Great Birch Parish Church demolished 1849.
On its site the present Birch Parish Church was built. Note how the design of the east window was copied in the present church. The old spire was a typical Essex wooden one. The present bell of 1737 was formerly in the old spire.

Cyril R. Jefferies in Essex County Standard in the 1930s interviewed Mr Fred Hutton: Fred's father had helped to pull down the old Birch Church, and assisted in lowering the bell, and fixing it in the present church. Mr Fred Hutton had heard his father talk of the old church with its high box pews, and he told how members of the congregation used to take beer bottles with them and leave them in the porch until after the service when they carried home their beer obtained at a nearby cottage beerhouse. [ See TBM_BCR_041 ]
Date: February 1849