Shepperton is an urban village in the Borough of Spelthorne, Surrey, approximately south west of central London. Shepperton is equidistant between the towns of Chertsey and Sunbury-on-Thames. The village is mentioned in a document of 959 AD and in the Domesday Book. In the early 19th century, resident writers and poets included Rider Haggard, Thomas Love Peacock, George Meredith and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who were attracted by the proximity of the River Thames. The river was painted at Walton Bridge in 1754 by Canaletto and in 1805 by Turner. Shepperton Lock and nearby Sunbury Lock were built in the 1810s to facilitate river navigation. Urbanisation began in the latter part of the 19th century, with the construction in 1864 of the Shepperton Branch Line, which was sponsored by William Schaw Lindsay, the owner of Shepperton Manor. Its population rose from 1,810 residents in the early 20th century to a little short of 10,000 in 2011. Lindsay had hoped to extend the railway via Chertsey to connect to the South Western Main Line, however the village station remains a terminus. The rise in population and passing trade led to small businesses lining most of its high street by the end of the 20th century. Shepperton Film Studios is in the neighbouring village of Littleton, approximately to the north. The Swan Sanctuary and two SSSIs, one of which is managed by Surrey Wildlife Trust, are nearby. History While a history summary of 1994 indicates that Shepperton meant Shepherd's habitation, which would earlier have transliterated into late Saxon language as Sceapheard-ton, the place has been found in "a document of 959 AD" as Scepertune, which the book Middlesex (Robbins, 1953), states instead meant Shepherd's farm. The name of one of the older lanes, Sheep Walk, may date to the medieval period and was perhaps on a wide tract of low-lying meadows which produced the Middlesex wool, namely marsh wool, which was included in a valuation of 1343. The valuation was two years after Edward III imposed wool tax — Middlesex rendered a sack for every s of the county (contributing in total 236 sacks) – much of which however appears from contemporary returns to have been collected from other riversides in the county including, in particular, Hampton (which includes Hampton Court). Shepperton in the Domesday Book of 1086 was recorded by the Norman conquerors as Scepertone, with a population of 25 households and