Horley is a town in Surrey, England, situated between Reigate, Redhill and Gatwick. In early times the Weald was a densely forested and marshy area unsuitable for agricultural purposes. During Saxon times, the Manor of Horley came under the control of the Benedictine Abbey of St Peter at Chertsey. No mention is made of Horley in the Domesday Book and it is thought to have been included in the northern manor returns. The Manor passed to Henry VIII on the dissolution of the monasteries in 1539 and changed hands several times during the next sixty years. In 1602 it became the property of Christ's Hospital in London and the original map of the manor is now held at the Guildhall in the City of London. This shows that Horley consisted of three hamlets around a huge open common. One was around the area occupied by St Bartholomew’s Church and the Six Bells public house; another by the River Mole and the third in Horley Row where some of Horley’s oldest buildings can still be seen. The Common was enclosed in 1812, new roads were laid and the intervening land was sold. In 1809 and later in 1816, two turnpikes were introduced to allow the operation of regular coach services from London to Brighton. The railway was laid in 1841 and a station was built in the town.

From the original description - Horley is now a small scattered town of modern houses; the parish church stands at the west end, and was destructively restored in 1882 ; there is now little of interest except a large and finely cut brass to Dame Alice Fenner, who died in 1516 ; a small brass without inscription, showing a man dressed in a gown, and having long hair ; and a very fine tomb of stone, with the figure of a man in chain armour, his feet resting on a lion. There is no inscription, but it is supposed to be the tomb of the founder of the church. Old tradition ascribes this work to one of the Lords Sonde-a family who held lands at Dorking and were lords of the manor of Puttenden, near Lingfield-but the arms are said to be those of the family of Saleman, who held lands at Lodge in Burstow and Horley in the fourteenth century. The device of a spread eagle is finely carved on the shield, with a leopard's face in the centre the latter device appears also on the shoulders of the figure and on three small pieces of painted glass in the north windows. The north porch is old, and the mouldings fine in design but very much defaced. Outside the churchyard on the north is the only old house in the town, a tavern bearing the sign of the "Six Bells." The outside timbering appears to be late fifteenth- or sixteenth-century work, but some of the interior seems to be older than that. Local tradition claims it as the oldest house in Surrey, and also that it was a monastery before the church was built. Early in the fourteenth century the church and manor belonged to Chertsey Abbey, and certainly this house was not in existence then, though there may have been a lodging for the priest.