Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for BOREHAM

BOREHAM, a village and a parish in Chelmsford district, Essex. The village stands on the river Chelmer, near the Eastern Counties railway, 3 ½ miles NE of Chelmsford; and it has a post office under Chelmsford, and was once a market-town.—The parish comprises 3,739 acres. Real property, £7,002. Pop., 989. Houses, 186. The property is divided among a few. Boreham House is the seat of Sir J. T. Tyrell, Bart. Newhall belonged to Waltham Abbey; and passed to the Shardelowes, the Butlers, the Boleyns, Henry VIII., the Ratcliffes, the Villierses, Cromwell, Monk, the Cavendishes, and Olmius Lord Waltham. A mansion on it was built by the Butlers in the time of Henry VII.; inhabited by the Princess Mary, the Duke of Buckingham, Cromwell, and Monk; and demolished, all except the great hall, by Lord Waltham. The hall is now a chapel, 96 feet by 50, retaining the arms of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth; and a convent is connected with it, first occupied by nuns who fled from Liege at the first French revolution, and used as a seminary for Roman Catholic ladies. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Rochester. Value, £432.* Patron, the Bishop of Rochester. The church has a square Norman tower; contains tombs of the Ratcliffes, Earls of Sussex; and is good. The churchyard contains a mausoleum of the Walthams, after the model of the Temple of the Winds. There are national schools, Butler's charity school with £156 a year, and other charities with £13.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a village and a parish"   (ADL Feature Type: "populated places")
Administrative units: Boreham AP/CP       Chelmsford RegD/PLU       Essex AncC
Place: Boreham

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