HOUNSLOW, a township, formerly a market-town, in the parishes of Isleworth and Heston, county of Middlesex, England, is situated on the great western coach road, and on a branch of the London and South-Western Railway, 9 miles from Hyde Park Corner. In the Domesday survey Hounslow is mentioned as Honeslowe and Hundeslawe. It consists chiefly of one street about a mile in length. In the 17th century it numbered about 120 houses, principally alehouses and inns. Previous to the opening of the railway nearly 500 coaches passed through the town daily. Of late years it has considerably recovered from the depression caused by the opening of the railway, and a number of fine villas have been erected in the neighbourhood. A priory of friars of the Holy Trinity was founded at Hounslow in 1296, and existed till the dissolution of the monasteries. The priory chapel was used as a church till 1830, when it was demolished, and the present church in the later style of English architecture erected. Another church in the Early English style was erected in 1874, and a town-hall in 1857. The surrounding country is flat and uninteresting, and to the west of the town there was at one time an extensive heath, which, according to the survey of 1546, had an area of 4293 acres. It is the site of Roman and old British camps, and in later history was the scene of several important military rendezvous. For many years the heath was a favourite resort of highwaymen, the carcases of whom used to be exposed on gibbets along the road. According to an Act passed in the 53d of George III., the heath has been enclosed, and it is now nearly all cultivated. In 1793 large cavalry barracks were erected upon it, and it also affords a site of extensive powder-mills. The population of the township in 1861 was ...