About

Writtle is an attractive traditional English village having a historic centre with timbered houses around a triangular 'Green' complete with duck-pond and churches. It has the facilities of a modern village and is surrounded by a pleasant gently rolling, arable countryside and Hylands Park is on the 'doorstep'. Yet is in easy reach of Chelmsford. It is a friendly village with many active clubs and societies. Transport links are good with easy access to buses, airports and mainline trains.

Writtle has been a favoured place since the Stone Age some 6000 years ago. Bronze Age, Iron Age and Roman peoples also lived in Writtle, as seen in the artefacts,roads and buildings that are just being rediscovered. Writtle was a large town of over a thousand in the Doomsday book of 1086, whilst Chelmsford was a mere 20 souls. The site of a royal hunting lodge in King John's reign can be seen at the College, along with a tithe barn built about 1500. Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland was probably born in the Village. Judging by the number of large timber framed houses in the Parish, Writtle was an important, wealthy place in the Medieval & Tudor periods.

Latterly Writtle's claim to fame is that Marconi started the first regular radio broadcasts from a small hut in Writtle in 1922, with the call sign 2MT (two-emma-toc). The hut is now in the Sandford Mill Industrial Museum.