Level crossing at Chertsey, England, as the barriers rise
Chertsey is a town in Surrey, United Kingdom, on the River Thames. It can be accessed via road from junction 11 of the M25 London orbital motorway.
Chertsey is a town of historical importance, having grown around Chertsey Abbey, founded in 666 A.D. by Eorcenwald, bishop of London. After the priests were driven out by King Edgar in 964 and replaced by orderly Benedictine monks, the Abbey grew to become one of the largest Benedictine abbeys in England, supported by large fiefs in the northwest corner of Sussex until it was dissolved by Henry VIII in 1536. The King took stone from the Abbey to construct his palace at Oatlands, and the villagers used stone for raising the streets, and by the late 17th century, only some outwer walls remained. Today the ghost of the abbey is detected in local place names and the fishponds that still fill with water after a heavy rain [1].
Chertsey was visited by Charles Dickens to make notes for Oliver Twist, and the poem "The Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight" by Albert Richard Smith was also written in the town.
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