The busy, bustling town of Pulborough is home to over five thousand people and sits right at the heart of West Sussex. As such, it is hard to imagine a town that is more decidely English than Pulborough. At fifty miles from the big city, Pulborough offers the perfect blend of real London atmosphere but without the high rate of crime or pollution. Don't call it a mere suburb, though; Pulborough has been its own town for centuries upon centuries and this is in fact an aspect that also adds to the very British flavour of Pulborough.
The town emerged as a fording point for the River Arun during the reign of the Roman Empire. Many of England's oldest and most revered towns started up this way and it makes sense: If everybody crossed the river at the same point it would stand to reason that shops and inns would eventually be put in so that weary travellers could rest their bones and give their hard-earned money away. Pulborough emerged in just this fashion. In the days of the Romans there was already a station at nearby Hardham and by the time the Saxons took control of the area it became popular for cattle drivers to stop there and water their livestock. This too caused a community to take root fairly quickly. Over time the growth of London (which is only a mere fifty miles from Pulborough today) also helped to foster the rising population of Pulborough.
What really puts Pulborough on the map, though, is its very popular association with the sport of Cricket. Cricket is big business in many English cities but Pulborough may take the title as the most dedicated town for the sport. The game has been played in the town for over two hundred years and the Pulborough Cricket Club is easily among the most esteemed in all of Britain. Sadly, though, Pulborough's long history doesn't involve just Cricket and cattle. There are some dark chapters in the town's past and most of these chapters are in fact quite recent. On July 17th, 2000, a young girl named Sarah Payne had gone missing and her body was finally recovered in a field just outside Pulborough. Roy Whiting, her murderer, was thankfully caught and sentenced to life in prison. He was a forty two year old convicted child molester. Less than three years later, Jane Longhurst, a thirty one year old music teacher, was found strangled in Pulborough. This too resulted in a life imprisonment and one can rest assured knowing that Pulborough has not seen an act so heinous since. All towns have their sinister bits of history but with a town as old as Pulborough it is in fact rather surprising that most of the seedy elements of its past have in fact taken place closer to the present. At any rate, it can be surmised that Pulborough is a town filled with beauty, wonder, and grace and this is the true legacy of the town.
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