For some years now Kingston Parich Council has sent a welcome letter to people moving to the
village. The letter is reproduced below because it contains facts and information which may be of
general interest to visitors to this web site......
KINGSTON VILLAGE
Welcome to Kingston, and congratulations on your good fortune in coming to live in this beautiful
part of the Kent Downs. Village life has much to commend it, and especially so in a community of
the size of Kingston - large enough to support a wide range of social and amenity activities but
not so small that everyone knows everyone else perhaps a little too well!
We hope you will soon settle into our village and make friends. This guide to all that Kingston
has to offer will help you decide what interests you and whom to contact for further information.
But whether your participation in village life will be great or small, the welcome is just as
warm and we hope that you will enjoy living in this lively, caring community set in a lovely
corner of the garden of England.
Geoff Macdonald
Chairman, Kingston Parish Council.
KINGSTON - FACTS, FIGURES, AND ITEMS OF INTEREST
SIZE OF VILLAGE Approximately 200 dwellings and 391 inhabitants are listed in the Register of
Electors (1998)
SIZE OF PARISH Long and narrow (about 5 miles long and only a few hundred yards wide in many
places) and approx. 2 square miles in area; a parish map is displayed in the playing field.
LISTED BUILDINGS The parish contains 15 listed buildings:- Black Robin Public House, Rectory
Cottage, St Giles Church, Little Court, Kingstone Court, Ileden Farmhouse, Marley Farmhouse,
Railway Cottage, Whitelocks, Whitelocks Farmhouse, Alley Cottage, Westwood Farmhouse, Barn,
Stables and Granary at Westwood Farm.
ST. GILES CHURCH Largely rebuilt in the 14th. century but nave and chancel walls are 12th.
century or possibly Saxon; pulpit Jacobean or possibly Elizabethan; replaced Norman font;
King-post roof etc.
BLACK ROBIN PUB Built in 18th. or early 19th. century and named after a local highway man who
ended his days on a gallows on Barham Downs.
THE BARN The village hall, 'The Barn', given to the village in 1931, supports a number of
business, social and cultural activities, e.g. meetings of the Parish Council, Village Society,
Drama Group, Wives Club, Model Engineering, Keep Fit etc.
KINGSTON BROOCH One of the artefacts discovered in a Saxon burial mound above Kingston in the
1770's was the Kingston brooch, of ornate gold inlaid with garnets, blue glass and white shell,
and now kept at Liverpool museum.
RIVER NAILBOURNE Every few years the Nailbourne river runs through the parish; 'bourn' is the
name for an intermittantly running stream. Its source is in Lyminge and it eventually joins the
Little Stour beyond Wickhambreaux.
COVET LANE Running along the southern boundary of the parish, Covet Lane was the highest scoring
of 200 lanes surveyed in the Canterbury area for landscape beauty, historic interest and variety
of flora.
ELHAM VALLEY RAILWAY Closed in 1947. This ran between Canterbury and Folkestone through the parish.
The arched railway bridge remains in Covet Lane as well as traces of the
railway embankment. During the second world war, a 250 ton 18" military gun, called the 'Boche
Buster' was hidden in neighbouring Bourne Park tunnel and was to be used in the event of an
invasion.
TWINNING Kingston is one of 7 villages in the Elham Valley collectively twinned with the Vallee
de la Course, south of Boulogne, through the Elham Valley Twinning Association.
PUBLIC RIGHTS OF WAY The parish has about 8 miles of footpaths and bridleways, and includes
sections of the North Downs Way and Elham Valley Walk. A set of 5 circular-walk cards is
available and a map showing PROWS is located in the playing field.
BUS SERVICES Bus services to/from Canterbury and Folkestone/Dover stop in the village (bus
shelter and Black Robin Pub, or on the A2 near junction to Ileden); time tables are available
from Canterbury bus station.
HENRY MOORE The world renowned sculptor, Henry Moore, lived in a house on Marley Lane (now, The
Orchard) during 1935-1940. In neighbouring Bishopsbourne, the novelist Joseph Conrad lived at
Oswalds for 6 years before his death in 1924.
We had an e-mail from Robert (Bob) Coombs who lived in Kingston as a
boy/teenager between 1942 and 1954. He still takes an interest in what goes on
in the village although it's almost 50 years since he left home to join the RAF.
On his last visit to the site he came across an old 1855 sketch of the village
and he couldn't help wondering how a windmill came to be shown on the horizon.
After much head scratching he come to the conclusion that it was a bit
of poetic licence (if that's the correct expression) on the part of the artist.
As a boy he used to spend his summer holidays working on a farm a
mile or so up the road that led eventually to Bursted Manor. On the way to work
he used to pass the remains of an old mill that lay back from the road on the
left. He believed that a family did actually live there at the time.
He sent part of the village map for us to include on this web site.
You will see a mill marked by the name 'Westwood' although he must in all
honesty say that one would have had to
be standing on the highest part of the Dover Road looking west on a fine clear
day to even get a glimpse of it, and then possibly not at all. We hope you
find this map interesting.
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