Horsham
Horsham is a market town on the upper reaches of the River Arun on the fringe of the Weald, in West Sussex, England. The town lies south-south-west of London, north-west of Brighton and 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 the Horsham district.
History
Governance
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, recreated in 1983. Jeremy Quin had served as Conservative Member of Parliament for Horsham since 2015, succeeding Francis Maude, who held 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.
Administrative history
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 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 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 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 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.
Geography
Horsham lies 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 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.Town centre
The name Carfax is likely of Norman origin – a corruption of 'Quatre Voies' or 'Carrefour', 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 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 the banks of the Arun in a south-easterly direction is Chesworth Farm, an area of open public access.
Swan Walk is a shopping centre which opened in 1976 and was enclosed with a glass roof in 1989 with the addition of Springfield Court. It 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 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 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 road becomes Queen Street and the area becomes Iron Bridge. The area consists of mainly Victorian and Edwardian houses to the north of Brighton Road, whilst to 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.
Suburbs
Horsham has developed beyond 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 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, this area was developed as a district in the latter part of the 20th century.
Holbrook
An area of Horsham named after a feeder stream of the River Arun. It consists of residential housing, 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. The Tithe Barn at Fivens Green is the most notable building in the district.Littlehaven
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.Needles
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 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
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 a few farmhouses and cottages. Here is an iron church, capable of accommodating 80 persons'. Maps of the 1880s show Roffey Corner, 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; it is shown in the location now known as Wimland Road. Roffey 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.