Editing Hindhead (section)

==History==
[[File:Hindhead Sailors stone front.jpg|thumb|right|Stone commemorating the murder of an unknown sailor on Hindhead Common]]
This area was notorious for highwaymen. In 1736, Stephen Phillips, a robber tried and convicted at the [[Old Bailey]], admitted to the [[Newgate Prison|Newgate]] chaplain to having stolen 150 [[Guinea (British coin)|guineas]] in gold on the road towards London. In 1786, three men were convicted of the [[Unknown Sailor|murder of an unknown sailor]] on his way from London to rejoin his ship, a deed commemorated by several memorials in the area. The perpetrators were hung in chains to warn others on [[Gibbet Hill, Hindhead|Gibbet Hill]], a short walk away on top of the Devil's Punch Bowl. With an increase in traffic and opening of the London to Portsmouth railway line removing much of the road transport of freight, such incidents reduced during the 19th century.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.oldbaileyonline.org/record/OA17360726 |title= Ordinary and Chaplain's account of 26 July 1736.|version=9.0|website=Proceedings of the Old Bailey.|access-date=26 April 2012}}</ref><ref>Moorey, Peter. 2000.''Who was the Sailor Murdered at Hindhead 1786''. Blackdown Press {{ISBN|0-9533944-2-5}}</ref>

Hindhead became a substantial settlement in the late 19th century. In 1904 a temporary mission church was built to serve the new community. An architectural competition to design a permanent church, that of St Albans in [[Beacon Hill (Hindhead, Surrey)|Beacon Hill]], was held in 1906, and John Duke Coleridge (1879&ndash;1934) was chosen as the architect. The first phase, comprising the chancel, north chapel, transept and the lower stage of a projected bell tower, was completed by 1907, and the church gained its own parish in the same year. A series of windows by the [[Arts and Crafts]] designers [[Karl Parsons]] and [[Christopher Whall]] were installed in the unfinished church between 1908 and 1912. The three eastern bays of the nave were consecrated in 1915, but the two western bays were not built until 1929&ndash;31; the bell-tower was never completed and became in effect a south transept. There followed two additional [[stained-glass]] windows: by Christopher Webb in 1945 and by [[Francis Skeat]] in 1950. A large vestry extension was added in 1964. A fire in 1999 destroyed the original high altar and [[reredos]] paintings.<ref>{{cite book|last=Cormack|first=Peter|title=Karl Parsons, 1884-1934: Stained Glass Artist - Exhibition Catalogue|year=1987|publisher=William Morris Gallery|location=London|isbn=9780901974259|pages=24}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Pevsner|first=Sir Nikolaus|title=The Buildings of England: Surrey|year=1982|publisher=Penguin Books|location=Harmondsworth}}</ref>