The village of Stock Harvard, at 318 feet above sea level, is one of the highest points in Essex lying on a range of hills running north-eastward from Brentwood to Danbury. The origin of the village's name is still open to dispute but to derive it from the Saxon "stocce", meaning "wood" conveys little and it is prefer-able to conclude that it comes from "Stoke", that is a place within another district and the Saxon word for a Steward was "Hereward" and so Stock Harvard originally meant "the place of the Steward" of the parish of Buttsbury of which Stock was then a hamlet.
The first written evidence of the existence of a Church in Stock is in 1232 and assumes that it had been there for some time. It is reasonable therefore to suppose that a Church consisting of a Nave and Chancel, was erected here in the early Norman period, a view supported by the fact that the South and West walls of the Nave are about three feet thick, that is similar to other undoubted Norman churches. These thick walls are the only remains of that building. Reconstruction work in 1948 uncovered the foundations of a still earlier building under the North wall which may, though there is no definite proof of this, indicate an original Saxon church on this site.
The cache has a log book but no pen so please bring one with you.
PLEASE REPLACE THE LOGBOOK IN THE ZIPLOCK BAG AS THIS KEEPS IT DRY !!
If any body would like to expand to this series please do, could you please let sadexploration know first so he can keep track of the Church numbers and names to avoid duplication.