Kings Langley (GB)
Kings Langley (recorded in the Post Office records as King's Langley) is a village, former manor and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England, 21 miles north-west of Westminster in the historic centre of London and to the south of the Chiltern Hills. It now forms part of the London commuter belt.
The village is divided between two local government districts by the River Gade with the larger western portion in the Borough of Dacorum and smaller part, to the east of the river, in Three Rivers District.
It was the location of Kings Langley Palace and the associated King's Langley Priory, of which few traces survive. The earliest mention in surviving documents of the manor of Langalega is in a Saxon charter dated circa 1050. It appears as Langelai in the Domesday Book of 1086, and is recorded as Langel' Regis ("Langley of the King") in 1254. The name means "long wood or clearing".
A Roman villa has been excavated just south of the village.
The manor was probably a possession of the Abbey of St. Albans, the records of which have been lost. Following the Norman Conquest of 1066 the manor was one of hundreds given to Robert, Count of Mortain, uterine half-brother of King William the Conqueror. His tenant was a certain Ralf.
The present village developed as a linear village along the old road from London to Berkhamsted and beyond to the Midlands. In the Domesday Book of 1086, Langley was in the hundred of Danish. By 1346 the place was known as Kyngeslangley and by 1428 as Lengele Regis.
The 18th century Sparrows Herne turnpike road (later the A41 trunk road) traversed the Chilterns via the valley of the River Gade and ran down the village high street. The 16th century Saracen's Head public house is a coaching inn which flourished in this period.
20th century housing developments have led to the village spreading out on either side of the main road. The A41 has now been diverted west of the village leaving the high street to local traffic for the first time in centuries.
During the Second World War, the village was home to the secret headquarters in Britain of the Polish Underground army based at Barnes Lodge just off the Hempstead Road near Rucklers Lane.
King's Langley was allocated the 354 Post Office numeral in 1844
Kings Langley
Sub-Offices
Kings Langley Station Office
Kings Langley railway station is almost under the M25 motorway near Junction 20. It serves the village of Kings Langley, and the nearby villages of Abbots Langley and Hunton Bridge.
The station is 21 miles north west of London Euston on the West Coast Main Line. The station and all services calling at the station are operated by London Northwestern Railway.
The station was opened in 1839.
From 1909 the station was known as Kings Langley & Abbots Langley, becoming Kings Langley on 6 May 1974.