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| Contents | Page |
|---|---|
| Map of Witham | 4 |
| Acknowledgements | 5 |
| Map of Witham’s surroundings | 6 |
| Introduction | 7 |
| Chapter 1. Early days | 8 |
| Anglo Saxons | 9 |
| The burh | 10 |
| The parish | 12 |
| The Knights Templar | 14 |
| The new town | 15 |
| More changes | 16 |
| The Knights Hospitaller | 17 |
| Everyday life in the 1400s | 17 |
| Chapter 2. Tudor and Stuart Witham | 20 |
| Christopher Raven | 20 |
| The Dissolution of religious houses | 20 |
| Making woollen cloth | 21 |
| Puritans | 23 |
| The Civil War, 1642-1651 | 25 |
| The Restoration of Charles II, 1660 | 25 |
| Everyday life in the 1600s | 27 |
| Chapter 3. 1700-1815. ‘A good handsome town’ | 29 |
| The best gentry and their mansions | 29 |
| The lesser gentry and the military | 31 |
| The Pattissons | 32 |
| The Clergymen | 33 |
| Dissenters | 35 |
| Schools | 36 |
| Witham Spa and social life | 37 |
| The Great Essex Road | 39 |
| Cider, clocks and surgeons | 42 |
| Rebuilding Witham | 45 |
| Manufacturing and farming | 46 |
| The poor | 48 |
| The French Wars, 1793-1815: the poor | 51 |
| The French Wars, 1793-1815: the wars | 52 |
| Chapter 4. 1815-1901. ‘A radical place’ or ‘a respectable little town’? | 54 |
| The Witham Fires, 1828-1829 | 55 |
| The poor before 1834 | 57 |
| The Union Workhouse and the poor after 1834 | 58 |
| The railway, 1840s | 62 |
| The telegraph | 65 |
| Tanning, gas and coke, and brushes and drills | 65 |
| Farming | 68 |
| Peculiars, Congregationalists and the like | 70 |
| William Henry Pattisson | 72 |
| The Church of England and the Reverend John Bramson | 73 |
| Catholics | 75 |
| Charity and self-help | 76 |
| Chartists and reformers | 77 |
| Respectable mid-Victorian life | 78 |
| Jacob Howell Pattisson | 80 |
| The Empire and foreign parts | 81 |
| Water, drains and health | 83 |
| New houses and factories | 85 |
| Trouble on the farms | 88 |
| The Co-op | 90 |
| The Victorians’ last word | 92 |
| Chapter 5. 1901-1945. Paradise in Cressing Road | 93 |
| An eventual start to the century | 93 |
| Novelty | 94 |
| Pinkham’s glove factory and the liberals | 97 |
| Women and ladies | 98 |
| Health and houses | 102 |
| The First World War, 1914-1918 | 102 |
| Pinkham’s again | 110 |
| Crittall’s window factory | 110 |
| The General Strike and the Great Depression | 113 |
| Progress | 114 |
| More motors | 117 |
| The ‘Great Essex road’ again | 118 |
| Flight | 121 |
| Living and housing | 121 |
| Social Witham between the Wars | 126 |
| Town Planning | 130 |
| War approaches | 130 |
| The Second World War, 1939-1945 | 131 |
| Witham recovers | 139 |
| Walk 1. Round the ancient earthworks | 140 |
| Walk 2. The village of Chipping Hill | 150 |
| Walk 3. The town centre | 160 |
| Other places to see | 183 |
| Sources of information | 186 |
| Index | 190 |