Colchester

Colchester rises above the River Colne within the walls of a Roman town. Once the Roman capital of Britain, it retains traces of that early importance, while its great Norman castle occupies the site of the Roman temple of Claudius. In the later Middle Ages its woollen cloth, especially the grey-brown fabric known as russet, found buyers far beyond Essex.

Flemish refugees brought new skills to Colchester in the sixteenth century and helped revive its cloth industry. Their textiles were inspected at the Dutch Bay Hall, a mark of the growing importance of the trade. In 1648 a Royalist army entered the town and was besieged by Parliamentary forces under Thomas Fairfax. After eleven and a half weeks the defenders surrendered, leaving a town badly damaged by fighting and privation.