Hockley

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Village in Essex, England

title: "Hockley" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["villages-in-essex", "rochford-district"] description: "Village in Essex, England" topic_path: "general/villages-in-essex" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockley" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Village in Essex, England ::

::data[format=table title="infobox UK place"]

FieldValue
countryEngland
official_nameHockley
coordinates
static_image_nameSt Peter ^ St Paul Church - geograph.org.uk - 2748970.jpg
static_image_captionParish Church of St Peter and St Paul
population9,639
population_ref(Parish, 2021)
15,425 (Hockley and Hawkwell built up area, 2021)
civil_parishHockley
shire_districtRochford
shire_countyEssex
regionEast of England
constituency_westminsterRayleigh
post_townHOCKLEY
postcode_districtSS5
postcode_areaSS
dial_code01702
os_grid_referenceTQ826924
mapframeyes
mapframe-zoom12
mapframe-pointnone
::

|country= England |official_name= Hockley |coordinates = |static_image_name = St Peter ^ St Paul Church - geograph.org.uk - 2748970.jpg |static_image_caption = Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul |population = 9,639 | population_ref = (Parish, 2021) 15,425 (Hockley and Hawkwell built up area, 2021) |civil_parish= Hockley |shire_district= Rochford |shire_county= Essex |region= East of England |constituency_westminster= Rayleigh |post_town= HOCKLEY |postcode_district= SS5 |postcode_area= SS |dial_code= 01702 |os_grid_reference= TQ826924 | mapframe = yes | mapframe-zoom = 12 | mapframe-point = none Hockley is a large village and civil parish in the Rochford District of Essex, England. It is located between Chelmsford and Southend-on-Sea, or, more specifically, between Rayleigh and Rochford. It came to prominence during the coming of the railway in the 1890s. At the 2021 census the parish had a population of 9,639. The urban area has grown to be contiguous with the neighbouring village of Hawkwell; the Office for National Statistics now classes them as a single built up area that it calls "Hockley and Hawkwell", which had a population of 15,425 in 2021.

Hockley railway station serves the village.

History

The place-name 'Hockley' is first attested in the Domesday Book of 1086, where it appears as Hocheleia. The name means "Hocca's woodland clearing or glade". Today, there is still a large wooded area named Hockley Woods. Notable buildings in the village include the church of St Peter and Paul, which has a nave which was possibly built before the twelfth century, a thirteenth-century chancel and a fourteenth-century tower, the upper half of which is octagonal and was built at a later date. The tower holds three bells, manufactured by Miles Gray in 1626, by James Bartlett in 1684 and by John Hodgson in 1657, and the building is Grade II* listed. The church is situated to the north-west of the village centre, where Grade II listed Spa Pump Room is situated. The building was built as a spa to a design by James Lockyer in 1842, after Robert Clay found a medicinal spring there in 1838. Hockley is also the site of the former Bullwood Hall prison which closed in 2013.

Plumberow Mount, a Roman burial mound, was excavated in 1913 by Mr. E. B. Francis. At the time, there was a summer house on the top of the mound, and so trenches were cut on three sides. The excavation found a Roman coin of Domitian and some Saxon pottery which may indicate a secondary burial. The oval mound is 14 ft high, and 76 ft in diameter, with a flattened top, where the summerhouse was located. Since 2005, a metal fence has surrounded the mound to protect it from erosion, and a number of trees which were growing on or near it were cut down at the same time.

In 2009, the sixteenth-century Hockley Pendant was discovered in a field at Hockley.

Governance

Hockley has a parish council consisting of two wards (West Ward and East Ward) and is part of Rochford District Council

The parish historically included Hullbridge, which was made a separate civil parish in 1964.

References

References

  1. "2021 Census Parish Profiles". Office for National Statistics.
  2. "Towns and cities, characteristics of built-up areas, England and Wales: Census 2021". Office for National Statistics.
  3. "Hockley Parish Council website: History". Hockley-essex.gov.uk.
  4. [[Eilert Ekwall]], ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-names'', p.243.
  5. {{NHLE
  6. {{NHLE
  7. Danny Shaw. (10 January 2013). "BBC News - Seven prison closures in England announced". Bbc.co.uk.
  8. (27 July 2006). "Plumberow Mount". Geograph.
  9. {{PastScape
  10. "Plumberow Mount". The Megalithic Portal.
  11. (2010-11-17). "Boy, four, unearths 16th Century gold pendant in Essex".
  12. "Hockley Parish Council {{!}} Councillors".
  13. "Rochford District Council".
  14. "Rochford Registration District".

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::

villages-in-essexrochford-district