GOSFIELD, a village and a parish in Halstead district, Essex. The village stands on a branch of the river Colne, 2 miles SW of Halstead town and r. station; and has a post office under Halstead. The parish comprises 2, 990 acres. Real property, £4, 578. Pop., 620. Houses, 132. The manor belonged to the Veres, the Rolfes, the Wentworths, the Ryches, and others; passed to the Duke of Buckingham; and went afterwards to the Barnards. Gosfield Hall, once the seat of the Duke of Buckingham, dates from the time of Henry VIII.; has been much altered from its original appearance, but still is a fine specimen of the stately castellated mansion of its period; and stands amid well-wooded grounds, with a splendid lake. Gosfield Place is a handsome modern edifice. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Rochester. Value, £266.* Patron, not reported. The church includes two chapels; in one of which is a large marble monument, by Scheemaker, to John Knight, Esq., with the follow. ing epitaph by Pope:-

O fairest pattern to a falling age,
Whose public virtue knew no party rage;
Whose private name all titles recommend,
The pious son, fond husband, faithful friend;
In manners plain, in sense alone refined;
Good without show, and without weakness kind;
To reason's equal dictates ever true;
Calm to resolve, and constant to pursue;
In life with every social grace adorned,
In death, by friendship, honour, virtue, mourned.

(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))