St Osyth is an English village and civil parish in the Tendring District of north-east Essex, about west of Clacton-on-Sea and about south-east of Colchester. It is located on the B1027 road. The village is named after Osgyth, a 7th-century saint and princess. Locally, the name is sometimes pronounced "Toosey". St Osyth is claimed to be the driest recorded place in the United Kingdom.
History
Before being renamed to commemorate St Osyth, the village was called Chich, from an Old English word meaning "bend", in reference to St Osyth Creek. Later, the manor of Chich in Essex was assumed as part of his royal demesne by the DanishKing Canute, who granted it to Earl Godwin, and by him it was given to Christ Church, Canterbury. At the Conquest it was transferred to the Bishopric of London. In his 2002 book Essex off the Beaten Track, Stan Jarvis relates that Osyth was the daughter of the great Frithewald, King of the East Saxons. She grew up in the Christian faith and became prioress of a nunnery founded by her father in the tiny settlement of Chich. In the autumn of AD 653 a band of Danish raiders came up the creek in their boats and went on the rampage. They broke into the nunnery, intent on humiliating the nuns and subjecting them to sexual harassment. Osyth stood before them and faced up to the Danish chief. He demanded that the nuns deny their faith; she rejected his demands. In his wrath he ordered her to be beheaded and so Osyth died for her faith. Thomas Darcy, the first Baron Darcy of Chiche was buried in St Osyth. St Osyth was the subject of an episode of Channel 4's Time Team programme, "Lost Centuries of St Osyth",. The programme sought to uncover the early origins of the village, which was presumed to have grown up about the same time as the Priory, in the 12th century. Many of the investigations around the current village centre found little evidence of settlement earlier than the 14th century; it appeared that the early village centre lay some way off, between the Priory and the river. The village was a focus for the St Osyth witch persecutions in the 16th and 17th centuries. A total of ten local women were hanged as a result. In 1921 the skeletons of two women were discovered in the garden of a house in the village. One was claimed to be the witch Ursley Kempe, who was the first to be prosecuted. The skeletons became a local tourist attraction.
Legend has it that Saint Osyth, Osgyth or Ositha was a young lady involved in various fantastical events during her lifetime. The legends include:
A young Osyth drowned in a stream, but was revived by nuns from the local convent praying for her for three days.
Osyth was executed by beheading; where she fell a spring issued forth from the ground. She picked up her head and walked to the door of the nunnery, where she knocked three times on the door before collapsing.
Osyth's ghost is said to walk along the priory walls carrying her head one night each year.
In the Napoleonic Wars two Martello Towers were built on the peninsula between the Colne Estuary and Brightlingsea Creek. One survives at Stone Point and is now the East Essex Aviation Museum. The peninsula was cordoned off and used by the Navy and Army in both world wars. Between 1942 and 1944 it was a large, minor landing-craft training base called HMS Helder. No 1 Martello Tower was a signal station and minefield control point, linked to the Navy at Brightlingsea.
Geography
St Osyth is claimed to be the driest recorded place in the United Kingdom, with an average rainfall of just per year. St Osyth parish extends south from the village to the coast, and includes the smaller villages Point Clear and Lee-over-Sands. Although a significant part of the parish boundary is coastline, which does not need to be "beaten", St Osyth is one parish which maintains the tradition of beating the bounds on Rogation days.
Landmarks
The most notable building in the village is undoubtedly St Osyth's Priory, a group of Grade I listed buildings. The Abbey was the home to the Earls of Rochford, following King William III's creation of the title for William Nassau de Zuylestein in 1695. St Osyth's Priory was once the home of a herd of polled White Park cattle, until an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in 1951, which led to their slaughter. A contemporary account states: The land within the Priory boundaries is shown as a Deer Park on the Ordnance Survey map. The village church is dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul. The Martello tower at Point Clear has been converted into a war museum. Another landmark is Mill Dam Lake, which is filled and emptied from St Osyth Creek. It is used for water skiing.
St Osyth Beach
The neighbouring settlement of St Osyth Beach contains Essex's largest concentration of static caravan parks, including Seawick, St Osyth Beach and Hutleys. The holiday parks boost the local population in the summer months by an estimated 7,000 people. Part of the beach is used for nude bathing. St Osyth Beach and adjoining Jaywick were the scene of fatalities during "The Great Flood" of 1953.
