Langdon Hills
| Langdon Hills | |
| Essex | |
|---|---|
| |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | TQ679875 |
| Location: | 51°33’42"N, -0°25’17"E |
| Data | |
| Post town: | Basildon |
| Postcode: | SS16 |
| Dialling code: | 01268 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | Basildon |
| Parliamentary constituency: |
South Basildon & East Thurrock |
Langdon Hills is an area of Basildon in Essex, which was once a hill overlooking what was then a small town. It began to develop with the 'plotland' movement which transformed Basildon.
This area is located south of Laindon railway station on the London, Tilbury and Southend line. It is the location of the 400-acre Langdon Hills Country Park.
History
In 1767, Arthur Young commented on the view from Langdon Hills
- "…near Horndon, on the summit of a vast hill, one of the most astonishing prospects to be beheld, breaks almost at once upon one of the dark lanes. Such a prodigious valley, everywhere painted with the finest verdure, and intersected with numberless hedges and woods, appears beneath you, that it is past description; the Thames winding thro’ it, full of ships and bounded by the hills of Kent. Nothing can exceed it…"[1]
From the 1930s the Dunton Plotlands developed and are now commemorated by a museum.[2]
In 1931 the developed village and parish covered an area of 1,816 acres and had a population of 2,103. 100 years earlier, in 1831, the population was 224 and the area covered was 1,850 acres.[3]
The village has a church, St Johns Church, and two schools. It has a nature reserve stretching down to Laindon. It also has a supermarket in the towns boundaries.
Outside links
- Laindon and District Community Archive
- Langdon Living Landscape
- Langdon Hills & Dunton: Basildon Borough History
References
- ↑ Arthur Young, A Six Weeks' Tour through the Southern Counties of England and Wales
- ↑ Essex Live https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/dunton-plotlands-how-londoners-escaped-5501754
- ↑ Vision of Britain - Langdon Hills parish (historic map)