Place:Crawley, Sussex, England

Watchers
NameCrawley
Alt namesBewbushsource: neighbourhood within borough
Broadfieldsource: neighbourhood within borough
Furnace Greensource: neighbourhood within borough
Gossops Greensource: neighbourhood within borough
Langley Greensource: neighbourhood within borough
Lowfield Heathsource: abandoned neighbourhood within borough
Maidenbowersource: neighbourhood within borough
Manor Royalsource: industrial zone
Northgatesource: neighbourhood within borough
Pound Hillsource: neighbourhood within borough
Southgatesource: neighbourhood within borough
Three Bridgessource: neighbourhood within borough
Tilgatesource: neighbourhood within borough
West Greensource: neighbourhood within borough
Worth Villagesource: neighbourhood within borough
TypeParish, Borough (municipal)
Coordinates51.117°N 0.183°W
Located inSussex, England
Also located inWest Sussex, England     (1865 - )
See alsoLewes Rape, Sussex, Englandrape in which it was located
Buttinghill Hundred, Sussex, Englandhundred in which it was located
Horsham Rural, Sussex, Englandrural district 1894-1956
source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names
source: Family History Library Catalog
source: Family History Library Catalog



the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Crawley is a large town and borough in West Sussex, England. It is 28 miles (45 km) south of central London, 18 miles (29 km) north of the city of Brighton and Hove, and 32 miles (51 km) northeast of the county town of Chichester. Crawley covers an area of 17.36 square miles (44.96 km2) and had a population of 106,597 at the time of the UK census of 2011.

The area has been inhabited since the Stone Age, and was a centre of ironworking in Roman times. Crawley developed slowly as a market town from the 13th century, serving the surrounding villages in the Weald. Its location on the main road from London to Brighton brought passing trade, which encouraged the development of coaching inns. A rail link to London opened in 1841.

A mid 19th century Crawley is described by John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales of 1870-72 (provided by the website A Vision of Britain Through Time (University of Portsmouth Department of Geography)).

"CRAWLEY, a village and a parish in East Grinstead [registration] district, Sussex. The village stands adjacent to the Horsham railway, 1½ mile WSW of the Three Bridges Junction, near the boundary with Surrey, 7½ miles W by S of East Grinstead; has been much improved and extended since the forming of the railway; and has a head post office, a railway station, two inns, a church, an Independent chapel, a Baptist chapel, a Roman Catholic chapel, and fairs on 8 May and 9 Sept. The church is decorated English, with a square tower; and has been restored. The Roman Catholic chapel, with conventual buildings, was erected in 1861, at a cost of £5,000; but is very plain. The parish comprises 770 acres. Real property: £1,171. Population: 473. Houses: 88. The property is subdivided. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Chichester. Value: £116. Patrons: the Heirs of Mrs. Clitherow.

Gatwick Airport, nowadays one of Britain's busiest international airports, opened on the edge of the town in the 1940s, encouraging commercial and industrial growth. After the Second World War, the British Government planned to move large numbers of people and jobs out of London and into new towns around South East England. The New Towns Act 1946 designated Crawley as the site of one of these. A master plan was developed for the establishment of new residential, commercial, industrial and civic areas, and rapid development greatly increased the size and population of the town over a few decades.

The town contains 13 residential neighbourhoods radiating out from the core of the old market town, and separated by main roads and railway lines. The nearby communities of Ifield, Pound Hill and Three Bridges were absorbed into the new town at various stages in its development. In 2009, expansion was being planned in the west and northwest of the town, in cooperation with nearby Horsham District Council. Economically, the town has developed into the main centre of industry and employment between London and the south coast. Its large industrial area supports manufacturing and service companies, many of them connected with the airport. The commercial and retail sectors continue to expand. Image:Crawley Neighbourhoods.png

The colours on the map replicate those used for street signs in the individual neighbourhoods.

Neighbourhoods

Bewbush (8)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Bewbush is one of the town's 13 designated neighbourhoods. Bewbush is located in southwest Crawley and is bordered by Broadfield to the south, Ifield to the north and Gossops Green to the northeast. According to the UK census the neighbourhood had a population of 9,083 in 2001 and 8,865 in 2011.

Broadfield (7)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Broadfield is a neighbourhood within the town of Crawley. It is located in the southwest of the town and is bordered by Bewbush to the north, Southgate to the northeast and Tilgate to the east. Broadfield was built in several stages and is relatively densely populated. According to the UK census the population was 12,679 in 2001 and 13,216 in 2011.

Broadfield Park was part of the Tilgate Estate. Broadfield House was the hunting lodge for the estate, and the park contains a small lake and some woods.

Furnace Green (5)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Furnace Green is one of the 13 designated neighbourhoods of Crawley and is located to the east of the town centre. It is bordered by Tilgate to the southwest, Three Bridges to the north and Maidenbower to the east (on the other side of the London-Brighton railway line). According to the UK census the population of the neighbourhood was 5,736 in 2001 and 5,499 in 2011.

The name Furnace Green is a reference to the iron smelting which is reputed to have taken place in Roman times - the local public house is the "Charcoal Burner".

Gossops Green (11)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Gossops Green is a neighbourhood located in the west of the town and is bordered by Bewbush to the southwest, Ifield to the north and Southgate to the east across the ring road. According to the UK census the population in 2001 was 5,017 and in 2011 was 5,252.

Ifield (9)

Ifield has its own article in WeRelate.

Langley Green (1)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Langley Green is a neighbourhood located in the northwest of the town and is bordered by Manor Royal to the east, Northgate to the south east, West Green to the south across the ring road and Ifield to the west. Its northern border is the county border with Surrey.

Lowfield Heath (not on map)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Lowfield Heath is a former village within the boundaries of the Borough of Crawley. Situated on the main London to Brighton road approximately 27 miles (43 km) south of London and 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Crawley, it was gradually rendered uninhabitable by the expansion of London Gatwick Airport immediately to the north.

Maidenbower (4)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Maidenbower is a neighbourhood located in the southeast corner of the town, bordering the M23 motorway. It is bordered by Pound Hill to the north and Furnace Green to the west across the railway line. Maidenbower's population was 8,071 in 2001 and 9,360 in 2011 (figures from UK census statistics).

Maidenbower is the newest of the neighbourhoods in Crawley and was built between 1986 and 2000. The original 16th-century Frogshole farm building, unlike the adjoining Maidenbower farm that gave the area its name, remains as the public house for the neighbourhood.

In September 2006, close to one of the entrance roads to Maidenbower leading from the Balcombe Road, a large piece of public art was installed. A community project, it was created in five pieces by the four schools in the neighbourhood and one piece by the community. The pieces fit together like a giant jigsaw puzzle to form an outline representing a map of the neighbourhood. The streams that run through it create the joins between each of the pieces. The overall theme of the piece is the history and development of Maidenbower.

Manor Royal (not shown on map)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Manor Royal is an industrial zone within Crawley opened in 1950. It is in the north of the town near to Gatwick airport. The area is devoted to light industry and offices and was designed for industry as part of the Crawley new town project.

It is bordered by Northgate and Three Bridges to the south, Langley Green to the west, Gatwick to the north and the London - Brighton railway to the east. The area falls largely within the local government ward of Northgate (2).

Wikipedia lists the major firms with premises in the zone.

Northgate (2)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Northgate includes the town centre of Crawley. It is bordered by West Green to the west, Langley Green to the north, Three Bridges to the east and Southgate to the south. According to the UK census Northgate had a population of 4,409 in 2001 and 5,298 in 2011.

Pound Hill (3)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Pound Hill is the largest of the neighbourhoods and the most northerly, located to the northeast of the centre. It is bordered by Three Bridges and Manor Royal to the west and Maidenbower to the south. The ward of Pound Hill North had a population of 6,744 in 2001 and 6.733 in 2011 (UK Census statistics)

Southgate (12)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Southgate is one of the earliest of the 13 residential neighbourhoods in Crawley, one of the four in the "inner ring" closest to the town centre, and intended to be the largest of the nine designed in the original master plan. It was built in two stages between the 1950s and the 1970s, but retains some older buildings from before the New Town era and has "significant areas of pre-New Town character".

The area was originally settled by pre-Roman people, and industrial and other artefacts from that era were found during construction of the neighbourhood. In the 19th century, after Crawley was connected to the national railway network, housing developed south of the line around the Brighton Road, which divides the modern neighbourhood in two. The population at the time of the UK census 2011 was 8,533.

Three Bridges (13)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Three Bridges was a tiny hamlet, which first began to grow with the coming of the London and Brighton Railway in 1841. Despite beliefs to the contrary, the village was not named after rail bridges, but three much older crossings over tributaries of the local River Mole.

The hamlet became the site of an important railway junction in 1848 with the opening of the branch line to Horsham and thence to Portsmouth. The railway established a motive power depot and marshalling yards to the south of the village. A further branch line to East Grinstead was opened in 1855. The village changed radically with the coming of the New town development in the Crawley area in the late 1940s. Three Bridges was one of the first group of neighbourhoods to be built. The population according to the 2001 UK census was 5,654; increasing to 7,253 in 2011.

Tilgate (6)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Tilgate is bordered by the districts of Furnace Green to the northeast, Southgate to the northwest and Broadfield to the southwest. It had a population of 6,198 in 2001 and 6,078 in 2011 (UK census figures).

West Green (10)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

West Green was the first neighbourhood to be developed, and is one of the smallest and closest to the town centre. Its population in 2001 was 4,394; in 2011 5,120 (UK census figures).

Worth Village (not shown on map)

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

Worth village is now an area within the neighbourhood of Pound Hill in the borough of Crawley. It was formerly a separate village, and its name is still used for the civil parish in which it was originally situated.

Worth village has Saxon origins and its church still retains its Saxon floor plan. The Wealden iron industry flourished here in the 17th and 18th centuries. The coming of the railway in 1855 brought more employment to the area, but the line closed in 1967.

Worth Park House, a large country house, once stood on the Milton Mount housing estate, now part of Pound Hill, Crawley. The house was home to Sir Joseph Montefiore (1803-1893) and his family. The gardens have recently been restored.

The ward of Pound Hill South and Worth had a population of 7,967 in 2001 and 8,244 in 2011 (UK census statistics)

History

For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Crawley#History.

Research Tips

  • The West Sussex Record Office is located in Chichester. Because it holds the records of the Church of England Diocese of Chichester, which covers the whole of Sussex, it has church records relating to both parts of Sussex.
  • An on-line catalogue for some of the collections held by the West Sussex Record Office is available under the Access to Archives (A2A) project (a nationwide facility housed at The National Archives, Kew).
  • West Sussex Past - database of 2 million records from West Sussex heritage organizations.
  • The Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies' Sussex Collection (PDF). This is a 9-page PDF naming the files relating to Sussex in their collection-a possible first step in a course of research.
  • The National Library of Scotland has a website which provides maps taken from the Ordnance Survey England & Wales One-Inch to the Mile series of 1892-1908 as well as equivalent maps for Scotland itself. The immediate presentation is a "help" screen and a place selection screen prompting the entry of a location down to town, village or parish level. These screens can be removed by a click of the "X". The map is very clear and shows parish and county boundaries and many large buildings and estates that existed at the turn of the 20th century. Magnification can be adjusted and an "overlay feature" allows inspection of the area today along with that of 1900. The specific map from the series can be viewed as a whole ("View this map") and this allows the inspection of the map legend (found in the left hand bottom corner. Becoming familiar with the various facilities of these maps is well worth the trouble.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Bewbush, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Broadfield, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Furnace Green, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Gossops Green, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Langley Green, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Lowfield Heath, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Maidenbower, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Northgate, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Pound Hill, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Southgate, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Three Bridges, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Tilgate, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at West Green, Crawley. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
This page uses content from the English Wikipedia. The original content was at Worth, West Sussex#Worth Village. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with WeRelate, the content of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.