Sandridge, Hertfordshire

Description
Sandridge, a parish, with a village, in Hertfordshire, 2 1/2 miles S by W of Wheathampstead station on the Hatfield, Luton, and Dunstable branch of the G.N.R., and 2 1/2 NNE of St Albans. It has a post office under St Albans; money order and telegraph office, St Albans. Acreage, 5753; population, 1458. There is a parish council of eight members and a chairman. Bernard's Heath, in this parish, is the place where the second, battle of St Albans was fought on 17 February, 1461; and on a furzy common, now known as " No Man's Land," there lies a large boulder of conglomerate or " pudding stone," which formerly marked the boundary between the lands of the rival monasteries of Westminster and St Albans, and now serves to mark the division between Sandridge and Wheathampstead. An ancient entrenchment with a moat called the " Devil's Dyke," is partly in this parish and partly in the neighbouring parish of Wheathampstead. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of St Albans; net value, £68. Patron, Earl Spencer. The church, which was restored, enlarged, and partly rebuilt in 1887-88, is an ancient and interesting building in mixed styles, consisting of chancel, nave, aisles, N and S porches, and a western tower. The Duchess of Marlborough, born in 1660, was a native.