Barking Abbey became known as Warley Abbess. The manor owned in 1086 by Swein later became known as Warley Franks, after being owned by two men called Frank in the 13th century.
The Warley area became the two ancient parish of Little Warley, covering that manor, and Great Warley, covering the two manors of Warley Abbess and Warley Franks. The parish of Great Warley was also sometimes called Warley Magna, Warley Wallet, or West Warley.
Great Warley's original parish church, dedicated to St Mary, stood towards the southern end of the parish, south of the modern A127 road. The church immediately adjoined Great Warley Hall, the manor house of Warley Abbess.
Great Warley Common at one time ran from the village and connected with the outskirts of Brentwood, as shown by Chapman and André's 1777 Map of Essex.[ The common, along with Little Warley Common, were owned by George Winn, who started selling off the land for development, including 116 acres for Warley Barracks and another 172 acres for residential development. In 1855, the new ecclesiastical parish of Christ Church was set up, covering northern parts of Great Warley, along with parts of South Weald and Shenfield civil parishes to serve the new residents. The old church at St Mary's had been reported as totally inadequate for the growing population in 1851, with the rector's sister-in-law, Sarah Clay, donating £1,000 to build the new church.]
By 1876, 1,416 people lived in the parish, of which 1,004 were in the new church parish of Christ Church.[
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In 1858, the chancel at St Mary's collapsed, so remodelling work commenced under the guidance of Samuel Sanders Teulon which was completed in 1860.[ However, with the village centre moving further away from the church, it fell into disrepair, and a new "interim" church was built from wood in the grounds of "Fairfields", home of Rector Bailey. The first service was in 1892 attended by 140 parishioners, although the old church was continued to be used for funerals.][
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In 1904, a replacement St Mary's Church opened on a new site closer to the modern centre of the village, after a local resident Eveline Heseltine donated the site and £5,000 towards the cost of the new building.[
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Administrative history
Great Warley was an ancient parish in the Hundred of Chafford. From 1836, the parish was included in the Romford Poor Law Union, a group of parishes which collectively administered their responsibilities under the poor laws.
The Local Government Act 1894 converted rural sanitary districts into with elected councils and also established elected parish councils. Great Warley was therefore given a parish council and included in the Romford Rural District.[ Vision of Britain - Great Warley area history] In 1901 it had a population of 1,900.[ Vision of Britain - Great Warley census population]
In 1934, a County Review Order abolished the Romford Rural District and split the civil parish of Great Warley. The northern , covering the village itself, the Warley suburb of Brentwood, and the surrounding more wooded landscape on higher ground, was transferred to the parish and urban district of Brentwood. The remainder, covering the more low-lying area of open farmland including the area around Great Warley Hall and the site of the original parish church, was transferred to Hornchurch Urban District. The part transferred to Hornchurch continued to form a civil parish called Great Warley despite no longer including the village itself, but after 1934 it was classed as an urban parish and so was ineligible to have a parish council. The civil parish of Great Warley was abolished in 1965 when Hornchurch Urban District was abolished and its area became part of the new London Borough of Havering in Greater London.
In 1993, the boundary between Brentwood and Havering was locally realigned to the M25 motorway in the west and the London, Tilbury and Southend line in the south by the Essex and Greater London (County and London Borough Boundaries) (No.2) Order 1993.[ OPSI - Essex and Greater London (County and London Borough Boundaries) (No.2) Order 1993] This transferred back to Essex most of the pre-1934 Great Warley civil parish that had been in Greater London.
Geology
The village sits on London Clay with an outcropping of Bagshot sands.[
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Governance
Parliamentary constituency
Great Warley comes under the parliamentary constituency of Brentwood and Ongar, which current MP Alex Burghart has held since 2017.
Local authorities
Great Warley sits within the non-metropolitan county of Essex, governed Essex County Council and the non-Metropolitan Borough of Brentwood, which is governed by Brentwood Borough Council. The village is within the Warley ward.
Buildings, structures and attractions
The main part of Great Warley village is covered by a conservation area, which was first designated in 1975.
Consecrated in 1904, the listed building parish church, St Mary the Virgin[ A little further to the south is The Kilns Hotel in the building locally known as The Brick House which dates back to the 16th Century and is Grade II listed.
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In 2024, work was started on Hole Farm Community Woodland, a 100 acre woodland and visitor centre developed by National Highways and Forestry England due to open in 2025.
Warley Place is a nature reserve and is managed by the Essex Wildlife Trust. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries this site was the home and garden of the leading horticulturalist, Ellen Willmott, described by Gertrude Jekyll as 'the greatest living gardener', who planted many plants from all over the world, some of which still survive. The site remained derelict after Willmott death, after a development for the site failed until the site was leased to the Essex Wildlife Trust in 1977, who uncovered the structure of the garden.
Listed buildings and structures
Sports
Great Warley has a cricket field, the De Rougemont Cricket Ground, formerly the Great and Little Warley Cricket ground,
Notable people
•Ellen Willmott (1858 – 1934), renowned horticulturalist and recipient of the first Victoria Medal of Honour.
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