Stoke-by-Nayland is a village and civil parish in the Babergh district, in the county of Suffolk, England, close to the border with Essex. The parish includes the village of Withermarsh Green and the hamlets of Thorington Street and Scotland Street. The village has many cottages and timber-framed houses, all surrounding a recreation field. Possibly once the site of a monastery, the population of the civil parish was 703 at the 2001 Census, falling to 682 at the 2011 Census

​​

The history of Stoke by Nayland has attracted the interest of many people in the parish and much information has been informally collected and shared over many years. It was  in the 1970s & 1980s when local residents John and June Wallace, Laurence Harley and the then village recorder Bill Webb started to collect, collate and report publicly on matters relating to the history of the village that some sort of organisation started. 
 
Historic snippets found their way into local newsletters and magazines, local field walking trips were organised and sporadic presentations took place at the village hall.  Many local residents, most notably Gerry Smith, contributed and over time it became apparent the amount and variety of local history relating to Stoke by Nayland was considerable.  In the early 2000s local 'Stokers' Bryan and Carole Boggis took up the informal mantle of collectors and collators of local information and it was at their instigation that the Stoke by
Nayland Local History Society first saw the light of day in 2011