Archaeological evidence indicates that the area now occupied by Grays has been inhabited by humans since thePalaeolithic period.[2]
Samuel Pepys recorded in his diary that he visited Grays on 24 September 1665 and apparently bought fish from the local fishermen.[3] Parts of Grays and Chafford Hundred are set within three Victorian chalk pits; the largest two are the Lion Gorge and the Warren Gorge. Another area of theChafford Hundred residential development is built on a Victorian landfill site.
In 1931 the parish had a population of 18,173.[4] On 1 April 1936 the parish was abolished to form Thurrock.[5]
Thurrock Town Hall on New Road in Grays was built in the 1980s;[6] work on an extension began in January 2020.[7]
On 23 October 2019,the bodies of 39 people were found in the back of a lorry at Waterglade Industrial Park in Eastern Avenue. They are believed to have been victims ofhuman trafficking, ormigrants being smuggled into Britain. The vehicle, registered inBulgaria, was thought to have travelled to the UK throughPurfleet fromZeebrugge. A 25-year-old lorry driver fromNorthern Ireland was arrested byEssex Police on suspicion of murder[8] and pleaded guilty to manslaughter in April 2020.[9] Essex Police launched an investigation afterwards and the lorry was moved to the nearby Port of Tilbury.[10][11] It is the biggest murder investigation in the history of Essex police. On 26 May 2020, a total of 26 further suspects, most of them Vietnamese nationals, were arrested in Belgium and France.[12]
The origin of the name "Grays Thurrock" comes in two parts. Thurrock is a Saxon name meaning "the bottom of a ship".[13] The element "Grays" comes fromHenry de Grai, a descendant of the Norman knightAnchetil de Greye,[citation needed] who was granted the manor ofGrays Thurrock in 1195 byRichard I.
Grays contains the wards and residential areas of Grays Riverside, Grays Thurrock, Stifford Clays,Little Thurrock Blackshots, Little Thurrock Rectory and Chadwell St Mary.[14][15] Parts of Chafford Hundred and North and SouthStifford are also in Grays.[16]
Local sites of interest include the Thameside Theatre, the Thurrock History Museum, Grays Beach,The White Hart, and the formerState Cinema.
The Dell was one of the earliest houses in Britain to be built of concrete.[17] It was built on the instructions ofAlfred Russel Wallace, who lived in the town from 1872 until 1876.
From the top of the Derby Road Bridge in Grays one can look down to Thurrock Yacht Club, Grays Beach children's playground and theRiver Thames.
As well as Thurrock Yacht Club, Grays Beach is the site of the local landmarkThe Gull, a lightship built in 1860, which has lain on the foreshore for decades and is now in a serious state of dilapidation. The light fromThe Gull has now been removed, restored and installed on the foreshore of the yacht club.
The Thameside Theatre was built in 1971 and is the only theatre in Thurrock.[18][19] In July 2021 Thurrock Council declared it to be surplus to budget requirements and announced plans for its closure.[20] TheLabour opposition in the council opposed the plans and an online petition calling for its preservation was signed by over 1000 residents.[21] Grays nativeRussell Brand gave his support to saving the theatre on an Instagram post and pledged to perform a show there to help prevent its closure.[22] In January 2022 Thurrock Council announced that they supported a counter proposal that will see the theatre remain open undercommunity ownership.[23] A group dedicated to saving the theatre began negotiating with the council, and had to provide it with an affordablebusiness plan for the theatre by 13 July 2022.[24] However, after an unnamed organisation expressed interest in buying the theatre, the council has delayed the deadline to September to allow it to put forward an alternative business plan.[25]
The town is approximately 20 miles (32 km) to the east of London on the north bank of the River Thames and 2 miles (3.2 km) east of theM25 motorway. Its economy is linked toPort of London industries, its own offices, retail andLakeside, West Thurrock. Its variously used riverside (from homes through wild bird-habitat marshland to importation, storage and distribution) facesBroadness Lighthouse in Kent.[26]
Quarry Hill Primary and Pre School and Thameside Primary School were formed from the amalgamations of failinginfant andjunior schools.[38][39] Since then, both schools have received favourable grades from education watchdogOfsted.[40][41] Belmont Castle Academy was renamed in honour ofBelmont Castle, a demolished gothic mansion that was located on the school site.[42] The Gateway Primary Free School is situated on the site of Gateway Academy,[43] and is the only primary school withfree school status in Grays.
A Christianprivate school, The Light Christian School, opened in Grays in 2025.[44]
A sixth form was operated by Gateway Academy before 2014, but it closed that year.[73] In 2011, Ofsted deemed the sixth form as satisfactory, which meant it required improvement. This was primarily because of concerns over the number of students dropping out, which was above average.[51] Hathaway Academy intended to open a sixth form some time before the 2014/2015 academic year,[74] but this never came to fruition.
Thurrock Technical College opened in 1952 on Dell Road. Between 1954 and 1957 the college was based in parts of the site of Grays County Technical High School (which would become Grays School) and Grays Hall. In 1960 it reopened on Woodview Road, later establishing a second campus in Aveley.[75] The college later merged with Basildon College to formThurrock and Basildon College, with the Woodview Campus remaining in operation. The college then amalgamated with South East Essex College of Arts and Technology in 2010, formingSouth Essex College.[76] The Thurrock Campus relocated from Woodview Road to a new complex in Grays town centre in September 2014.[77][78]
The local sixth form college isUSP College Palmer's Campus.[79] Palmer's dates back to 1706, when the merchant William Palmer founded acharity school for "ten poore children" of the parish of Grays Essex. The school was located in the local churchyard and evolved into a boys' school. In response to the enactment of theElementary Education Act 1870, the school reopened on a new site on the hill above the town in 1874. A girls' school opened on the site in 1876.[80] Both schools weregrammar schools,[81] operating on the same site until 1931, when the girls' school relocated to Chadwell Road.[82] From this time, Palmer's became apublic school. This meant that students were no longer admitted on academic performance regardless of background and were instead admitted by fee. This was reversed in 1944, however wealthier students were still prioritised, even if they failed the11+ exam required for enrolment. In 1971 the girls' school began its conversion into a sixth form college,[83] reopening as Palmer's College in 1972 after it amalgamated with the boys' school andAveley County Technical High School. The college merged with Seevic College in August 2017, forming USP College.[84]
There is also Thurrock Adult Community College which is located in multiple venues and community hubs across Thurrock and used to be based from Richmond Road in Grays.[85]
Grays bus station, outside the railway station, is a hub for most bus services in Thurrock. The bus services are operated byEnsignbus,First Essex andNIBS Buses.
^Gateway Primary Free School and Gateway Academy are located between the two communities that they serve, Chadwell St Mary and Tilbury.[35] The schools' official addresses, however, are in Grays.[36][37]
^Herbert Brooks,William Palmer and his School. Being an account of the founder of Palmer's Charity at Grays Thurrock, Essex (Colchester, 1928).
^Lord Strang, 'Fifty Years Ago', in J. R. Hayston (ed.),250 Years on. To commemorate the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the trust deed by which William Palmer endowed in 1706 a school in Grays Thurrock (1956), p. 59. See also Strang's autobiography,Home and abroad (1956)
