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Hertfordshire
Flag of Hertfordshire
Motto of County Council: Trust and fear not
Geography
Status	Ceremonial and non-metropolitan county
Origin	Historic
Region	East of England[1]
Area - Total - Admin. council	Ranked 36th 1,643 km2 (634 sq mi) Ranked 32nd
Admin HQ	Hertford
ISO 3166-2	GB-HRT
ONS code	26
NUTS 3	UKH23
Demography
Population - Total (2010 est.) - Density - Admin. council	Ranked 14th 1,107,600 674 /km2 (1,750 /sq mi) Ranked 6th
Ethnicity	88.8% White British 1.7% White Irish 3.2% White Other 1.6% Indian
Politics
Arms of Hertfordshire County Council Hertfordshire County Council http://www.hertsdirect.org/
Executive	Conservative
Members of Parliament	James Clappison (C) David Gauke (C) Richard Harrington (C) Oliver Heald (C) Peter Lilley (C) Anne Main (C) Stephen McPartland (C) Mike Penning (C) Mark Prisk (C) Grant Shapps (C) Charles Walker (C)
Districts
Three Rivers Watford Hertsmere Welwyn Hatfield Broxbourne East Hertfordshire Stevenage North Hertfordshire St Albans Dacorum

Hertfordshire (ⁱ/ˈhɑrtfərdʃɪər/ or /ˈhɑrfərdʃər/; abbreviated Herts) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England. The county town is Hertford.

Hertfordshire is one of the home counties and lies inland, bordered by Greater London (to the south), Buckinghamshire (to the west), Bedfordshire (including the unitary authorities of Luton and Central Bedfordshire to the north), Cambridgeshire (to the north east) and Essex (to the east).

History[link]

Hertfordshire was originally the area assigned to a fortress constructed at Hertford under the rule of Edward the Elder in 913. The name Hertford is derived from the Anglo-Saxon heort ford, meaning deer crossing (of a watercourse). The name Hertfordshire first appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in 1011. Deer feature prominently in many county emblems.

There is evidence of human beings living in Hertfordshire since the Middle Stone Age. It was first farmed during the Neolithic period and permanent habitation appeared at the beginning of the Bronze Age. This was followed by tribes settling in the area during the Iron Age.

Following the Roman conquest of Britain in AD 43, the aboriginal Catuvellauni quickly submitted and adapted to the Roman life; resulting in the development of several new towns, including Verulamium (St Albans). It was here in c.293 that the first British martyrdom took place. St. Alban, an Anglo-Roman soldier, took the place of a Christian priest and was beheaded on Holywell Hill. His martyr's cross of a yellow saltire on a blue background is reflected in the flag and coat of arms of Hertfordshire as the yellow background to the stag or Hart representing the county. He is the Patron Saint of Hertfordshire.

With the departure of the Roman Legions in the early 5th century, the now unprotected territory was invaded and colonised by the Anglo-Saxons. By the 6th century the majority of the modern county was part of the East Saxon kingdom. This relatively short lived kingdom collapsed in the 9th century, ceding the territory of Hertfordshire to the control of the West Anglians of Mercia. The region finally became an English shire in the 10th century, on the merger of the West Saxon and Mercian kingdoms.

A century later the victorious William of Normandy received the surrender of the surviving senior English Lords and Clergy, at Berkhamsted, resulting in a new Anglicised title of William the Conqueror. He then embarked on an uncontested entry into London and coronation at Westminster.

After the Norman conquest, Hertfordshire was used for some of the new Norman castles at Bishop's Stortford and at the royal residence of Berkhamsted and at King's Langley, a staging post between London and the royal residence of Berkhamsted.

The Domesday Book recorded the county as having nine hundreds. Tring and Danais became one, Dacorum, from (Danis Corum or Danish rule harking back to a Viking not Saxon past). The other seven were Braughing, Broadwater, Cashio, Edwinstree, Hertford, Hitchin and Odsey.

As London grew, Hertfordshire became conveniently close to the English capital; much of the area was owned by the nobility and aristocracy, this patronage helped to boost the local economy. However, the greatest boost to Hertfordshire came during the Industrial Revolution, after which the population rose dramatically. In 1903, Letchworth became the world's first garden city and Stevenage became the first town to redevelop under the New Towns Act 1946.

From the 1920s until the late 1980s, the town of Borehamwood was home to one of the major British film studio complexes, including the MGM-British Studios. Many well-known films were made here including the first three Star Wars movies (IV, V, & VI). The studios generally used the name of Elstree (the adjoining village). American director Stanley Kubrick not only used to shoot in those studios but also lived in the area until his death. In more recent times, Elstree has had the likes of Big Brother UK and Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? filmed there, whilst EastEnders is also filmed at the studios. Also Hertfordshire has seen development in other film studio complexes, Leavesden Film Studios were developed on the Leavesden Aerodome site. The Harry Potter series was filmed at the studios, whilst the 1996 James Bond film GoldenEye was also filmed there.^[2]

On 17 October 2000, the Hatfield rail crash killed four people with 170 injured. The crash exposed the shortcomings of Railtrack, which consequently saw speed restrictions and major track replacement. On 10 May 2002, the second of the Potters Bar rail accidents occurred killing seven people; the train was at high speed when it derailed and flipped into the air when one of the carriages slid along the platform where it came to rest. In early December 2005 the 2005 Hemel Hempstead fuel depot explosions occurred at the Hertfordshire Oil Storage Terminal.

In 2012, the town of Waltham Cross, within the borough of Broxbourne, will host the canoe and kayak slalom events of the 2012 Summer Olympic Games.

Following a proposal put forward by The Welwyn Garden Heritage Trust, town-planner Andrés Duany has suggested that designated "Garden Villages" could be built within Hertfordshire to relieve some of the pressure for new homes, with perhaps a third Garden City to follow.^{[citation needed]}

Geography[link]

Hertfordshire is located immediately to the north of Greater London and is part of the East of England Government Office Region.^[1] Much of the county is part of the London commuter belt. To the east of Hertfordshire is Essex, to the west is Buckinghamshire and to the north are Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire.

The county's boundaries were fixed by the Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844 which eliminated exclaves. They were amended when, in 1965 under the London Government Act 1963, East Barnet Urban District and Barnet Urban District were abolished and their area was transferred to Greater London to form part of the present-day London Borough of Barnet. At the same time the Potters Bar Urban District of Middlesex was transferred to Hertfordshire.

The highest point in the county is 803 feet (245 m) above sea level, a quarter mile (400 m) from the village of Hastoe near Tring.^{[citation needed]}

As part of a 2002 marketing campaign, the plant conservation charity Plantlife chose the Pasqueflower as Hertfordshire's county flower.^{[citation needed]}

Geology[link]

The rocks of Hertfordshire belong to the great shallow syncline known as the London Basin. The beds dip in a south-easterly direction towards the syncline's lowest point roughly under the River Thames. The most important formations are the Cretaceous Chalk, exposed as the high ground in the north and west of the county, forming the Chiltern Hills and the younger Palaeocene, Reading Beds and Eocene, London Clay which occupy the remaining southern part. The eastern half of the county was covered by glaciers during the Ice Age and has a superficial layer of glacial boulder clays.

Natural resources and environment[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Despite the spread of built areas, much of the county is given over to agriculture. One product, now largely defunct, was water-cress, based in Hemel Hempstead and Berkhamsted supported by reliable, clean chalk rivers.

Some quarrying of sand and gravel occurs in the St. Albans area. In the past, clay has supplied local brick-making and still does in Bovingdon, just south-west of Hemel Hempstead. The chalk that is the bedrock of much of the county provides an aquifer that feeds streams and is also exploited to provide water supplies for much of the county and beyond. Chalk has also been used as a building material and, once fired, the resultant lime was spread on agricultural land to improve fertility. The mining of chalk since the early 18th century has left unrecorded underground galleries that occasionally collapse unexpectedly and endanger buildings.^[3]

Fresh water is supplied to London from Ware, using the New River built by Hugh Myddleton and opened in 1613. Local rivers, although small, supported developing industries such as paper production at Nash Mills.

Hertfordshire affords habitat for a variety of flora and fauna. One bird common in the shire is the Royston Crow, which is the eponymous name of the regional newspaper, the Royston Crow published in Royston.

Urban areas[link]

Baldock

Berkhamsted

Bishop's Stortford

Borehamwood

Broxbourne

Buntingford

Bushey

Cheshunt

Harpenden

Hatfield

Hemel Hempstead

Hertford

Hitchin

Hoddesdon

Letchworth

Potters Bar

Rickmansworth

Royston

Sawbridgeworth

Stevenage

St Albans

Tring

Waltham Cross

Ware

Watford

Welwyn Garden City

Barnet

Enfield

Harlow

Amersham

High Wycombe

Luton

Stanmore

Main towns in Hertfordshire and environs

Economy[link]

This is a table of trends of regional gross value added of Hertfordshire at current basic prices with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling.^[4]

Hertfordshire has headquarters of many large well-known UK companies. Hemel Hempstead is home to DSG International. Tesco are based in Cheshunt. Welwyn Garden City hosts Roche UK's headquarters (subsidiary of the Swiss pharmaceutical firm Hoffman-La Roche) and Cereal Partners production facilities, Pure Digital the DAB radio maker is based in Kings Langley. JD Wetherspoon is in Watford. Comet and Skanska are in Rickmansworth, whilst GlaxoSmithKline has plants in Ware and Stevenage. Hatfield used to be connected with the aircraft industry, as it was where de Havilland developed the world's first commercial jet liner, the Comet. Now the site is a business park and new campus for the University of Hertfordshire. This major new employment site is home to, among others, T-Mobile, Computacenter and Ocado. A subsidiary of BAE Systems, EADS and Finmeccanica in Stevenage, MBDA, develops missiles. In the same town EADS Astrium produces satellites. The National Pharmacy Association (NPA), the trade association for all of the UK's community pharmacies, is based in St. Albans.

The loss of aircraft manufacture at Hatfield is just one of a number of industrial losses as companies capitalise on land values and move to regions where land is cheaper and recruitment is easier.^{[citation needed]} Examples include Scammell, (formerly of Watford), DRG (Hemel Hempstead) and Lucas (also Hemel). In general, the land thus freed has been used for housing or service industries.

Landmarks[link]

Ashridge house

St Albans Abbey

Bluebells in Dockey Wood

Below is a list of places, large and small, to visit in Hertfordshire.

• Aldenham Country Park
• Ashridge estate and house. The Neo Gothic house by James Wyatt, is a Grade 1 listed building (and is not open to the public) but the estate is National Trust land.
  • Bridgewater Monument built in 1832 in memory of Francis Egerton, 3rd Duke of Bridgewater. 108 feet (33 m) tall and open to the public to ascend to the top.
• Berkhamsted Castle
• Butterfly World, Chiswell Green
• de Havilland Aircraft Heritage Centre, between London Colney and South Mimms
• Gardens of the Rose, Chiswell Green, near St Albans. Home of the Royal National Rose Society
• Hatfield
  • Hatfield House – Jacobean house, gardens and park
  • Mill Green Watermill in Hatfield
• Henry Moore Foundation, Much Hadham – sculpture park on the work of Henry Moore
• Knebworth House, 250 acres (1.0 km²) of country park, venue of regular rock and pop festivals.
• Letchworth Garden City Worlds first Garden City. Home of the first planned Green Belt, the UK's first roundabout, and a number of experiments in early town planning and house and factory design.
  • Spirella Building
• Magic Roundabout (Hemel Hempstead) a complex road junction.^{[citation needed]}
• Royston Cave in Royston town centre
• St Albans
  • Beech Bottom Dyke – large scale iron age defensive or boundary ditch
  • Sopwell Nunnery
  • St Albans Cathedral
  • Verulamium – Roman town remains, including museum of Roman life and the remains of a Roman amphitheatre.
  • Ye Olde Fighting Cocks – a claimant to being the oldest pub in Britain
• Scott's Grotto, Ware on the outskirts of town
• Shaw's Corner, Ayot St Lawrence – home of George Bernard Shaw
• Stevenage – the first UK New Town
  • Six Hills Roman barrows site
• Therfield Heath – a local nature reserve in the north of the county.
• Welwyn Viaduct to the north of Welwyn Garden City.
• Rye House Gatehouse in Hoddesdon (part of the Rye House Plot to assassinate King Charles II).
• Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum, Tring. One of the finest collections of stuffed mammals, birds, reptiles and insects in the UK.

Transport[link]

Junction of the M1 and M25 near Hemel Hempstead

Virgin and London Midland trains at Watford Junction

The Metropolitan Line at Croxley

Hertfordshire lies across routes between London and the North, the North-West and the Midlands and as a consequence it is well-served by road and rail routes and, in the past, by canals.

The county has always been traversed by some of the principal roads in England, originally the A1 (Great North Road) to Yorkshire and Scotland, A5 (Watling Street) to North Wales, A6 to North West England and the A41 (Sparrows Herne turnpike) to the Midlands and now the M1, M11, A1(M) and the M25.

Three principal national railway lines pass through the county:

• the West Coast Main Line from London Euston through Watford Junction to the Midlands, north Wales, the North West and Glasgow;
• the East Coast Main Line from London Kings Cross through Stevenage to Yorkshire and Scotland
• the Midland Main Line from St Pancras via Elstree & Borehamwood and St. Albans to the East Midlands and Yorkshire

A number of other regional and local rail routes also cross Hertfordshire:

• the Thameslink route which runs from Brighton through central London, Elstree & Borehamwood and St Albans
• the London to Aylesbury Line from London Marylebone via Rickmansworth
• the West Anglia Main Line from London Liverpool Street via Cheshunt to Cambridge
• the Abbey Line, a local line from Watford to St Albans Abbey
• the Cambridge Line, a branch of the East Coast line which runs via Royston and Letchworth to Cambridge

Due to Hertfordshire's proximity to London, two commuter lines operated by Transport for London enter the county:

• the Watford DC Line, a suburban metro line from Euston to Watford Junction
• London Underground Metropolitan line, of which five stations - Chorleywood, Croxley, Moor Park, Rickmansworth and Watford - are in Hertfordshire.

Two international airports lie just outside the county Stansted and Luton. At Elstree, there is a busy airfield for light aircraft.

The Grand Union Canal passes west Hertfordshire, through Watford, Hemel Hempstead and Berkhamsted.

Intalink is an organisation run by the county council that manages the transport.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Transport in Hertfordshire

Education[link]

Hertfordshire has 26 independent schools and 73 state secondary schools. The state secondary schools are entirely comprehensive, although 7 schools in the south and southwest of the county are partially selective (see Education in Watford). All state schools have sixth forms, and there are no sixth form colleges. The tertiary colleges, each with multiple campuses, are Hertford Regional College, North Hertfordshire College, Oaklands College and West Herts College. The University of Hertfordshire is a modern university based largely in Hatfield. It has more than 23,000 students.

Literature[link]

Graham Greene

Hertfordshire is the location of Jack Worthing's country house in Oscar Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest.

Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice is primarily set in Hertfordshire. Topographical scholars place the town of Meryton either as Hertford or Hemel Hempstead, based on how far Mr Collins travels on the post from Watford, in either an easterly or westerly direction. The former location places the Bennet family home Longbourn as the town of Ware.

The eponymous residence in E. M. Forster's novel, Howards End was based on Rooks Nest House just outside Stevenage. In the novel, Forster describes Hertfordshire as "England at its quietest".^[5]

George Orwell based his book Animal Farm on the village of Wallington, Hertfordshire where he lived between 1936 and 1940. Manor Farm and The Great Barn both feature in the novel.

Notable residents[link]

The town of Berkhamsted was home to the Christian poet and hymn-writer William Cowper and to novelist Graham Greene. Violinist Thomas Bowes was born in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire. Martin Freeman is also a notable resident. Charli XCX was born and raised in Hertfordshire. Rupert Grint was born and raised in Hertfordshire.

See also[link]

• Lord Lieutenant of Hertfordshire
• High Sheriff of Hertfordshire
• Custos Rotulorum of Hertfordshire - Keeper of the Rolls
• Hertfordshire (UK Parliament constituency) - Historical list of MPs for Hertfordshire constituency

Notes[link]

References[link]

Coordinates: 51°54′N 0°12′W / 51.9°N 0.2°W / 51.9; -0.2

External links[link]

• Hertfordshire at the Open Directory Project
• Hertfordshire County Council website
• Hertfordshire Constabulary website
• Lord Lieutenant of Hertfordshire Website
• Population of Hertfordshire Settlements - from census 2001
• Hertfordshire, by Herbert W Tompkins, 1922, from Project Gutenberg
• GENUKI Hertfordshire Genealogy
• Hertfordshire Genealogy Including A Guide to Old Hertfordshire

Neighbouring counties

	Bedfordshire	Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire	Cambridgeshire
	Bedfordshire Buckinghamshire		Essex
		Hertfordshire    East
	Buckinghamshire	Greater London	Essex

v t e London commuter belt Home Counties Bedfordshire Berkshire Buckinghamshire Cambridgeshire City of London Dorset Essex Greater London Hampshire Hertfordshire Kent Middlesex Oxfordshire Surrey Sussex Urban Areas Greater London Urban Area Reading/Wokingham Urban Area Southend Urban Area Aldershot Urban Area Luton/Dunstable Urban Area High Wycombe Urban Area Medway Towns Urban Area Aylesbury Urban Area London boroughs Barking and Dagenham Barnet Bexley Brent Bromley Camden Croydon Ealing Enfield Greenwich Hackney Hammersmith and Fulham Haringey Harrow Havering Hillingdon Hounslow Islington Kensington and Chelsea Kingston upon Thames Lambeth Lewisham Merton Newham Redbridge Richmond upon Thames Southwark Sutton Tower Hamlets Waltham Forest Wandsworth Westminster Cities and towns (100k+) Chelmsford Crawley High Wycombe London Luton Reading Slough Southend-on-Sea Towns (25k-99k) Aldershot Ashford, Surrey Aylesbury Basildon Basingstoke Billericay Bishop's Stortford Borehamwood Bracknell Brentwood Burgess Hill Camberley Canvey Chatham Cheshunt Dartford Epsom Ewell Dunstable Earley Farnborough Farnham Fleet Gillingham Guildford Gravesend Grays Harlow Harpenden Hatfield Hemel Hempstead Horsham Hitchin Letchworth Loughton Maidenhead Maidstone Rayleigh, Essex Redhill Rochester Royal Tunbridge Wells Sittingbourne St Albans Stevenage Strood Sunbury-on-Thames Tonbridge Ware Watford Welwyn Garden City Wickford Windsor Woking Wokingham Woodley Towns (10k-25k) Addlestone Amersham Ashtead Beaconsfield Berkhamsted Broxbourne Buckhurst Hill Bushey Chertsey Chesham Chigwell Croxley Green Dorking East Grinstead East Malling Englefield Green Epping Godalming Hadleigh Haywards Heath Hertford Hoddesdon Horley Houghton Regis Knaphill Marlow Potters Bar Reigate Rickmansworth Sandhurst Sevenoaks Snodland Shepperton Southborough, Kent Staines-upon-Thames Stanwell Swanley Thundersley Tilbury Tring Waltham Abbey Waltham Cross