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- source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
- source: Family History Library Catalog
- source: Family History Library Catalog
- the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia
Rickmansworth is a town in southwest Hertfordshire, England, about northwest of central London and inside the perimeter of the M25 motorway. The town is mainly to the north of the Grand Union Canal (formerly the Grand Junction Canal) and the River Colne. The town of Watford is to the northeast. Rickmansworth is the administrative seat of the Three Rivers District Council. The confluence of the River Chess and the River Gade with the Colne in Rickmansworth inspired the district's name. The enlarged Colne flows south to form a major tributary of the River Thames. The town is served by the Metropolitan line of the London Underground and Chiltern Railways from London Marylebone to Aylesbury.
A nineteenth-century description
A Vision of Britain through Time provides the following description of Rickmansworth from John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72:
- "RICKMANSWORTH, a small town, a parish, and a [registration] sub-district, in Watford [registration] district, Herts. The town stands at the confluence of the rivers Chess and Colne, on the Grand Junction canal, and at the terminus of the Watford and Rickmansworth railway, 3¾ miles W by S of Watford; was originally called Richmeresweorth; has pleasant environs; attracts many anglers, for sake of sport in the neighbouring waters; is irregularly laid out; was once a market-town; and has a head post-office, designated Rickmansworth, Herts, a railway station, a banking office, a good inn, a timbered market house on pillars, a church, Baptist and Wesleyan chapels, an endowed school with £24 a year, alms-houses with £10, other charities £32, an extensive brewery, a silk mill, four paper mills, cattle fairs on 20 July and 24 Nov., and a fair on the Saturday before the third Monday of Sept. The church is large and good, with ancient embattled tower; has a fine painted window, 300 years old, brought from a church at Rouen; and contains a brass of 1585, and monuments of the Duke of Monmouth, the Fother-leys, the Coltes, and the Earles. The Wesleyan chapel was rebuilt in 1866, at a cost of about £2,500; is in the early English style; and has an octagonal tower and spire 75 feet high. The parish contains also Mill-End, Croxley-Green, West Hyde, Batchworth, and Chorley-Wood. Acres: 9,937. Real property: £26,550; of which £150 are in gas-works. Population: 4,873. Houses: 1,004. The property is much divided. The chief manor belonged to the Saxon kings; was given by Offa to St. Albans abbey; went, at the dissolution, to Bishop Ridley; was given, by Mary, to Bishop Bonner; reverted, in the time of Elizabeth, to the Crown; and passed to the Fotherleys and the Whitfields. Moor Park was formerly the residence of Cardinal Wolsey and the Duke of Monmouth; and is now the seat of Lord Ebury. Rickmansworth Park is the seat of J. Arden, Esq. There are several other good residences. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Rochester. Value: £510. Patron: the Bishop of Rochester. The [perpetual] curacies of West Hyde and Chorley-Wood are separate benefices. Baptist chapels are at Mill-End and Chorley-Wood.
- "The sub-district contains also Sarratt parish, and comprises 11,487 acres. Population: 5,609. Houses: 1,146.
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