Uppark, built c1685-1690, was the home of Sir Matthew Fetherstonehaugh, a wealthy 18th century MP.

In March 1832, the parish of South Bersted agreed to subsidise the expense for three families, James Goldring, with his wife and eight children, Henry Goldring, with his wife and five children, and Thomas Joyce with his wife and seven children to emigrate to America.

George Percy (1580-1632), son of the 8th Earl of Northumberland who lived at Petworth House.(2) One of the English branches of the Washington family, from which George Washington, first President of the United States, was descended, was living in Petworth in the late 17th century.

It was from Shoreham Harbour that William sailed into a three year period of exile from February 1691 following the issuing of arrest warrants for treason.

In 1678 a Quaker meeting house and burial ground was established here, in Horsham Road opposite the junction with Mouse Lane. William Penn is known to have preached here in 1678. Sir John Fagg of Wiston House may have helped fund the purchase and conversion of the building which has reverted to a private home named Penn House.

Parham Park, near Pulborough was the family seat of the Bisshopp baronets for over 300 years. Lieutenant-Colonel Cecil Bisshopp (1783-1813), eldest son of Sir Cecil Bisshopp (1753-1828) the 8th Baronet was an army officer who was posted to Upper Canada, then a British colony, to defend the borders against American invasion during the War of 1812.

At least 16 Friends (Quakers) from the Thakeham area emigrated to Pennsylvania with William Penn aboard the ‘Welcome’ in 1682. Penn is reputed to have preached from a large prominent stone on the green near the pond adjacent to Abingworth Hall [now Hotel].

Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr (or 12th Baron) (1577-1618) was a politician and merchant who became governor of the colony of Virginia (c1609).

n September 1676 William Penn bought Warminghurst from Henry Bigland for £4,450, a mansion in the parish of the same name, located between Thakeham and Ashington. It was here between 1680 and 1682 that William worked on the Frame of Government for Pennsylvania, which later became the basis for the colony’s Constitution and influenced the American Declaration of Independence less than a century later.

The parish of West Grinstead received a number of applications for financial assistance to travel to the United States in the 1830s-1840s. In 1849, William Tourle and his family emigrated from West Grinstead to New York.