Site of medieval church, Church Of St Michael The Archangel, Woodham Walter Hall (EHER 81852)

Now destroyed. Possible site of the documented medieval Church of St Michael, demolished in around 1563; a 13th-century grave cover has been found nearby. The church has been erroneously claimed as dedicated to St Nicholas. The site was previously thought to have been also that of an alleged deserted medieval settlement.

Autumn 1990. Fieldwalking survey. In the autumn of 1986 a large piece of carved stone was found on the edge of the field west of the ruins and was identified as a medieval grave cover. Two years later it was recognised as being from the Barnack School of grave cover production and later 12th or 13th century in date. A second section was discovered and both pieces have been deposited in the Chelmsford and Essex Museum. This discovery pinpointed the field to the west of the earthworks (EHER 7781) as being the probable site of the old church. In the autumn of 1990 a fieldwalking survey was carried out in order to find its exact location. Three concentrations of material were discovered. An aerial photograph, which shows a rectangular cropmark with an east/west axis and length twice that of its breadth in the position of one of the concentrations is further evidence for the identification of this as the site of the old church of Woodham Walter (see also EHER 7986). <1> NRHE data transfer: Woodham Walter: possible deserted medieval village site. The site of the medieval church, demolished in around 1563, is said to lie 150 yards to the north. <2> The present church of St Michael at Woodham Walter (EHER 39095) was built in 1562-1564 to replace an earlier structure which was in a depopulated part of the parish. The earlier church, St Nicholas', lay just to the north of the Hall (EHER 7781) behind 'The Wilderness Cottage' (EHER 7783). <3> The site of the medieval church of Woodham Walter is believed to lie within the grounds of the Hall, and part of a medieval coffin lid was seen at the edge of the moat at the time of survey. A licence to build a new church was obtained in 1562 and some of the material from the old church was probably re-used in it. <4> <5> Published account of the decorated grave slab, plus a discussion of the site of the church. The slab is probably 13th century, and is likely to have derived either from the documented medieval church or its graveyard, demolished in 1562 when Thomas Ratcliffe, 3rd Earl of Sussex, was authorised by Elizabeth I to pull down the church at Woodham Walter and to rebuild it nearer the village (EHER 39095). The church is likely to have stood at TL 8120 0639, on a building platform identified during the RCHME 1988 survey (contra grid reference given by <6>). Further fieldwalking following deep ploughing of the site in autumn 1990 revealed a scatter of building stone and other material centred on TL 8120 0638, and an aerial photograph (<7>) shows a rectangular cropmark with an east-west axis and length twice that of its breadth at this same location. Although it is claimed that the church was dedicated to St Nicholas, this arises from a mistake in a 15th century will; other late medieval documents show that the church was in fact dedicated to St Michael the Archangel. The fragments of grave slab are in Chelmsford Museum, Accession nos: CHMER 1988:170 and 1991:12. <8> October 1976. Field survey. No indication of medieval desertion was visible in the area of the grid reference given above. From the description in her letter, Mrs Sellers refers to a medieval building site at TL 8090 0680 lying 140.0m north of Woodham Walter Church. The site falls in Church Field (<9>) and is now marked by a dense scatter of medieval peg tile within an area of dark earth about 20m in diameter. No indication was found to suggest the site of an earlier church, and no further trace of medieval desertion was found in this area. <10> February 1988. Field survey. The grid reference supplied by <4> falls at the east end of a large complex of formal garden earthworks associated, and contemporary, with the 16th century Woodham Walter Hall (EHER 7781). These may have been misinterpreted. The medieval coffin lid referred to by <3> is a decorated, roughly 13th century, Barnack limestone grave slab (now stored in an outhouse adjacent to Falconers Lodge, EHER 7783); this was ploughed out from the field immediately west of the Hall site (<6>). Further fragments of limestone are visible in the ploughsoil on a level, artificial E-W terrace in this field at TL 8200 0639 along with a concentration of stone, brick, decorated tile fragments, peg tile and pottery; very reduced earthworks on this terrace are indicative of a rectangular building measuring approximately 25m by 12m with its longest axis E-W. There is no direct evidence to indicate this is the site of the early church and may conceivably be the site of a detached building associated with Woodham Walter Hall. <11> <12> See also <13> - <16>.