The Essex Churches Site

 

THE ESSEX CHURCHES SITE

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St Andrew, Boreham

Boreham

Boreham Boreham
Our Days on Earth are as a Shadow MCMIX Boreham processional way

  Boreham is suburban Chelmsford, a bit that's floated off but still involving a twenty minute bike ride from Chelmsford station through rush hour traffic and then the tangle of the A130 and A12. Fortunately, Chelmsford is well-served for cycle lanes, and soon I was in the old village centre of Boreham, below the old London road. St Andrew is a big church with aisles, a central tower and chancel transepts. The interior feels very urban, but the central tower and crossing are Norman, and on the west side you can see the outline of the Saxon tower arch, as if this were a huge version of Newton-by-Castle Acre in Norfolk.

This was the church of the Earls of Sussex, and three of them lie in full armour in the south chancel transept. There are some good 19th Century memorials, too. As at a number of churches today there were people around, perhaps because it was Holy Week, and I was reminded again of quite how friendly most Essex people are. The younger women call you 'darlin' with customary ease, and older people always want to have a chat. It makes travelling in unfamiliar places a pleasure.

I now set off into the gently rolling meadows of the Chelmer and Blackwater through Little Baddow, towards Woodham Walter and Maldon beyond.

Simon Knott, April 2018

                

looking west through crossing chancel sanctuary ghost of Saxon tower arch (looking east)
Earls of Sussex Earls of Sussex ape in a hat (16th Century)
an ape in a hat (16th Century) Earls of Sussex ape in a hat (16th Century)
west window (from top): Old Testament Prophets; angels; Christ the Good Shepherd with the four Evangelists; post-Ascension visions (Lavers, Barraud & Westlake) Blessed Virgin and child appear in a vision to St John (Lavers, Barraud & Westlake) St Luke with a portrait of the Blessed Virgin and child (Lavers, Barraud & Westlake) dirty Annunciation
to perpetuate the memory of the best of mothers aumbry and banner font
one of her majesty's counsel, recorder of Aldborough and a bencher at Lincoln's Inn died on board HMS Dunedin, buried in the British cemetery, Danzig are deposited the remains
after a very painful illness war memorial Holy Trinity shield (19th Century)

the Boreham dead Priest, Poet, Historian

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Norfolk churches - Suffolk churches
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