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We join the fight for Ham Farm

Ann Furedi

Part of Ham Marshes, on the north bank of Faversham Creek is at threat as a developer plans to build 250 houses on the site. The area is a corridor for birds migrating along the east coast of England and is important for skylarks, curlews and yellow wagtails.

It’s also a green buffer between the developed area of the town and an adjoining Ramsar site – wetlands of international and special scientific importance. This precious green corridor, with trees that help to soak up surface water, will be bulldozed with a loss of wildlife that may never recover.

We don’t want to lose it. If the development goes ahead, the immediate threat is of flooding of existing homes nearby, as well as to new houses. If excess surface water from heavy rainfall is poured onto the marshland at the same time as the creek overflows on a high tide, there could be severe flooding of the marshes.

Through the Faversham Neighbourhood Plan, the community of Faversham has made it clear that that Ham Marshes is not a site in Faversham suitable for any new development. The community doesn’t want it but the government is not listening. The Faversham Society is joining with the Faversham Creek Trust and Save Ham Marshes in opposing the plan.

Faversham Town Council is co-ordinating fundraising for an appeal. You can make your pledge on the link below.

Surveymonkey.com/r/SaveHamMarshes

Path palaver shuffles on …

ANN FUREDI

Just when you think everything has been sorted out, it turns out to be even more of a muddle than you could have imagined.

In the town council’s autumn newsletter, Councillor Charles Gibson explained his proposed compromise to resolve the long and winding saga of the Shooting Meadow Path (ZF8). “It is suggested that the long path from Abbey Place to Cyprus Road will be named ‘the Shuts’ (a local pronunciation of the Shoots from Shooting Meadows) and the shorter path from Abbey Place to the church will be named Queen Matilda Place in recognition of the route that may well have been part of an English queen’s final journey, long before shooting meadows had ever been conceived … [This] … is a compromise which allows us to recognise as much as the town’s history as possible.”

However, by the time the council newsletter dropped through our letter boxes the proposal was dead in the water. A consultation of Faversham Society members and Abbey Street residents found just two of 39 respondents were in favour. Many responses thought “shut” implied opposite to “open”, others thought it would be mischievously altered to something more scatological.

Most concurred with Faversham Society board that the paths should be left as they are. So, during an outbreak of common sense, the town council’s relevant committee “RESOLVED to leave the footpath officially unnamed, allowing residents to continue using Shooting Meadows informally and to provide an interpretation board at the site, explaining the historical significance of the name Shooting Meadows”.

But what of the Queen Matilda part of the proposal?

This now sits with Swale Borough Council and Kent Magistrates’ Court which seem to not quite know what to do. The court administration has apologised for being unable to respond to everyone “due to the volume of correspondence”.

The Faversham Society and the Old Grammar School Trustees have formally registered an appeal to oppose any “renaming”, which means letters sent by anyone else can be included as witness statements. If you sent a letter, please drop a copy to me c/o the Visitor information Centre. The court cannot forward them for reasons of confidentiality and data protection.

We have our ducks in a row, or at least being arranged in one by a London barrister who has volunteered to take our case on pro bono because he finds it “so extraordinary”!

In truth, it seems most likely that the matter will be dropped without the drama and publicity that a court hearing would entail, particularly if Swale council falls into line with the decision taken by Faversham as regards the long part of the path. There is every reason for Swale to do this.

Since the row over the name first started, the law has changed. The Levelling-up and Regeneration Act (2023) debars a change of name without a process including consultation. Among reasons given to parliament was “to ensure there
is local support before making
changes”.

This may all seem quite petty. After all, what’s in a name. But as the government of the day recognised, “names can be cherished by a community and tied to history. Changing them without due process can damage sense of place (Hansard, 12 July, 2022). That nobody thought to call this place after Queen Matilda until now seems relevant, as it does that so many insist on leaving it alone.

Carnival challenge

MIKE COSGROVE

Some people may be a little sniffy about the carnival and think: Too much noise and too crowded.

Since 1890, however, Faversham Carnival has been one of the town’s significant cultural icons. On an October Saturday evening hundreds – probably thousands – of people come from across Faversham and the surrounding villages to stand along pavements and watch the procession that gives so much fun and excitement.

When I first came to Faversham in 1973 the carnival was torchlit with carriers walking along the sides of the floats shaking their charity collection buckets. Then every small business with a flat-top Ford Transit took part. The trucks were decorated and staff dressed up. Cottage Hospital doctors and nurses had their own float that usually contained an operating table, a “patient” and sausages. Afterwards the adults went into the pubs and children to the fair, then all came to the Rec to watch the fireworks.

The carnival tradition continues but without torchlight. This year there were competing carnival queens, four fire engines, with perhaps 50 floats and groups. But each year it gets harder to organise with insurance, risk analysis, safety requirements and fewer individuals and organisations such as primary schools taking part. The organising committee has done a great job once again, and the pleasure that the children and us old ’uns get from it is immeasurable.

Perhaps next year the Faversham Society could participate with a group dressed in costume representing the carnival across its decades? This would follow the lead of one of its former presidents, Jacqi Hitchcock, who would dress as a cat and parade along the route stalking unsuspecting children to their glee.

The carnival tradition is much cherished and we need to keep its spirit alive and healthy, so that in years to come our children’s grandchildren can come out on a dark evening and remain entranced as the floats and their fancy-dressers go by waving at the crowds. Now the 2025 carnival has finished, is it time to find a flat-top truck, get friends together, decide on a theme and register for next year’s?

The Fleur de Lis garden was designed and planted to reflect Edward Jacob’s 18th-century book relating to plants found in Faversham. It has become a wildlife haven and a lovely place for our visitors to enjoy. However, we need some help to maintain it and get it ready for 2026. If you would be interested in helping, then please contact us at the address below.

volunteer@favershamsociety.org

Calendars then and now

MARY RANSOM

The Faversham Society calendars for 2026 are ringing the changes. The design features “then and now” images of the town, which we hope will prove to be popular. They are on sale from the Visitor Information Centre at 12 Market Place, priced at £6, which represents excellent value for money and would make ideal Christmas presents.

Calendars will also be available from our website at the address below (plus £2 postage) so there’s no excuse if you are not local!

favershamsociety.org/store

What a year for walking with history

CATHERINE LEE

Catherine Lee

By the time you’re reading this – probably tucked up somewhere warm and perhaps with a hot drink on the side – our Walking with History guided town walks season will almost be at an end for 2025.

At the time of writing, however, we still have one of our busiest weeks ahead of us so thank goodness for the wonderful Indian summer we’re enjoying – it should help ensure that our autumn visitors see Faversham at its best. And what a year it’s been. We will close our season having welcomed more than 450 walkers and shared with them our love of our wonderful built heritage and what it tells us about our town’s fascinating past.

We think we’ve managed to do a good job on the whole – feedback such as “enthusiasm is infectious, knowledge amazing”, “Brilliant tour, can highly recommend” and “We’ve lived here for six years and 90 per cent of what we heard was new to us” is music to our ears.

Very excitingly, we even received two five-star reviews on Tripadvisor this year. Exposure on national platforms such as this can only help attract more visitors to our wonderful town. But we’re not complacent and are always looking for ways to improve, broaden our offer, and promote ourselves ever more widely.

Among the requests we were able to comply with this year was for a French translator so that the guide’s commentary could be enjoyed by the French members of a combined English/French Rotary group.

Our walking guests this year have been diverse in every respect: from local primary schoolchildren to professional societies and organisations – from students of architecture to a group celebrating the 50th anniversary of their graduation from teacher training college (they had enjoyed a Seventies disco the previous evening – all heads seemed fairly clear!).

Professional groups have included the Canterbury branch of the Historical Association; the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings and the London Historians. We were also very pleased to provide a walk for colleagues from the Faversham Society Archaeological Research Group – to help add some above-ground context to their below-ground expertise.

Diversity also relates to the distance travelled to us. The Abbey Street Neighbourhood Group probably came the shortest distance while the prize for the longest undoubtedly goes to Rosemary and John from Aberdeen who booked a private tour to coincide with their weekend here doing family history research. Rosemary is related to William Keech who was church organist at St Mary of Charity Church and taught music at the Willam Gibbs School in the early 1900s.

This year we’ve continued to diversify and have added a couple of new walks to our repertoire: “Victorian Faversham” focused on the new town development and “The sorry tale of Alice Arden” allowed more focus on the Arden murder than we are able to give it in our standard itinerary.

We were also delighted to partner with Henry Cleary, who has been undertaking research on the history of the Pollocks shipyard. There’s nothing quite like learning history while standing on the very spot where it took place, and Henry kindly led two very well-received walks for us this year, pointing out surviving elements of the shipyard, including the gates, sentry box and slipway. We were also able to introduce an updated gunpowder walk itinerary that includes a guided visit to Chart Mills. We hope to be able to repeat this more regularly in 2026.

We’d like to take this opportunity to thank Faversham Town Council for all its help and support this year. We were proud to partner with the council once again on Active Travel Month, during which we ran a number of new town walks, several of which showcased the cross-town walking route. We also acknowledge with thanks the privilege of being able to take our walking guests into the guildhall (when it is not being used). It’s always a favourite!

Like the organisers of any outdoor event, we are of course very much at the mercy of the weather. This summer the weather gods did seem to be mainly on our side – on more than a couple of occasions rain was promised and we spent all day with one eye on the forecast – only to be granted an additional dry hour just when we needed it. But the changing climate means that it’s not only typically British rain and wind that might deter potential walking guests: June 2025 was, according to the Met Office, hotter even than the same month in 1976 and so perhaps it’s not at all surprising that we had no takers for a couple of our walks scheduled then.

None of the above would, of course, be possible without the untiring input of a fabulous bunch of colleagues, to whom I’d like to extend my profound thanks. This year we have welcomed Frances Bish to the team and congratulate her on having got her first successful solo walks under her belt.

Our town guides each bring their own individual interests and expertise to the job – we like to think that no two walks will be identical even if we’re working from roughly the same template. And, of course, we are updating our itinerary constantly in line with new discoveries and new ways of thinking. The recently laid memorial stone to the Faversham women executed on charges of witchcraft in the 1600s, together with the evidence unearthed in the garden of Furlongs Ale House about the gunpowder explosion of 1781, attract a lot of interest among walking guests.

So, where to for 2026? I’m pleased to be able to report that we have already had three inquiries from groups wishing to plan visits for next year. In one case, they are aiming to fill a 52-seater coach! We’re also keen to develop our working partnerships with museum and council colleagues to offer a Faversham all-day visit package to include the Charters Museum and the Fleur de Lis Heritage Centre in addition to a guided walk.

But, before any of that, we have the season of spooks and hauntings to attend to! Our Frightful Faversham walks run between 3 and 27 November. Book online at https://favershamsociety.org/live-events/

WENDY CLARKE

The Fleur second-hand bookshop in Preston Street is aiming to mount a Jane Austen display in November in line with the other celebrations of the novelist’s 250th birthday but we are quite short of material.

If anyone has any books by Austen or about her that they no longer need, we would be very grateful to receive them.

We’d also appreciate any artefacts of her time or any material that could be relevant, focusing on the early 19th century. Thank you.

LEIGH ALLISON

Wayne Perkins’s appearance at Faversham Guildhall was another sell-out as as he told us all about witch bottles and other “magical” objects to ward off evil spirits from the home.

These bottles, usually contained bent pins and human urine, hair or nail clippings, would usually be concealed up chimneys, under the threshold, or in the walls and rafters.

As well as charms and taper burn marks to ensure protection, hidden objects included mummified cats, shoes and boots.

Children’s shoes were a common thing to use and there were some nice examples of some that have been found locally.

In Court Street, a child’s leather shoe (1680-1700), was found in the roof. A building in Market Street had a pair of girl’s shoes (1670s) hidden in a wall cavity.

In Selling, a boy’s boot from the mid-1800s. In Sheldwich, a single child’s shoe (1611-1620) in one house and another child’s shoe was found in the ceiling next to the inglenook of Orchard Cottage. In a bakery in Boughton under Blean, a single shoe dating from the 1720s was found in a chimney.

If anyone has any photographs of descriptions of things they’ve found while renovating their old house, please let us know and we can collate this at the museum.

Faversham’s treasures … and where they are now

PAT ROSS

Excavating graves is not for the faint-hearted and some may find it distasteful, but as far as the Anglo-Saxon period is concerned, it is vital for evidence.

Historians like to have reliable documents to back up facts. In the case of the Dark Ages, chroniclers look mainly at the accounts of St Gildas (a sixth-century monk), Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

However, all were written many years after the events described. An absence of certainty as to the accuracy of their sources inevitably gives rise to speculation – the truth as to what definitely happened is lost in the mists of time.

After the departure of the Romans, the Angles, Saxons and Jutes arrived here from mainland Europe. Thanks to archaeology, what we do know for certain from the grave goods is that the Jutes settled here in our part of Kent. Were the smallish group of Jutish warriors who arrived first hired to protect Kent from invaders? Did they arrive in separate waves over several centuries, or even en masse? Did they drive out the indigenous population or co-exist with them?

As pagans they worshipped several gods they believed had control of their lives and later – after 597, when St Augustine arrived – converted to Christianity. The practice of burying grave goods for use in the after-life, which also may have reflected a person’s status in the community, eventually ceased.

The Anglo-Saxons divided the country into separate kingdoms – and our Jutish Kingdom of Kent was relatively small. Faversham, though, was certainly an attractive location in which to settle with good farmland, sandwiched between the old Roman Road, Watling Street, and the sea, with a navigable creek. It was an ideal location for the skilled craftsmen required to set up their workshops, with raw materials imported from abroad, and had a large cemetery next to Watling Street.

That is why the name of the town is significant. It was first referred to in a charter in 811 as the King’s town of Febresham, a Jutish Anglo-Saxon name thought to mean “the smith’s settlement”. It translates roughly as place of makers, or home of the smith or blacksmith. In Latin the word Faber means a craftsman in metal, stone or wood, and “ham” is an old English word for home or settlement.

What about the name of the field: “Kings Field”? There doesn’t appear to have been an actual place with that name. However, it is suggested this would have been part of a royal estate containing open land as well as marshland.

Indeed, a display of some of the collection accumulated by the Victorian grocer William Gibbs (see last month’s newsletter) at a meeting of the newly formed Kent Archaeological Society caused quite a stir. Looking at the splendid nature of some of the items found, the question was asked as to whether this could possibly be the burial place of the Anglo-Saxon kings of Kent.

Charles Roach Smith, an English antiquarian and amateur archaeologist, contacted Gibbs to see if he knew. He in turn contacted an antiquarian friend of his – sadly the friend’s name was not revealed – who had been engaged for many years in a study of the history of Faversham. The friend replied that the field had been known as Kings Field since time immemorial, and that he could trace the name back for upwards of 800 years. There the matter rested and appears to have been taken no further.

However, from the exceptional quality of the items found in the Gibbs collection, now in the British Museum, and other items on display elsewhere, it can be agreed that people of high status were buried here – and that it was perhaps the richest Anglo-Saxon cemetery yet discovered in Kent.

Although it is disheartening that none of the treasure remains here, there is some good news. You do not have to go too far to see some of the items because some remain in Kent.

Folkestone

Folkestone Museum in the town hall has on display a disc brooch decorated around garnets and set in a cowrie sea shell. Found in a grave in Dover in 1907, it was made about 600. Like the Kingston brooch it was also made in Faversham, but is only 4.5cm in diameter. The garnets were imported from Sri Lanka.

Be warned, though. The brooch does come with a grave and skeleton attached, and is surrounded by other grave goods. If nothing else, you can see the sort of thing the railway or brickfield workers faced each day.

The woman in the grave died in her thirties and was about 5ft 6in tall. The museum staff are obviously quite fond of her, as they have given her the name Aefre, which means “forever” in Old English.

Rochester

Rochester Museum has a necklace of glass beads from Kings Field. It was donated to the museum by George Payne, their first curator.

It is not on permanent display, not being from its area, but is used with school groups. However, the heritage education officer has said he could produce it to show any visitors if given notice and if he is available.

Maidstone

Maidstone Museum has a glass claw beaker on display, made between 580 and 650 which was bought from one of the railway workers by General Augustus Pitt-Rivers and kept in his private collection. After he died, his collection was auctioned. It is assumed to have come from Kings Field.

Another skeleton is on display here: a woman who died at the age of about 45, and was buried at Eastry near Sandwich 1,500 years ago. Scientific analysis revealed she lived in a colder climate until the age of 12, before emigrating to Kent. Interestingly, her teeth were very bad as she appears to have been using them as a third hand. The replica grave goods are a mixture of Kentish and continental items. Have a look for the brooches – Anglo-Saxon ladies wore tunics pinned with a brooch on each shoulder.

Maidstone, being the county town of Kent, has items on display from many different parts of the county – and both the museum and the Kent Archaeological Society, which has an office there, have several other Kings Field items.

You can take the opportunity to have a look at the loom weight that was found when the foundations of Faversham post office were being laid in East Street in 1954. It was made in the eighth century, so could possibly have been made at a workshop in the town.

You may be feeling let down at this point that there are so far so few items. Fear not – there is more.

Canterbury

Canterbury Museum is based in the Beaney in the High Street. John Brent (1808-82), an antiquarian, was the mayor of Canterbury three times and a deputy lieutenant of the county. He published a catalogue of the museum’s antiquities, and was an honorary curator.

He donated a number of items to the museum – but his record-keeping was not always of the highest standard. One item is definitely from Kings Field and others are just recorded as being from Faversham which the museum presumes are also from Kings Field.

There is further confusion as well regarding references to “Stouting, Faversham”, and “Stowting”. The Beaney checked its database, and found an entry that says “Faversham? Stowting?”, which would seem to indicate John Brent was unsure where the item concerned came from. He researched 25 graves in Stowting, near Folkestone, in 1866 and seven more in 1881. It is rather confusing.

There is a very helpful catalogue you can use:

First, look for CANM2659. This is a circular silver gilt disc brooch set with three square and one round garnet from fifth to eighth century (found in Faversham, Kings Field);

CANCM 2166 Rare gilded bronze saucer brooch of the West Saxon type from the 6th century, one of a pair (found in Faversham)

CANM2614 Copper alloy, silver and garnet disc brooch of Kentish work, set with garnets, cloisonné work and gold wire filigree of fifth to eighth century, (found in an Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Stouting [sic], Faversham).

CANM 2161 Small gold pendant set with garnets that may have been used as a sword bead from fifth to eighth century (found in an Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Stouting [sic], Faversham.

CANM2151 Flass squat jar from the fifth to eighth century (found in Faversham);

CANM2149 Green glass jar that has been repaired from the fifth to eighth century (found in Faversham).

John Brent was a member of the Kent Archaeological Society and in 1874 was able to examine the contents of three Kings Field graves.

In grave one, there were 50 beads, a wire ring, a curved cutting blade that could be used as a weapon, a spearhead and two broken bracelets or armlets made of iron.

In grave two, there were 230 beads, a ruby-coloured piece of glass, a blue pendant fragment with a flower-like design on it, a gold pendant, and a circular brooch with a diameter of 42mm.

In grave 3, there was a sword, a buckle, a shell found under the sword, a purple glass fragment, a flint and a whetstone.

William Gibbs was not the only person interested in our Anglo-Saxon artefacts. He died in 1870 and the Rigden brothers, who owned the field carried on Gibbs’s tradition of rewarding the workers and started their own collection. Another serious collector was David Kennard from Linton. Word rapidly spread about the finds and it is said wealthy collectors came or sent agents on their behalf to buy items. Some were secretive about what they bought and took away. The only way to have any idea is to check later auction sale catalogues. Provenance is key.

Finally, to muddle the murky waters even further, there is talk of a black market – people bringing items into the town from elsewhere and passing them off as being found here!

To be continued …..