Northey Island is a peaceful place, surrounded by the River Blackwater and completely cut off from the mainland at each high tide.
It's difficult to image the quiet being disrupted by the cries and screams of clashing Vikings and Anglo-Saxons, but in the year 991, this is what took place during the Battle of Maldon, when almost 100 Viking longships sailed towards Maldon and apparently landed on the island.
Having lived in the district for nearly all my life, I've always been interested in the tales of the battle so, 1,023 years later, I took myself off in a tent to Northey Island to experience what it was like to spend the night there.
Read about Charlotte's night on Northey Island in this Thursday's Maldon and Burnham Standard
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