Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/808

Rh 772 county and one for the liberty of St Albans, which liberty had also a separate commission of the peace, but the county and the liberty are now amalgamated, though prisoners are tried both at Hertford and St Albans. The jail for the county is at the latter city. The county is divided into fifteen petty sessional divisions, and for some purposes into two divisions, those of Hertford and the liberty of St Albans. The boroughs of Hertford and St Albans have com missions of the peace. Ecclesiastically the county is in the diocese of St Albans, and contains 138 civil parishes, townships, or places, as well as parts of other parishes extending into adjoining counties. The total population in 1871 was 192,226, of whom 93,244 were males and 98,982 females. The population in 1861 was 173,280. Since the first census in 1801 it has increased by 94,833, or 97 per cent. History and Antiquities. Previous to the Roman invasion the Celtic inhabitants of Hertfordshire, as of the other parts of South Britain, had been subdued by the Belgre. In 54 B.C. Cassivelaunus, the chief of the Cassii, led an army to oppose C?esar, but he was de feated, and his capital Verulam, near the present town of St Albans, taken. At Verulam and Berk ham pstead traces of ancient British works may yet be seen ; and it has been conjectured that British stations existed at Royston, Braughing, and various other places in the county. Numerous British coins have been found at Verulam. Three principal British roads or trackways crossed the county : Watling Street passed through its south-west corner, in a north west direction by St Albans to Dunstable ; Ermine Street entered the south-east corner at Little Hookgate, whence it proceeded by Cough s Oak and Broxbourne Bury to Ware, holding thence much the same course as the present road by Buntingford to Royston ; Icknield Street, from Dunstable to Royston, crossed the north-west corner. There are numerous barrows at Royston, and along the range of chalk hills at the northern edge of the county. Hertfordshire was the scene of an important part of the struggle carried on against the Romans by Caractacus about 44 A.r. ; and during the rebellion of Boadicea the Romans were defeated on the road from Verulam to Colchester, and Verulam itself was taken and devastated by the Britons. The shire was included within the Roman province cf Plavia. Among the Roman stations within its limits were the capital Verulamium, which the Romans rebuilt and fortified ; Forum Diance, not far from Dunstable ; Ad Fines, supposed to have been near Braughing, where there are remains of a vallum with fosse ; and pro bably others at Royston and Bishop Stortford. &quot;Watling Street and Ermine Street were causewayed as Roman roads, and other branch roads traversed the county in various directions. Roman antiquities have been found at Verulam, Braughing, Royston, Wilbury Hill (where there are remains of an ancient camp), Cheshunt, Hemel-Hempstead, and Bishop Stortford. After the conquest of England by the Anglo-Saxons, Hertfordshire was included partly in Mercia and partly in Essex. It was the scene of frequent contests between the Saxons and the Danes. In 896 the Danes, having an chored their vessels in the Lea near the town of Ware, laid siege to Hertford, whereupon Alfred the Great, by dividing the stream into three channels, stranded their vessels and compelled them to retreat to the Severn. After the battle of Senlac in 1066, William the Conqueror, in order to force the earls to hurry home from London to their earldoms, crossed the Thames at Wallingford and marched into Hertfordshire, where at Berkhampstead an attempt was made by the abbot of St Albans to stop his course by cutting down the trees ; and at a meeting of nobles held at the town he took an oath to rule according to the ancient laws and customs of the country. The subsequent events of historic importance connected with the county are the capture of Hertford castle by the revolted barons under the French dauphin, December 6, 1216 ; the battle between the royalists and the armies of the White Rose at St Albans, May 22, 1455, in which Henry VI. was wounded and taken prisoner; a second battle near St Albans, 17th February 1461, in which the earl of Warwick was defeated by Queen Margaret ; the defeat near Barnet of the earl of Warwick by Edward IV., 14th April 1471 ; and the arrest by Cromwell of the high sheriff of the county as he was proceeding to St Albans for the purpose of proclaiming by order of Charles I. that all the Parliamentary commanders were rebels and traitors. Among the objects of antiquarian interest may be mentioned the cave of Royston, rediscovered in 1742, doubtless at one time used as a hermitage, and containing rude carvings of the crucifixion and other sacred subjects ; Waltham cross, in the Pointed style of architecture, (restored in 1833), erected to mark the spot where rested the body of Eleanor, Queen of Edward I., on its way to Westminster for inter ment ; and the Great Bed of Ware referred to in Shakespeare s Twelfth Night, for many years shown to visitors at the Crown Inn of that town, and in September 1864 put up to auction at the Saracen s Head for 100 guineas andbought in. The principal monastic buildings are the noble pile of St Albans abbey, founded about 793 in honour of the first Christian martyr of Great Britain ; the remains of Sopwell Benedictine nunnery near St Albans, founded in 1140 ; the remains of the priory of Ware, dedicated to St Francis, and originally a cell to the monastery of St Ebrulf at Utica in Normandy ; and the remains of the priory at Hitchin built by Edward II. for the- White Carmelites. Among the more interesting churches may bo mentioned those of Abbots Langley and Hemel-Hempstead, both of Late Norman architecture ; Baldock, a handsome Gothic build ing supposed to have been erected by the Knights Templars in the reigu of Stephen ; Royston, formerly connected with the priory of the canons regular ; Hitchin, built in the 15th ceuturj on the site of an older structure, with a fine porch in the Perpendicular style and an altarpiece by Rubens ; Hatfieli], dating from the 13th century ; Berkhampstead, chiefly in the Perpendicular style, with a tower of the 16th century. The ruins of secular buildings of importance are the massive remains of Berkhampstead castle, Hertford castle, Hatfield palace, the slight traces at Bishop Stortford, and the earthworks at Anstie. Of the numerous mansions of interest only a few can be mentioned : the Rye House, erected in the reign of Henry VI., tenanted by Rumbold, one of the principal agents in the plot to assassinate diaries II. ; Moor Park, Riekmansworth, at one time the property of St Albans abbey, granted by Henry VII. to John de Vere, earl of Oxford, for some time in the possession of Cardinal Wolsey and subsequently of the duke of Monmouth, who built the present mansion, which, how ever, after it was sold by the duchess of Monmouth to Mr Styles, was cased with Portland stone, and received various other additions at a cost of 150,000 ; Knebworth, the seat of the Lyttons, originally a Norman fortress, rebuilt in the time of Elizabeth in the Tudor style, and restored in the present century ; Hatfield House, the manor of which was granted to the abbey of St Ethelred at Ely by King Edgar, and with the palace was made over to Henry VIII., fn;m whose reign it remained a royal residence until the time of James I., who exchanged it for the palace of Theobalds with Sir Robert Cecil, afterwards earl of Salisbury, by whom the present mansion in the Elizabethan style was erected, being founded in 1611 ; Panshangcr House, now the principal seat of the Cowpers, a splendid mansion in the Gothic style erected at the beginning of the present century ; Cashiobury House, the seat of the earls of Essex, supposed to derive its name from the old British tribe Cassii, and the manor of which was formerly held by the abbot of St Albans, rebuilt in the beginning of the present century from designs by Wyatt, some what resembling those of Windsor Castle ; Gorhambury House, formerly the seat of the Bacons, and the residence of the great chancellor, but rebuilt by the Grimstons. Among the eminent persons connected with the county were Nicholas Brakespeare (Pope Adrian IV.), Francis Bacon, Sir John Mandeville, William Cowper, diaries Lamb, and Lord Lytton. The old histories of Hertfordshire by Cox, Salmon, and Chauncey have been superseded by the splendid work of C lutterbuck, 3 vols. folio, 1815-27, and the laborious compilation now in course of publication by John Edwin Cussans. HERTFORD, a town of England, capital of the above county, is situated in a sheltered valley on the river Lea, and on the Great Northern and Great Eastern Railways, 26 miles north of London by rail. It is somewhat irre gularly built, but is neat, clean, and well-paved. The principal buildings are the shire-house or town-hall, erected on the site of the former edifice, and finished in 1771 ; the corn exchange, erected in 1858; the church of All Saints recently restored, a cruciform structure of the 14th century, with a square tower surmounted by a spire ; the new church of St Andrews, occupying the site of the old one; the brick edifice which occupies the site of the ancient castle, and includes some portions of the old building ; and the in firmary. The county jail has lately been sold under the provisions of the new Prisons Act. There are a large num ber of educational institutions, including the preparatory school for Christ s Hospital, London ; Hale s grammar school for boys, the Cowper Testimonial school for boys, the Abel Smith Memorial school for girls, and the Green Coat school for boys and girls of poor parents who have never received alms. The town depends for its prosperity chiefly on agriculture. The trade is principally in wheat and wool, and a large quantity of malt is made for the London breweries. There are also breweries, iron foundries, and flour and oil mills. The population of the municipal borough in 1871 was 7169, and of the parliamentary borough 7894. The area of the municipal borough is 864 acres, and of the parliamentary borough 1123 acres. The name Hertford is identified byBede vrit b.fferudford, meaning red ford, but more probably it is a corruption of Hereford, meaning army ford, and indeed it is spelt in this way by Saxon authorities and in some monastic charters. In 673 a council was convened at Hertford by Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, at which two