Grays Thurrock

Grays Thurrock, or Grays, an urban district in the south-eastern parliamentary division of Essex, England, on the Thames, 20 m. E. by S. from London by the London, Tilbury & Southend railway. Pop. (1901) 13,834. The church of St Peter and St Paul, wholly rebuilt, retains some Norman work. The town takes its name from a family of Gray who held the manor for three centuries from 1149. There are an endowed and two training ship schools. Roman remains have been found in the vicinity; and the geological formations exhibiting the process of silting up of a former river channel are exposed in the quarries, and contain large mammalian remains. The town has trade in bricks, lime and cement.