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18th Century Life In 1722 Daniel Defoe undertook a journey through East Anglia starting on the Thomas and working his way through Eastern Essex. Defoe remarks on the wildfowl , the oysters and the number of wives that die from the Essex ague. His thoughts are shown below. From hence there is nothing for many
miles together remarkable but a continued level of unhealthy marshes, called
the Three Hundreds, till we come before Leigh, and to the mouth of the River
Chelmer, and Blackwater In this inlet of the sea is Osey, or Osyth
Island, commonly called Oosy Island, so well known by our London men of
pleasure for the infinite number of wild fowl, that is to say, duck, mallard,
teal, and widgeon, of which there are such vast flights, that they tell us the
island, namely the creek, seems covered with them at certain times of the year,
and they go from London on purpose for the pleasure of shooting; and, indeed,
often come home very well laden with game. But it must be remembered too
that those gentlemen who are such lovers of the sport, and go so far for it,
often return with an Essex ague on their backs, which they find a heavier load
than the fowls they have shot. On this shore also are taken the best
and nicest, though not the largest, oysters in England; the spot from whence they
have their common appellation is a little bank called Woelfleet, scarce to be
called an island, in the mouth of the River Crouch, now called Crooksea Water;
but the chief place where the said oysters are now had is from Wyvenhoe and the
shores adjacent, whither they are brought by the fishermen, who take them at
the mouth of that they call Colchester water and about the sand they call the
Spits, and carry them up to Wyvenhoe, where they are laid in beds or pits on
the shore to feed, as they call it; and then being barrelled up and carried to
Colchester, which is but three miles off, they are sent to London by land, and
are from thence called Colchester oysters. The chief sort of other fish which
they carry from this part of the shore to London are soles, which they take
sometimes exceeding large, and yield a very good price at London market.
Also sometimes middling turbot, with whiting, codling and large flounders; the
small fish, as above, they sell in the country. At this place may be said to end what
we call the Hundreds of Essex—that is to say, the three Hundreds or divisions
which include the marshy country, viz., Barnstable Hundred, Rochford Hundred,
and Dengy Hundred. I have one remark more before I leave
this damp part of the world, and which I cannot omit on the women’s account,
namely, that I took notice of a strange decay of the sex here; insomuch that
all along this country it was very frequent to meet with men that had from
five or six to fourteen or fifteen wives; nay, and some more. The reason,
as a merry fellow told me, who said he had about a dozen and a half of
wives (though I found afterwards he fibbed a little) was this: That they being
bred in the marshes themselves and seasoned to the place, did pretty well with
it; but that they always went up into the hilly country, or, to speak their own
language, into the uplands for a wife. That when they took the young
lasses out of the wholesome and fresh air they were healthy, fresh, and clear,
and well; but when they came out of their native air into the marshes among the
fogs and damps, there they presently changed their complexion, got an ague or
two, and seldom held it above half a year, or a year at most; “And then,” said
he, “we go to the uplands again and fetch another;” so that marrying of wives
was reckoned a kind of good farm to them. It is true the fellow told this
in a kind of drollery and mirth; but the fact, for all that, is certainly true;
and that they have abundance of wives by that very means. Nor is it less true that the
inhabitants in these places do not hold it out, as in other countries, and as
first you seldom meet with very ancient people among the poor, as in other
places we do, so, take it one with another, not one-half of the inhabitants are
natives of the place; but such as from other countries or in other parts of this
country settle here for the advantage of good farms; for which I appeal to any
impartial inquiry, having myself examined into it critically in several places. From the marshes and low grounds being
not able to travel without many windings and indentures by reason of the creeks
and waters,.
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