84-499: Horsham Hospital is a health facility at Hurst Road in Horsham , West Sussex , England. It is managed by Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust . The facility, which was financed by voluntary donations, was completed in 1892. The hospital expanded into new purpose-built facilities slightly further east along Hurst Road in May 1923. A physiotherapy department, an outpatients department and
168-447: A 1996 merger, was a major employer in the town, but the plant is now closed and the site scheduled for redevelopment. The RSPCA , an animal welfare charity, has a £16 million headquarters at Southwater near Horsham, built to replace its former headquarters in the centre of the town. Horsham is also the headquarters of video game studio Creative Assembly , as well as the location of its motion capture studio. The Town Hall in
252-548: A 2014 study, which then Business and Energy Minister Michael Fallon said "will bring jobs and business opportunities" and significantly help with UK energy self-sufficiency. Fracking in the area would be required to achieve these objectives, which has been opposed by environmental groups. Prehistoric evidence suggests that, following the Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, the Neolithic inhabitants had turned to farming, with
336-523: A Germanic root of the same meaning, and ultimately from Indo-European . Weald is specifically a West Saxon form; wold is the Anglian form of the word. The Middle English form of the word is wēld , and the modern spelling is a reintroduction of the Old English form attributed to its use by William Lambarde in his A Perambulation of Kent of 1576. In early medieval Britain, the area had
420-451: A borough from the thirteenth century and also electing members of parliament from 1295 onwards. By the eighteenth century the borough corporation had ceased to have much role in administering the town, instead serving primarily as the means by which the main landowners, the Dukes of Norfolk , controlled the election of MPs. Dealing with such rotten boroughs was part of the motivation behind
504-405: A few farmhouses and cottages. Here is an iron church, capable of accommodating 80 persons'. Maps of the 1880s show Roffey Corner (still spelt Roughey), but appear to label the hamlet as Star Row, with Roffey in use again by the start of the 20th century. A railway station opened as Roffey Road Halt in 1907, closing in 1937. The station is shown in the location now known as Wimland Road. Roffey
588-838: A geological structure, an anticline , a dome of layered Lower Cretaceous rocks cut through by weathering to expose the layers as sandstone ridges and clay valleys. The oldest rocks exposed at the centre of the anticline are correlated with the Purbeck Beds of the Upper Jurassic . Above these, the Cretaceous rocks, include the Wealden Group of alternating sands and clays – the Ashdown Sand Formation , Wadhurst Clay Formation , Tunbridge Wells Sand Formation (collectively known as
672-460: A half tons of water periodically; it was 45 ft across at its base, standing 28 ft high. It carried a plaque bearing one of his poems ' Mont Blanc '. The fountain was turned off in the spring of 2006 to save water. Despite recycling it used 180 gallons a day to cover evaporation and filtration losses. However, the council has made water saving efficiencies elsewhere and the fountain was turned on again on 13 November 2006, its tenth birthday but
756-558: A new maternity unit were all introduced during the Second World War . After the hospital joined the National Health Service in 1948, further additions included extra wards in 1981 and a new outpatients department in 1997. In June 2019 the trust began a consultation on closing a dementia ward at the hospital. Horsham Horsham ( / ˈ h ɔːr ʃ ə m / ) is a market town on the upper reaches of
840-577: A pension from the crown and made warden of the Weald in reward for his services. The inhabitants of the Weald remained largely independent and hostile to outsiders during the next decades. In 1264 during the Second Barons' War , the royalist army of King Henry III of England marched through the Weald in order to force the submission of the Cinque Ports . Even though they were not aligned with
924-608: A place that is called Cymenshore . There they slew many of the Welsh; and some in flight they drove into the wood that is called Andred'sley. Until the Late Middle Ages the forest was a notorious hiding place for criminals. Settlements on the Weald are widely scattered. Villages evolved from small settlements in the woods, typically four to five miles (six to eight kilometres) apart; close enough to be an easy walk but not so close as to encourage unnecessary intrusion. Few of
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#17327973723691008-734: A place where four roads meet. The Carfax was formerly known as "Scarfoulkes", the derivation of which is uncertain. Two other places in England share the name: the Carfax in Oxford and the Carfax in Winchester. The town centre's south is the Causeway. This street consists of houses erected in the 17th, 18th, and early 19th century and is lined with ancient London Plane trees. The Horsham Museum
1092-735: A resource by people living on its fringes, much as in other places in Britain such as Dartmoor , the Fens and the Forest of Arden . The Weald was used for centuries, possibly since the Iron Age , for transhumance of animals along droveways in the summer months. Over the centuries, deforestation for the shipbuilding, charcoal, forest glass , and brickmaking industries has left the Low Weald with only remnants of that woodland cover. While most of
1176-517: A yellow roof sign and display a vehicle licence plate on the rear. Private Hire vehicles display a vehicle licence plate on the rear. The railway station is run by Southern , and is on the Arun Valley Line from Chichester to Crawley , Gatwick Airport and London Victoria . Trains on this line start from Bognor Regis and Portsmouth & Southsea or Southampton Central and divide or attach at Horsham. There are also services on
1260-473: Is a great deal of surface water: ponds and many meandering streams. Some areas, such as the flat plain around Crawley , have been utilised for urban use: here are Gatwick Airport and its related developments and the Horley -Crawley commuter settlements. Otherwise the Low Weald retains its historic settlement pattern, where the villages and small towns occupy harder outcrops of rocks. There are no large towns on
1344-434: Is a separate ecclesiastical parish with its own parish church — All Saints' Church on Crawley Road, designed in 1878 by Arthur Blomfield . It replaced a temporary building which was licensed for worship in 1856. Roffey Park Institute is based just outside of Horsham, near Colgate . Tower Hill is a hamlet that lies one mile south from Horsham on a ridge of land containing a sandstone known as Horsham Stone rising above
1428-621: Is at the north end opposite to the recently developed former headquarters of the RSPCA . At the south end of the Causeway is the Church of England parish church of St. Mary: Norman in origin, rebuilt in the 13th century and restored in 1864–65 by the Gothic revival architect S.S. Teulon . The area immediately to the south east of the parish church is known as Normandy. It was formerly an area of artisans cottages and an ancient well. A short walk along
1512-583: Is essential of late-Victorian construction, though preserving some aspects of the earlier buildings. It has been used as council offices and as a magistrates court and more recently housed the Horsham Registry Office on the upper floor. The ground floor was still used as an occasional market place until the Town Hall was closed to be let as a restaurant. Carfax contains the Town's Memorial to
1596-535: Is home to the following well known independent schools: The Weald The Weald ( / ˈ w iː l d / ) is an area of South East England between the parallel chalk escarpments of the North and the South Downs . It crosses the counties of Hampshire , Surrey , West Sussex , East Sussex , and Kent . It has three parts, the sandstone "High Weald" in the centre, the clay "Low Weald" periphery and
1680-536: Is the River Arun . On the northern bank is Prewett's Mill, and on the south side is the town's cricket field. East Street joins the A281 and passes under a railway bridge (the line from London Victoria to Littlehampton ). The road becomes Queen Street and the area becomes Iron Bridge (named after the railway bridge). The area consists of mainly Victorian and Edwardian houses to the north of Brighton Road, whilst to
1764-477: The Battle Abbey for the disloyalty of its tenants. In the first edition of On The Origin of Species , Charles Darwin used an estimate for the erosion of the chalk, sandstone and clay strata of the Weald in his theory of natural selection . Charles Darwin was a follower of Lyell's theory of uniformitarianism and decided to expand upon Lyell's theory with a quantitative estimate to determine if there
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#17327973723691848-592: The Greensand Ridge , which stretches around the north and west of the Weald and includes its highest points. The Weald once was covered with forest and its name, Old English in origin, signifies "woodland". The term is still used, as scattered farms and villages sometimes refer to the Weald in their names. The name "Weald" is derived from the Old English weald , meaning "forest" (cognate of German Wald , but unrelated to English "wood"). This comes from
1932-826: The Hastings Beds ) and the Weald Clay . The Wealden Group is overlain by the Lower Greensand and the Gault Formation, consisting of the Gault and the Upper Greensand . The rocks of the central part of the anticline include hard sandstones, and these form hills now called the High Weald . The peripheral areas are mostly of softer sandstones and clays and form a gentler rolling landscape,
2016-546: The Horsham district. There are two main tiers of local government covering Horsham, at district and county level: Horsham District Council and West Sussex County Council . Much of the built-up area of Horsham is an unparished area , but some of the suburbs are included in civil parishes , notably North Horsham . The town is the centre of the parliamentary constituency of Horsham , re-created in 1983. Jeremy Quin had served as Conservative Member of Parliament for Horsham since 2015, succeeding Francis Maude , who held
2100-542: The Local Government Act 1894 . The 1894 Act also said that parishes could no longer straddle district boundaries, and so the part of Horsham parish outside the urban district became a separate parish called Horsham Rural. Horsham Urban District was abolished in 1974, merging with surrounding districts to become the modern Horsham District, which covers a large rural area as well as the town itself. The Horsham Rural parish continued to exist until 1987 when it
2184-610: The Low Weald . The Weald–Artois Anticline continues some 40 miles (64 km) further south-eastwards under the Straits of Dover , and includes the Boulonnais of France . Many important fossils have been found in the sandstones and clays of the Weald, including, for example, Baryonyx . The famous scientific hoax of Piltdown Man was claimed to have come from a gravel pit at Piltdown near Uckfield . The first Iguanodon
2268-499: The Reform Act 1832 , which reduced Horsham's representation from two to one MPs and made elections less open to abuse. Following those reforms Horsham's borough corporation stopped functioning. Local government eventually returned to Horsham in 1875 when the central part of the parish, containing the town, was made a local government district , governed by a local board. Such districts were reconstituted as urban districts under
2352-460: The River Arun on the fringe of the Weald in West Sussex , England. The town is 31 miles (50 km) south south-west of London, 18.5 miles (30 km) north-west of Brighton and 26 miles (42 km) north-east of the county town of Chichester . Nearby towns include Crawley to the north-east and Haywards Heath and Burgess Hill to the south-east. It is the administrative centre of
2436-579: The South Downs National Park to the south. The River Arun rising from ghylls in the St Leonard's Forest area, to the east of Horsham, cuts through the south of the town then makes its way through Broadbridge Heath . The Arun is joined by a number of streams flowing down from the north, which rises around Rusper . The middle The name Carfax is likely of Norman origin – a corruption of 'Quatre Voies' (four ways) or 'Carrefour',
2520-735: The Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty . In extent it covers about 85 miles (137 km) from west to east, and about 30 miles (48 km) from north to south, covering an area of some 500 square miles (1,300 km ). The eastern end of the High Weald, the English Channel coast, is marked in the centre by the high sandstone cliffs from Hastings to Pett Level ; and by former sea cliffs now fronted by
2604-452: The Sutton and Mole Valley lines which start from Horsham, and run to London Victoria via Dorking , Epsom and Sutton . Thameslink also serves the town with a service from Horsham to Peterborough via London Bridge . In 2012, work finished expanding and modernising the station. Other stations within or near the town are Littlehaven (previously named Littlehaven Halt), in the northeast of
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2688-723: The long tunnel near Balcombe and the Ouse Valley Viaduct . Tributaries of the River Ouse provided some assistance in the building of now-closed East Grinstead - Lewes and the Uckfield -Lewes lines. The principal main-line railway to Hastings had to negotiate difficult terrain when it was first built, necessitating many sharp curves and tunnels; and similar problems had to be faced with the Ashford-Hastings line. Several long-distance footpaths criss-cross
2772-404: The 17th century, but wild breeding populations have recently returned in the Weald, following escapes from boar farms. The Weald has been associated with many writers, particularly in the 19th and early 20th centuries. These include Vita Sackville-West (1892–1962), Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) and Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936). The setting for A.A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh stories
2856-407: The High Weald in lime green (9a). The Low Weald , the periphery of the Weald, is shown as darker green on the map (9), and has an entirely different character. It is in effect the eroded outer edges of the High Weald, revealing a mixture of sandstone outcrops within the underlying clay. As a result, the landscape is of wide and low-lying clay vales with small woodlands ( "shaws" ) and fields. There
2940-623: The Iron Bridge, a steel structure that carries the railway to the south of Horsham. North Heath was originally used as a label to describe the northern part of the Horsham ancient parish (compared to Southwater to describe that part south of the River Arun ), this area was developed as a district in the latter part of the 20th century. An area of Horsham named after a feeder stream of the River Arun. It consists of residential housing,
3024-658: The London Road at North Parade. It consists chiefly of semi-detached houses with corner shops, most of which have closed. Until the mid-20th century, it was known as "The Common", after a piece of common land that survived enclosure in Trafalgar Road for many years. Trafalgar forms one of the wards of Horsham Hurst (electoral division) of the Horsham District Council . Horsham holds the UK record for
3108-500: The Low Weald, although Ashford , Sevenoaks and Reigate lie immediately on the northern edge. Settlements tend to be small and linear, because of its original wooded nature and heavy clay soils. The Weald is drained by the many streams radiating from it, the majority being tributaries of the surrounding major rivers: particularly the Mole , Medway , Stour , Rother , Cuckmere , Ouse , Adur and Arun . Many of these streams provided
3192-486: The Market Square is a much-adapted building originally dating from c. 1648 when it was referred to as a 'Market House'. In 1721 a new construction of Portland stone was built containing a poultry and butter market. The building fell into disrepair and was substantially rebuilt around 1812. In 1888 it became the property of Horsham Urban District Council and was again largely rebuilt. The present building
3276-632: The Pevensey and Romney Marshes on either side. Much of the High Weald , the central part, is designated as the High Weald Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Its landscape is described as one of rolling hills, studded with sandstone outcrops and cut by streams to form steep-sided ravines (called gills); small irregular-shaped fields and patches of heathland, abundant woodlands; scattered farmsteads and sunken lanes and paths. Ashdown Forest , an extensive area of heathland and woodland occupying
3360-590: The Sun had been burning for less than a million years, and put the outside limit of the age of the Earth at 200 million years. Based on these estimates he denounced Darwin's geological estimates as imprecise. Darwin saw Lord Kelvin's calculation as one of the most serious criticisms to his theory and removed his calculations on the Weald from the third edition of On the Origin of Species . Modern chronostratigraphy shows that
3444-705: The Weald Clays were laid down around 130 million years ago in the Early Cretaceous. The Weald begins north-east of Petersfield in Hampshire and extends across Surrey and Kent in the north, and Sussex in the south. The western parts in Hampshire and West Sussex, known as the Western Weald , are included in the South Downs National Park . Other protected parts of the Weald are included in
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3528-416: The Weald was used for transhumance by communities at the edge of the Weald, several parts of the forest on the higher ridges in the interior seem to have been used for hunting by the kings of Sussex . The pattern of droveways which occurs across the rest of the Weald is absent from these areas. These areas include St Leonard's Forest , Worth Forest, Ashdown Forest and Dallington Forest . The forests of
3612-548: The Weald were often used as a place of refuge and sanctuary. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle relates events during the Anglo-Saxon conquest of Sussex when the native Britons (whom the Anglo-Saxons called Welsh ) were driven from the coastal towns into the recesses of the forest for sanctuary,: A.D. 477. This year came Ælle to Britain, with his three sons, Cymen, and Wlenking, and Cissa , in three ships; landing at
3696-592: The Weald": The game of cricket may have originated prior to the 13th century in the Weald . The related game of stoolball is still popular in the Weald, it was originally played mainly by women's teams, but since the formation of the Sussex league at the beginning of the 20th century it has been played by both men and women. Several other areas in southern England have the name "Weald", including North Weald in Essex , and Harrow Weald in north-west London . "Wold"
3780-486: The Weald, and it is well-mapped recreationally, covered by routes from: Neither the thin infertile sands of the High Weald or the wet sticky clays of the Low Weald are suited to intensive arable farming and the topography of the area often increases the difficulties. There are limited areas of fertile greensand which can be used for intensive vegetable growing, as in the valley of the Western Rother . Historically
3864-414: The Weald. Sir Winston Churchill , British statesman and a prolific writer himself, did much of his writing at his country house, Chartwell , near Westerham , which has extensive views over the Weald. The view from the house was of crucial importance to Churchill; he once remarked, "I bought Chartwell for that view." In the early 21st century, Tunbridge Wells Borough Council promoted "Seven Wonders of
3948-565: The Weald. The entire Weald was originally heavily forested. According to the 9th-century Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , the Weald measured 120 miles (193 km) or longer by 30 miles (48 km) in the Saxon era, stretching from Lympne , near Romney Marsh in Kent, to the Forest of Bere or even the New Forest in Hampshire. The area was sparsely inhabited and inhospitable, being used mainly as
4032-548: The area of cereals grown has varied greatly with changes in prices, increasing during the Napoleonic Wars and during and since World War II . About 60% of the High Weald farmed land is grassland, with about 20% being arable. The Weald has its own breed of cattle, called the Sussex , although the breed has been as numerous in Kent and parts of Surrey. Bred from the strong hardy oxen, which continued to be used to plough
4116-552: The back of the centre and a mosaic in the middle. The shopping centre once enclosed the Capital Theatre which was built in the 1930s and was sandwiched between shops and a multi-storey car park from 1976 until its demolition in early 1983 when Marks & Spencer bought the site to build their store that opened in 1984. A shopping area and public square, the Forum, opened in 2003 to the south of West Street. Fifty metres south
4200-405: The banks of the Arun in a south-easterly direction is Chesworth Farm, an area of open public access. Swan Walk, a shopping centre which opened in 1976 and was enclosed with a glass roof in 1989 with the addition of Springfield Court. Swan Walk takes its name from the Swan Inn that once stood where the pedestrian area now enters West Street, the old name being honoured by the bronze swan statues to
4284-411: The boar in Hampstead . In 1216 during the First Barons' War , a guerilla force of archers from the Weald, led by William of Cassingham (nicknamed Willikin of the Weald), ambushed the French occupying army led by Prince Louis near Lewes and drove them to the coast at Winchelsea . The timely arrival of a French fleet allowed the French forces to narrowly escape starvation. William was later granted
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#17327973723694368-478: The building that is now a study centre in Hurst Road, Parkside and the whole of the St Mark's complex, and print and security centres in industrial estates sprinkled around Horsham, plus Tricourt House closer to the Carfax and now occupied by a housing association. West Sussex County Council has partially occupied parkside after Royal Sun Alliance vacated the building. Until 2015 the Swiss-based multinational pharmaceutical company Novartis , formerly Ciba-Geigy before
4452-426: The clay soils of the Low Weald longer than in most places, these red beef cattle were highly praised by Arthur Young in his book Agriculture of Sussex when visiting Sussex in the 1790s. William Cobbett commented on finding some of the finest cattle on some of the region's poorest subsistence farms on the High Weald. Pigs, which were kept by most households in the past, were able to be fattened in autumn on acorns in
4536-447: The dead of the two world wars as well as a substantial well-used bandstand. The Parish Church of St. Mary the Virgin is the oldest building in Horsham, having been in continuous use for nearly eight centuries. It is located at the end of the Causeway in Normandy, the oldest existing part of Horsham. It has a ring of ten bells. The earthworks of the eleventh-century Horsham or Chennelsbrook Castle can be found near Chennells Brook. At
4620-474: The district. This hamlet dates back to the late 18th century, when a small number of houses were in existence, with an inn opening in the early part of the 19th century. A station opened in the area in 1907, originally called Rusper Road Crossing halt, but later renamed Littlehaven . South-west of the town, the Needles estate was laid out from c. 1955, with a mixture of privately owned and council-built houses and bungalows. The land around Hills Farm nearby
4704-475: The exception of iron smelting, they are on a small scale and no longer employ large numbers of workers. In 2014 the important industries were financial services, pharmaceuticals, and technology. Horsham is a commuter town serving London, Gatwick Airport and the South East Coast. The town still has Saturday and Thursday markets on Carfax. Horsham's town centre has a reputation for small business and also provides multiple retail chain stores. Supermarkets serving
4788-486: The extensive oak woods. In his novel Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man , the poet and novelist Siegfried Sassoon refers to "the agricultural serenity of the Weald widespread in the delicate hazy sunshine". Viticulture has expanded quite rapidly across the Weald, where the climate and soil is well suited to the growing of grapes, with over 20 vineyards now in the Wealden district alone The Weald has largely maintained its wooded character, with woodland still covering 23% of
4872-452: The heaviest hailstone ever to fall. On 5 September 1958, a hailstone weighing 140g (4.9 oz) landed in the town. It was similar in size to a tennis ball and impact speeds have been calculated to be 100 m/s (224 mph). Horsham is a market town formerly trading in cattle, sheep, and corn. Its prosperity was built on industries that included brewing, brickmaking, iron-smelting, and printing. Although some of these survive, with
4956-467: The highest sandy ridge-top at the centre of the High Weald, is a former royal deer-hunting forest created by the Normans and said to be the largest remaining part of Andredesweald . There are centres of settlement, the largest of which are Horsham , Burgess Hill , East Grinstead , Haywards Heath , Tonbridge , Tunbridge Wells , Crowborough ; and the area along the coast from Hastings and Bexhill-on-Sea to Rye and Hythe . The geological map shows
5040-829: The main reason. Horsham lies at the junction of three main routes with the dual carriageway A24 running north to south route from London and Dorking to Worthing . The A264 links Horsham to Crawley and the M23 to the east by a modern dual carriageway and to the A29 to the west. The A281 runs between Guildford and Brighton . Bus services are provided by Metrobus , Stagecoach South , and Compass Travel to destinations such as Brighton , Crawley , Gatwick Airport , Dorking , Guildford , Worthing , Pulborough , Burgess Hill , Storrington and Haywards Heath . Taxis and Private Hire Taxi and private hire companies in Horsham are regulated by Horsham District Council . There are 2 types of licences Hackney Carriage and Private Hire Hackney Carriages are White in colour, have
5124-399: The majority of which is of late 20th-century origin. The suburb is substantial enough for two council wards. The hamlet around Old Holbrook House is immediately to the north of the A264, which abuts Holbrook. Holbrook House was previously the home of Sir William Vesey-Fitzgerald , Governor of Bombay and M.P. for Horsham (1852–1875). The Tithe Barn at Fivens Green is the most notable building in
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#17327973723695208-421: The more sedate, but busy A21 trunk road to Hastings is still beset with traffic delays, despite having had some new sections. Five railways once crossed the Weald, now reduced to three. Building them provided the engineers with difficulties in crossing the terrain, with the hard sandstone adding to their problems. The Brighton Main Line followed the same route as its road predecessors: although it necessitated
5292-404: The name Andredes weald , meaning "the forest of Andred", the latter derived from Anderida , the Roman name of present-day Pevensey . The area is also referred to in early English texts as Andredesleage , where the second element, leage, is another Old English word for "woodland", represented by the modern leigh . The adjective for "Weald" is "wealden". The Weald is the eroded remains of
5376-423: The original boundaries to incorporate some of the smaller hamlets which now form part of the outer districts. Oakhill was originally known as Grub Street, and developed south of Depot Road in the 19th century. In keeping with many other towns, new developments to the east of the town centre were rapid in the early Victorian era, and that area of the town became known, as it is today, as New Town. The area contains
5460-478: The original communities by the addition of the suffix " -den ": for example, Tenterden was the area used by the people of Thanet . Permanent settlements in much of the Weald developed much later than in other parts of lowland Britain, although there were as many as one hundred furnaces and forges operating by the later 16th century, employing large numbers of people. In the 12th century, the Weald still extended so far that citizens of London could hunt wild bull and
5544-415: The overall area (one of the highest levels in England) and the proportion is considerably higher in some central parts. The sandstones of the Wealden rocks are usually acidic, often leading to the development of acidic habitats such as heathland , the largest remaining areas of which are in Ashdown Forest and near Thursley . Although common in France , the wild boar became extinct in Great Britain by
5628-487: The power for the watermills , blast furnaces and hammers of the iron industry and the cloth mills. The M25 , M26 and M20 motorways all use the Vale of Holmesdale to the north, and therefore run along or near the northern edge of the Weald. The M23 / A23 road to Brighton , uses the western, narrower, part of the Weald where there are stream headwaters, crossing it from north to south. Other roads take similar routes, although they often have long hills and many bends:
5712-410: The rebellious barons, the Weald's natives – mostly operating as archers – opposed the royalist advance, using guerrilla warfare . Even though they were unable to stop the army, their attacks inflicted substantial losses on the royalists. In retribution, King Henry ordered the execution of any Weald archers who were captured alive, for instance beheading 300 after a local shot his cook. The king also fined
5796-480: The resultant clearance of the forest. With the Iron Age came the first use of the Weald as an industrial area. Wealden sandstones contain ironstone , and with the additional presence of large amounts of timber for making charcoal for fuel, the area was the centre of the Wealden iron industry from then, through the Roman times , until the last forge was closed in 1813. The index to the Ordnance Survey Map of Roman Britain lists 33 iron mines, and 67% of these are in
5880-403: The seat from 1997 but retired at the 2015 general election. Quin was defeated in the 2024 election. John Milne is the town's current MP. Horsham was an ancient parish in the Hundred of Singlecross in the Rape of Bramber . The parish covered the town and surrounding rural areas including Broadbridge Heath , Roffey and Southwater . The town was an ancient borough , being described as
5964-445: The settlements are mentioned in the Domesday Book ; however Goudhurst's church dates from the early 12th century or before and Wadhurst was big enough by the mid-13th century to be granted a royal charter permitting a market to be held. Before then, the Weald was used as summer grazing land, particularly for pannage by inhabitants of the surrounding areas. Many places within the Weald have retained names from this time, linking them to
6048-425: The south of Horsham. The main secondary schools in Horsham are: The College of Richard Collyer is the sixth form college serving Horsham. Founded in 1532, it is known more commonly as "Collyer's", and is situated on Hurst Road. As of July 2020, West Sussex County Council announced proposals to alter The Forest School from a single sex boys' school to a co-educational school from September 2021 entry. Horsham
6132-460: The south, there are areas of inter- and post-war housing. This area is known as the East Side. Horsham Park, a remnant of the former Hurst Park Estate, is in the northern end of the centre. The park has football pitches, a wildlife pond and tennis courts. Leisure facilities, including a swimming complex and a gymnastic centre, have been built on land around the park. Horsham has developed beyond
6216-570: The town in 1965 as Sun Alliance, becoming the town's biggest employer, at its peak, it employed 2,500 people, plus the specialised computer centre called Lennox Wood, sited in Southwater country park to which many of the original Horsham computer department staff were relocated. At its peak, the company occupied several smaller premises on the Carfax, Springfield House near St John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church,
6300-591: The town include branches of Tesco , Sainsbury's , Marks & Spencer , Lidl and Waitrose . In 2015, a new £8 million "Waitrose" and "John Lewis at Home" joint facility was opened after the closure of the smaller Waitrose that was formerly located in Piries Place. RSA Insurance Group , an insurance company, has its registered office in Horsham. Sun Alliance merged with Royal Insurance in 1996 to form Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance Group, then renamed RSA Insurance Group in 2008. The company first came to
6384-598: The town on the Arun Valley Line, and Christ's Hospital station serving the west of Horsham. Horsham is 20 km (12 mi) from Gatwick Airport and 65 km (40 mi) from Heathrow Airport . Cyclists, pedestrians, and horseriders can reach Guildford and Shoreham via the Downs Link , a long-distance bridleway and cycle route which follows the now disused Horsham-Guildford, and Horsham-Shoreham railway lines and passes through Southwater , just to
6468-560: The town. A quarry existed here from 1830 to 1876. Tower Hill consists of housing dating from medieval to late 20th century. It has a public house called the Boar's Head, formerly the Fox and Hounds. The economic importance of quarrying Horsham Stone to Horsham in the 19th century has left a legacy of toponyms including Stone Pit Field, Stone Barn, Stonyhurst and Stone Pit Wood. An area of late 19th and early 20th centuries development on land west of
6552-473: The west end of the town centre formerly stood a kinetic water sculpture called the ' Rising Universe ', colloquially known as 'The Shelley Fountain'. It was designed by Angela Conner , and erected to commemorate the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley who was born at Field Place in Broadbridge Heath, near Warnham , two miles west from Horsham centre. The fountain was designed to release a torrent of six and
6636-584: Was divided into the parishes of Broadbridge Heath, North Horsham and Southwater, subject to some adjustments to the boundaries with neighbouring parishes at the same time. Horsham is 50 metres (160 ft) above sea level. It is in the centre of the Weald in the Low Weald, at the western edge of the High Weald , with the Surrey Hills of the North Downs to the north and the Sussex Downs of
6720-441: Was enough time in the history of the Earth to uphold his principles of evolution. He assumed the rate of erosion was around one inch per century and calculated the age of the Weald at around 300 million years. Were that true, he reasoned, the Earth itself must be much older. In 1862, William Thomson (later Lord Kelvin) published a paper "On the age of the sun's heat", in which – unaware of the process of solar fusion – he calculated
6804-464: Was identified after the fossil collector and illustrator Mary Ann Mantell supposedly unearthed some fossilised teeth by a road in Sussex in 1822. Her husband, the geologist Gideon Mantell sent them to various experts and this important find led to the discovery of dinosaurs. The area contains significant reserves of shale oil , totalling 4.4 billion barrels of oil in the Wealden basin according to
6888-469: Was inspired by Ashdown Forest , near Milne's country home at Hartfield . John Evelyn (1620–1706), whose family estate was Wotton House on the River Tillingbourne near Dorking , Surrey, was an essayist, diarist, and early author of botany, gardening and geography. The second half of E. M. Forster's A Room with a View takes place at the protagonist's family home, "Windy Corner", in
6972-572: Was sold for development in 1972 and further development took place in the 1980s. The Needles are named after a local farmhouse, built using timbers from ships wrecked on the Needles rocks off the Isle of Wight . Roffey is north east of the centre of Horsham and as a hamlet dates back to at least the 13th century, with taxation records of 1296 showing 18 liable people in the area. Kelley's Post Office Directory for 1867 describes 'Roughey' as consisting 'of
7056-469: Was turned off again after that Christmas. In May 2008 the fountain was turned off again due to the failure of its main hydraulic cylinder. On 19 January 2009 the fountain was fenced off for repairs. It was reopened without the fountain functioning. The fountain was again repaired at the start of March 2011 at a cost of more than £30,000 and was removed altogether in June 2016 with cost of upkeep being cited as
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