Harbledown Parish

A View of the Parish

Your Online Parish Clerk for Harbledown is:  VACANT.  

Harbledown is, ecclesiastically, in the diocese of Canterbury, in the archdeaconry of Canterbury and in the deanery of Canterbury.  The church is named for St. Nicholas with registers commencing 1557.

Harbledown, a village and a parish in Bridge district, Kent.  The village stands near the London, Chatham and Dover railway, 1 mile west of Canterbury;  and has a post office under Canterbury.  It grew around a lazar-house, founded, in 1084, by Archbishop Lanfranc;  and it is "the little town" of Chaucer "which that yeleped is Bob up and down, Under the Blee, in Canterbury way."  The parish includes also the hamlet of Rough Common.  Acres, 1,670.  Real property in 1860, £4,826.  Population in 1861, 655.  Houses, 145.

The lazar-house adjacent to the village was for lepers, and consisted originally of several wooden structures;  was refounded, by Edward VI., for the residence and maintenance of 26 poor men and women;  was rebuilt, with the exception of its church, in the time of James I.;  consists now of a range of cottages and gardens, with central large common hall;  bears the name of St. Nicholas’ hospital;  and has an endowed income of £223.

An excellent spring adjacent to it bears the name of the Black Prince’s well, from a tradition that the water of it was sent to the Black Prince during a severe illness;  and it may have occasioned the selection of the site for the hospital, on account of its reputed virtues.

The upper leather of a shoe of Thomas à Becket, with a crystal set in it, was possessed by the hospital before the Reformation;  and, when pilgrims to Canterbury were passing by, this was usually brought forth by one of the inmates to the steps leading down to the road, and presented, with much reverence, to the better class of pilgrims, to be devoutly kissed as a sacred relic.  A ludicrous account of the performance is given by Erasmus in his "Peregrinatio".  A maple bowl, figured with Guy of Warwick’s killing the dragon, and set with a large crystal, is preserved in a chest in the common hall;  and the crystal on it is supposed to be that which was formerly on Becket’s shoe.

The church of the hospital is partly Norman, partly early English;  consists of nave, aisles, and chancel, with western ivy-clad tower;  and contains a curious ancient stone font, and some remains of ancient frescoes.

A farm on which the hospital stands, together with the hospital itself, is exempt from the jurisdiction of the parish, and belongs to Canterbury.

The parochial living is a rectory in the diocese of Canterbury.  Value £383 with a habitable glebe house.  Patron, the Archbishop of Canterbury.  The church is ancient;  consists of nave and chancel, with a small tower;  and was recently enlarged and improved.

Rough Common, a hamlet in Harbledown parish, Kent;  near Canterbury.¹

¹John Marius Wilson, comp. The Imperial Gazatteer of England and Wales.  (London, England:  A. Fullerton & Co., 1870).

• Monumental Inscriptions
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• Pigot's Directory of Kent, 1824
• Illustrated Guide to the London and Dover Railway, 1846
• History, Gazetteer & Directory of Kent, Vol. II, 1847
• Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Kent ... , 1855. [Part 1: Counties & Localities]
• Post Office Directory of Essex, Herts, Kent ... , 1855. [Part 2: Court & Trade Directories]
• Melville & Co.'s Directory of Kent, 1858
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, 1882
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, Surrey & Sussex, 1891. [Part 1. Kent: County & Localities]
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, Surrey & Sussex, 1891. [Part 2. Kent: Court & Trade Directories]
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, 1903. [Part 1: County & Localities]
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, 1903. [Part 2: Private Resident & Trade Directories]
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, 1913. [Part 1: County & Localities]
• Kelly's Directory of Kent, 1913. [Part 2: Private Resident & Trade Directories]

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