Transcribed from the 1913 edition , email
Loughton. Essex.
A brief account of the Manor
and Parish, being the sub-
stance of a paper read in 1903
by William Chapman Waller,
M.A., F.S.A.
(One hundred copies reprintedOctober, 1913).
Price: Six Pence.
p.3Loughton. Essex.
Foreword.—Perhaps some apology is needed forreprinting this paper. It was read some ten years ago tothe Club Literary Society, fully reported in the ‘LoughtonGazette’ in March, 1903, and thereafter issued in pamphletform, one hundred copies being struck off. But these copieshave long been dispersed, like many of the people who then livedin the village, and it may be that a new generation will not beunwilling to devote a few moments to the story of the place inwhich their lot is, at any rate for the time being, cast. To those whose interest may be aroused I may indicate theexistence of a fuller account, contained in a volume (of whichonly twelve copies exist,) to be found in the Guildhall Library,the British Museum, and a few other public libraries.
W. C. W.
Loughton before the Conquest.
It is not always that the story of a parish reaches back to aperiod beyond Domesday Book, but that of Loughton begins for usin the reign of the Confessor. In the year 1062, four yearsbefore the coming of the Conqueror, King Edward, with the assentof his Witan, or wise men, confirmed to the Monastery at Walthama great gift of lands which had been made to the Canons by theirfounder, Harold, the son of Godwin. The different estatesare enumerated in the document, and the boundaries of several aregiven—not in Latin, the language of the rest of thedocument, but in Anglo-Saxon. Among them arethree—Lukinton, Tippedene, and Ælwartun, which areincontestably to be identified with the places we now know asLoughton, Debden, and Alderton. The boundaries of Lukinton,or Loughton, p.4are unfortunately wanting. Not, of course, that itwould be any longer possible to trace them; even in the case ofDebden, where the natural features are mentioned, it is doubtfulof what extent the manor was; in the case of Alderton none of theboundaries can be connected with any names occurring in documentsof a later date.
Domesday Book.
When we come to Domesday Book we find no less than eightseparate entries, all of which apparently relate toLoughton. The Canons are found to hold Debden and Alderton,with two other manors merely described as‘Loughton.’ Peter de Valoines held two more,equally nameless, one being his demesne, and the other held by anunder-tenant called Ralph; the latter was probably nearNorth’s Farm on Buckhurst Hill; Robert Gernon held 44acres, his under-tenant being W. Corbun; and the King held 20acres, which were seemingly a sort of perquisite of the royalReeve at Havering. There appear, therefore, to have beensix manors and two extra-manorial holdings. What‘manor’ meant in that remote period is still a mootpoint, but it is certain that the word was of