Editing Gerrards Cross (section)

==History==
The site of a minor [[Iron Age]] [[hillfort]], Bulstrode Park Camp, is to the south-west of the town centre. It is a [[scheduled monument|scheduled ancient monument]].<ref>{{National Heritage List for England|num=1006954|desc=Bulstrode Park camp|access-date=25 January 2015}}</ref>

The area which is now Gerrards Cross was historically an area of wasteland known as Chalfont Heath, which later became known as Gerrards Cross Common. In the medieval period, there was no village in the area, which straddled the edges of five different parishes. The name Gerrards Cross, sometimes spelled Jarretts Cross, is recorded from at least 1448, and may relate to an early landowner, Gerard of Chalfont, who is recorded as having owned land in the area in the 14th century.<ref name=Hunt&Thorpe/>

[[File:Gerrards Cross, Latchmoor Pond - geograph.org.uk - 3792482.jpg|thumb|left|Latchmoor Pond]]
The origin of the 'cross' element of the name is uncertain; a cross is marked on early maps near the Bull Hotel and Latchmoor Pond at the western end of the common, but whether it was a standing cross marking a boundary or meeting place, or a name for a crossroads is unclear. The modern crossroads of the Oxford Road (the [[A40 road|A40]]) and Windsor Road / Packhorse Lane (B416) was not created until 1707, when an old north-south road through [[Bulstrode Park]] was diverted, which was many years after the name Gerrards Cross was first recorded.<ref name=Hunt&Thorpe>{{cite book |last1=Hunt |first1=Julian |last2=Thorpe |first2=David |title=Gerrards Cross: A history |date=2023 |publisher=Phillimore |isbn=9781803994024 |url=https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Gerrards_Cross/eT6xEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22gerrards%20cross%22%20%22jarretts%20cross%22&pg=PP24&printsec=frontcover |access-date=19 February 2025}}</ref>

[[File:Gerrards Cross, West Common - geograph.org.uk - 3793100.jpg|thumb|Houses at West Common]]
Until the 19th century, development in the area was limited to a small number of buildings immediately adjoining the common, most of which were in the parish of [[Chalfont St Peter]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Buckinghamshire Sheet XLVIII |url=https://maps.nls.uk/view/102340241 |website=National Library of Scotland |publisher=Ordnance Survey |access-date=19 February 2025 |date=1883}}</ref>

In 1859, [[St James Church, Gerrards Cross|St James' Church]] was built on Oxford Road.<ref name=NHLE>{{NHLE|desc=Church of St James|num=1124389|grade=II*}}</ref> It was initially a [[chapel of ease]] for the parish of [[Fulmer]] in which it lay, but in 1861 it became parish church of a new [[ecclesiastical parish]] called St James, Gerrard's Cross, created from parts of the parishes of Chalfont St Peter, Fulmer, [[Iver]], [[Langley Marish]], and [[Upton-cum-Chalvey]].<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=22502|page=1577|date=16 April 1861}}</ref> The creation of the ecclesiastical parish did not change the civil parish boundaries. A new civil parish of Gerrards Cross matching the ecclesiastical parish was subsequently created in 1895.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Langston |first1=Brett |title=Eton Registration District |url=https://www.ukbmd.org.uk/reg/districts/eton.html |website=UK BMD |access-date=19 February 2025}}</ref>

Gerrards Cross remained a relatively small village at the turn of the 20th century. The parish had a population of 552 at the 1901 census.<ref name=Kelly>{{cite book |title=Kelly's Directory of Buckinghamshire |date=1915 |page=105 |url=https://specialcollections.le.ac.uk/digital/collection/p16445coll4/id/52363/rec/2 |access-date=19 February 2025}}</ref> In 1906, [[Gerrards Cross railway station]] opened on the [[Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway]], a new line jointly built by the two companies to improve their routes from the Midlands to London. The station is to the north-east of Gerrards Cross Common, and the area around the station was developed soon after the station opened; by 1911, the population of the parish had grown to 1,612,<ref name=Kelly/> and it then grew steadily throughout the 20th century.<ref>{{cite web |title=Gerrards Cross Chapelry / Civil Parish Population |url=https://visionofbritain.org.uk/unit/10218925/cube/TOT_POP |website=A Vision of Britain through Time |publisher=GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth |access-date=19 February 2025}}</ref>