Historian Stephen Nunn asks what it means to be a Maldonian

I am also, of course, 'British', but when it comes to establishing what that really means, it soon becomes apparent that the population of this country has never been, in all its long history, entirely of one ethnicity.

Developments in the study of ancestry (particularly DNA) can uncover some personal surprises.

The same is true of regional demographics. London has the largest non-white population of any European city, with more than 200 languages spoken.

The East End’s Brick Lane alone has, down the centuries, been home to Irish, Huguenot, Jewish and Bangladeshi families.

Successive waves of immigrant peoples have settled and mixed with existing residents to form a multi-cultural, ever evolving nation and there is evidence that is also true here in Maldon.

An imaginary pastiche of a 'true Maldonian' would probably be someone describing themselves as having the same pure Anglo-Saxon blood that was spilt at the battle of 991.

In reality, however, it is quite rare that any family (here or otherwise) can establish direct continuity in the same place back more than a dozen or so generations. 'Locals' have not always been 'locals', that was the case from the earliest times and is still true today.

So when it comes to it, who are we really?

The extensive archaeological discoveries at Elms Farm, in Heybridge, included amounts of imported Iron-Age Gaulish pottery and post-conquest Roman fine wares.

Was this simply the result of trade, or did those vessels once belong to settled, migrated peoples?

Heybridge emerged as an integrated Romano-British ‘civitas’ (or small town) with a defined social hierarchy of 'haves and have-nots', and even those forced to wear slave shackles.

Individually named Saxon Germanic people are identified on Maldon coinage – moneyers like Abonel and Toga, and in the words of the poem The Battle of Maldon – Byrhtnoth and his warriors such as Godric, son of Odda.

The invaders, under Olaf Triggvasson, were victorious in 991 and left Norse names in our topography (such as 'Nass' in the Blackwater) and at least some permanent, integrated Viking settlers (including on Mersea Island).

The Norman Conquest saw a change in local landownership, transfers from the 'old guard' to Norman nobility - Ranulf Peverel and Count Eustace.

In his Prospect (published in 1991) Bill Petchey identified long-distance migration to Maldon during 1500-1688 and the presence of so-called 'foreigners' who came here to trade, like John 'the Dutchman' and Richard Frank.

This continued throughout the 18th and into the early 19th centuries and linked to that time is a memorial in Heybridge church to 'Eleanor Incledon, a native of Jamaica….faithful and affectionate servant of Mr and Mrs Hering of Heybridge Hall…'

The monument to Jamaican born Eleanor Incledon in Heybridge Church (Image: Stephen Nunn)

Historians have drawn the understandable conclusion that Eleanor was a slave.

From the early 19th Century Maldon became a barrack town and the soldiers stationed here included those from abroad, like the hospital attendant buried in St Peter’s churchyard who was 'a native of Nijmegen'.

The parish registers reveal a number of children fathered by those troops and who then became part of the local population. (There is a repeat of this during both the First and Second World Wars).

Irish and German navies came here to dig the canal (in 1797) and build the railway in 1847 (and its extension in 1889).

Some of them never went 'home' and ended up marrying local girls.

At one point Maldon had its own Chinese quarter in Butt Lane (colloquially known as ‘Whang-poo Street’) where they ran a laundry between 1860 and 1885.

They would have brought with them their own cuisine and, much later, Maldon’s House of Delight was established in 1970 and has specialised in serving Cantonese and Peking dishes ever since.

The same is true of our Indian restaurants and their Anglo-Indian recipes – the first being The Curry Inn, then at 111 High Street and opened in 1978 by Abdul Hannan.

But it is not just food that highlights Maldon’s ethic make-up. The parish church of St Mary the Virgin is located in Church Street and could be on a site of Christianity established there as early as the 7th Century.

The mosque and St Mary's Church - two faiths in the same street (Image: Stephen Nunn)

At the opposite end of the street is Maldon’s mosque, run by the Maldon District Islamic Cultural Association. The association was founded in 1988 and in 2005 purchased and converted the old Labour Hall, which had previously been a Salvation Army Hall and before that a Methodist Chapel.

In many ways those two buildings, St Mary’s and the mosque, evidence and epitomise what it really means to be 'Maldonian'.

In common with the rest of the country, ours is a town where no one really has deep roots – rather we are part of an ever evolving community that call this place home.