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General
At one time Gerrards Cross was a hamlet but little remains of its past except for a few Georgian houses by the common. On the west side of Gerrards Cross stands Bulstrode Park covering four hundred acres most of which is unspoilt. The first house built on the site was the home of ‘Hanging Judge Jeffreys’, this was demolished in 1879 to make way for the present mansion. In a corner of the park is the site of an ancient British encampment.
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Local Lanes
On February 10th 1984 ‘The Bucks Free Press’ carried a report of the sighting of a phantom highwayman. Mr. Dave Robson was walking home after he had finished work at the Bull Hotel in Gerrards Cross. It was around midnight when he was startled by the screech of an owl and then he noticed the sound of horse’s hooves. He waited while the sound approached, then was surprised to see a horse and rider appear from the darkness, the presence of the pair was not a surprise but the fact that the rider was a highwayman surrounded by a luminous haze was. “Through the haze I could clearly pick out a man, with a gun, dressed in a big cloak and black hat. He rode past me and disappeared by a group of trees.”
This event took place on the quiet country lanes around Gerrards Cross and was not the only sighting, as numerous people have seen the mysterious glowing horseman. Usually the horse and rider are seen on dark but warm moonless nights in the summer. Could this be yet another occurrence of the ghost of Dick Turpin, so popular in this and surrounding areas?
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