Abbots Langley


Abbots Langley is a large village and civil parish in the English county of Hertfordshire. It is an old settlement and is mentioned in the Domesday Book. Economically the village is closely linked to Watford and was formerly part of the Watford Rural District. Since 1974 it has been included in the Three Rivers district.
WWW Official Site

History

This village has had a long history of human habitation. The first traces of human habitation in the area were recorded by archaeologist Sir John Evans. The village sits on a saucer of clay covered by a layer of gravel, and as a result water supply has never been a problem; records show that in earlier times water could be drawn from a well just deep.
In 1045 the Saxon thegn Ethelwine "the Black" granted the upper part of Langlai to St Albans Abbey as Langlai Abbatis the remainder being the king's Langlai. By the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 the village was inhabited by 19 families.
The area was split into four manors: Abbots Langley, Langleybury, Chambersbury, and Hyde. In 1539, Henry VIII seized Abbots Langley and sold it to his military engineer Sir Richard Lee. The Manor of Abbots Langley was bequeathed by Francis Combe in his will of 1641 jointly to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge and Trinity College, Oxford.
The manors of Langleybury and Chambersbury passed through the family of William Ibgrave, the king's embroider, and the Child family, and in 1711 were conveyed to Sir Robert Raymond then Solicitor General later Attorney General and Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench. On the death of his son without issue in 1756 the manors passed to the Filmer family.
The Manor of Hyde passed to Edward Strong in 1714, through his daughter to Sir John Strange, who left the manor to be shared between his children and their descendants and then to the possession of F.M. Nares & Co which sold the estate to the British Land Company in 1858.
On Tibbs Hill Road there is a well-preserved example of a Prince Albert's Model Cottage. The original design and construction was for the Great Exhibition of 1851, to demonstrate model housing for the poor. Subsequently, the design was replicated in several other locations, including Abbots Langley.
Kitters Green developed as a separate hamlet by Manor House. The land between Kitters Green and Abbots Langley was bought from the estate of Sarah Smith by the British Land Company in 1866. It laid out plots for development along Adrian, Breakspear, Garden and Popes roads. The development of these plots led to the merger of the two settlements and the loss of Kitters Green's separate identity.
The West Coast Main Line railway passes through the western edge of the parish, where it crosses Abbots Langley railway bridge, a skewed brick arch, and Nash Mills railway bridge, originally built in cast iron but strengthened in the 1960s by encasing it in concrete. Both bridges are original features from the London and Birmingham Railway. They date from 1837 and are both Grade II listed buildings.

Sport

Abbots Langley Cricket Club and Langleybury Cricket Club are both based in the village. There are a number of football clubs, including Abbots Langley F.C., Ecocall F.C., Evergreen, Everett Rovers, and Bedmond F.C.

People