[THURLEYONLINE]The rural Parish of Great Hallingbury lies about 3 miles to the east of Bishops Stortford. It was a corn growing countryside, probably mostly barley, which supplied the extensive maltings of local areas including Bishops Stortford and Sawbridgeworth.
The name Great Hallingbury means "burh", fortified area or dwelling of the Heallas. This would have been Wallbury Camp, which was said to be 2000 years old and to have been a place of refuge for women, children and beasts when tribal enemies threatened. The Romans who succeeded the early settlers must have used Wallbury, with it's fine position overlooking the River Stort, along which there were a number of Roman settlements. At the Conquest, the Norman's found a well organized village of two groups which they named manors: the manor of Wallbury and the manor of Much or Great Hallingbury. After the succession by the Norman's, a long list of over-lords were in charge of the local area.
With the coming of the Morley family to Great Hallingbury, the subsequent ownership of the land was in close association with the crown. In the 16th Century the Morleys transformed the Hallingbury hunting ground by building a mansion (picture) with a park around it. Village farms and humble cottages developed around the perimeter of the park, many of them held by manorial rent. But it was the Great House which dominated life in the parish throughout the "reign" of the Morleys and their successors. The Great house was pulled down in 1922. After the Great War, the devastation that this event caused to the local area prevented anyone to be in a position to buy such a property or to keep it up. The property was divided into forty-nine lots and sold.
St Giles Church (pictured above) was the focal point for a significant number of the local community.