Little Oakley, Essex

Description
Oakley, Little, a parish in Essex, 2 miles NE of Great Oakley, 3 1/2 SE of Wrabness station, and 3 from Dovercourt station on the Harwich and Manningtree branch of the G.E.R. It has a post office under Harwich; money order and telegraph office, Great Oakley. Acreage, 1218; population, 305. There is a parish council consisting of five members and a chairman. The manor belongs to the Rowley family. The living is a rectory in the diocese of St Albans; net value, £260 with residence. The church, which is an ancient building of rubble, comprises Decorated English nave and chancel and Later English tower, which, having fallen into decay and become unsafe, had to be taken down to the level of the nave roof, and contains a good modern stone reredos and a font. The priest's door in the chancel is pierced through a buttress, a very unusual feature in church architecture. There is a Wesleyan chapel.