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The History of Pikes Marsh

 

The land developed in 2013/14 by Persimmon has a wealth of history, which will be explained here very briefly

The name Pikes Marsh can be traced back to the 1500`s

Quote:-

This land included two 'ruinous' houses on the Nayland Road, one of which was known as Pike House and was associated with ground called Pikes Acre and a marsh called Pikes Marsh.

The other is not named, but lay to the north of Pikes House and also possessed a significant but unspecified amount of land to the rear (it is said to have belonged previously to John Arundell and afterwards to Thomas Mollens)

 
















During 1874 Henry Hardy was a gardener and seedsman who lived in London, but neither the Hardy name nor any comparable business is listed in Kelly's Directory for 1912.

A transcription of births, deaths and marriages available online records Abraham Hardy as a 'farmer, seedsman and church clerk' born at Nayland in 1799, marrying a Sarah Pilgrim (of a prolific Bures family of builders) in 1817 and dying at Billericay in Essex in 1873.

The most recent owner of the orchard was Mr Dennis Eaves whose father is understood to have bought it in or about 1937.

Mr Eaves originally lived at Lorne House (1 Nayland Road) but the rest of the terrace was bought by the Hitchcock family of Bures mill.

He operated the orchard as a fruiterer and smallholder, supplying produce to local shops and keeping chickens in the now demolished sheds behind no. 7 Nayland Road. He also sold directly to the public from a shop in the central shed , but opened on only one afternoon each week in the years leading up to his death in the 1990s.

The early-19th century a shed with the sunken floor was used to store apples, along with the upper storey of the central shed, and older residents of Bures recall at least one horse stalled in the shed with the mono-pitch roof during the 1940s and 1950s.

Mr Eaves sold part of the orchard to Babergh District Council in the 1980s and the resulting estate of bungalows bears his name (albeit mis-spelled- Eaves Orchard).
The business terminated with his death and the trees were subsequently cleared by his son-in-law, the present owner Mr Alan Cockrell of Colchester. Nos. 2-7 Nayland Road were sold individually in the 1970s.

Their link with the site of the orchard to the rear is documented as early as 1577 when Barnaby Claydon, a wealthier clothier and church warden who lived in Bures High Street, owned a larger block of land in the same area stretching from the Nayland Road on the west to what is now Fysh House Farm at the top Cuckoo Hill to the east .

This land included two 'ruinous' houses on the Nayland Road, one of which was known as Pike House and was associated with ground called Pikes Acre and a marsh called Pikes Marsh. The other is not named but lay to the north of Pikes House and also possessed a significant but unspecified amount of land to the rear (it is said to have belonged previously to John Arundell and afterwards to Thomas Mollens).

Courtesy of Leigh Alston, Bures History Soc

 


The Bures St Mary tithe map of 1837, showing the area of the 'orchard and garden' to the west of the Nayland Road

The orchard area indicated by 479 and 486.

No 479 was known as "The Great Orchard Field was part sold in the 1970`s to become the housing estate known as Friends Field.

No 486 known as Nursery Field.

No 539 known as Shooting Field

No 486 known as Slaughters Field

 

This 1904 map shows land as an orchard.

The upper section with the text "Malthouse etc" is now occupied by Friends Field.

For many years this plot of land has been used as an orchard containing over 1000 (circa 1980) mature apple trees.

The Great Orchard was part sold in the 1970`s
to accommodate the properties known as Friends Field to the left

The remaining orchard represents a fragment of a large orchard that was left isolated by the construction of social housing in 1988 (bottom right)
Photograph courtesy of Ken Baxter

No486 on the Tithe Maps

Aerial view of the orchard dated 2000

In that year it contained 1,000 mature apple trees

In the 1980`s a further section of the field was sold by Mr Dennis Eves to Babergh District council for sheltered housing
Bottom left corner of photograph.

Ref:- Google Earth maps

2013

When visiting the new development, it`s quite obvious that it lies well beneath the level of the surrounding field to the North.
For centuries water has drained from the field down into Pikes Marsh.

According to the local residents, back in the mid 1900`s the land was excavated and clay pipes layed to drain away the excess water towards the river.

However when the developers arrived, these drains were excavated and destroyed.
Consequently when the footings were dug for the new properties, water quickly filled the trenches which seriously hampered their work.

Within the centre of the picture you can see a large hole full to the brim with water
This hole was excavated by the Suffolk County Council Archaeological Group during the autumn of 2012
Within days of excavation the water table rose to the level we see in the image.
It remained like this for some six months before the developers arrived in March 2013 and set up their site office

This dramatically show the water table level on this land.

One resident quotes:-"During the 1980`s with permission of the Denis Eaves the owner, I would visit the orchard in the autumn to collect windfall apples for my cider making. I always wore water boots as the ground was spongy and wet, like a peat bog. It was always wet underfoot"


   
Despite pile driving the water continued to flood the foundations, eventually a vast amount of concrete was poured into this cavity
to displace the water and to give a firm base for bricklaying.
Water rises as fast as the JCB could excavate the soil.
Updated 03/08/14