It depicts three seaxes, a short sword used by Saxons (seeing as Essex means Land of the East Saxons - as I found out today in Eng lang lecture) but there is much debate whether they were curved, like in the crest, and if they contain the notches that are on the crest.

There is a cricket green in Woodford Green that I've heard is the oldest in the country, which would explain its procarious position next to a dual carrageway - they probably cannot get rid of it anymore. I don't know how true this is though.

Home to Essex Girls A5547080 (soon to be part of the EG)

Also the only place that links famed Celtic Queen and original girl power promoter, Boadicea, with the infamous highway man Dick Turpin in Epping Forest. A popular hold for both of them.

One of Essex's political constituencies is Woodford which was the borough of PM Sir Winston Churchill and failed Opposition leader Iain Duncan Smith

About all I can muster for the time being.

Oh yeah and in Essex was born Anthony Beckingham, someone who is gonna be very very famous one day, I just don't know how yet :p

Also I've heard the University of Essex (http://www.essex.ac.uk) is home to the highest suicide rate of all British universities, possibly due to that suspiciously tall tower and the vast amounts of grey decor. I don't know how true this statistic is though.

Woodford Green isn't in Essex these days.

Epping forest - A531974

"Manningtree - England's smallest town" Just found out this is only true if you count the area above the high tide mark.

Loads of fantastic facts and figures here! Keep 'em coming!



Paully

Mersea Island - A810127

Agree on the Tiptree Jams front http://www.tiptree.com/

Colchester has the Greensted Roundabout, the original magic roundabout, the road kind that is.

Erm, sure there is loads more.....

There's another of those roundabouts on the way to Canvey Island too.

Canvey Island? *shudders*

How's this all going then, everyone?

Paully

You want more?

No, not more - but it'd be lovely to see somebody having a go at writing this up into a full entry!

Paully

*checks very busy diary* I could pencil you in for December?

I'd love to have a stab and represent my county with pride but I don't feel I know it enough, I'm only familiar with the side thats near enough London. I don't think theres enough information to go on here to do the whole article.

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Noyt2Miset/Frop. Hasoc, the beauty of this sort of entry is that it doesn't matter if you don't know loads - other people will also know a little, and it can all be added up to make one entry.

If you could write some of the info that you do know here, then when someone gets round to turning it into the entry, every little helps.