Undiscovered Essex

Part of a series highlighting the picturesque towns and villages of the historic county of Essex. This excerpt features Thaxted, once home to the famous highwayman Dick Turpin.

The village is also famous for the annual music festival, established by the composer Gustav Holst, a former resident of Thaxted. Holst moved to the village in 1914 and organised the first festival in 1916. He wrote:

'Four whole days of perpetual singing and playing, either properly arranged in the church or impromtu in various houses or still more impromptu in ploughed fields during thunderstorms, or in the train going home'.