Teston /ˈtiːstən/ The Place Names of Kent,Judith Glover,1976,Batsford. or /ˈtiːsən/ BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British Names — is a village in the

Maidstone Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies 32 miles (51 km) east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the c ...

District of

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, England. It is located on the

A26 road The A26 road is a primary route in the southeast of England, going from Maidstone to Newhaven through the counties of Kent and East Sussex. The road is almost entirely single carriageway with one lane on each side, although some of the road is ...

out of

, four miles (6.4 km) from the town centre. There is a narrow stone bridge over the

River Medway The River Medway is a river in South East England. It rises in the High Weald AONB, High Weald, East Sussex and flows through Tonbridge, Maidstone and the Medway conurbation in Kent, before emptying into the Thames Estuary near Sheerness, a to ...

here.

History

Barham Court Barham Court is an English country house in the village of Teston, Kent. History It was once the home of Reginald Fitz Urse, one of the knights who murdered Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170. As a result of that deed, Fitz Urse f ...

is the 'big house'. It has now been converted into offices and apartments. It was once the home of Randall Fitz Urse, one of the knights who murdered

Thomas Becket Thomas Becket (), also known as Saint Thomas of Canterbury, Thomas of London and later Thomas à Becket (21 December 1119 or 1120 – 29 December 1170), was an English nobleman who served as Lord Chancellor from 1155 to 1162, and then ...

in 1170. It passed to the de Berham family now called the Barhams, and then the Boteler (or Butler) family. They were

Royalists A royalist supports a particular monarch as head of state for a particular kingdom, or of a particular dynastic claim. In the abstract, this position is royalism. It is distinct from monarchism, which advocates a monarchical system of governme ...

, William Butler was imprisoned for supporting the Kentish Royalist Petition 1642, which indirectly led to the

Battle of Maidstone The Battle of Maidstone (1 June 1648) was fought in the Second English Civil War and was a victory for the attacking Parliamentarian troops over the defending Royalist forces. Background In May 1648, a significant part of the Royalist uprisi ...

1648. When

Edward Hasted Edward Hasted (20 December 1732 OS (31 December 1732 NS) – 14 January 1812) was an English antiquarian and pioneering historian of his ancestral home county of Kent. As such, he was the author of a major county history, ''The History and To ...

visited in the 18th century, it was owned by the Bouveries. After that it passed to the

Charles Middleton, 1st Baron Barham Admiral Charles Middleton, 1st Baron Barham, PC (14 October 172617 June 1813) was a Royal Navy officer and politician. As a junior officer he saw action during the Seven Years' War. Middleton was given command of a guardship at the Nore, a R ...

. Barham Court has been recognised by historians as the birthplace of the British

evangelical Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide Interdenominationalism, interdenominational movement within Protestantism, Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "bor ...

abolitionist movement. It was in the house in the 1780s that a young

Thomas Clarkson Thomas Clarkson (28 March 1760 – 26 September 1846) was an English abolitionist, and a leading campaigner against the slave trade in the British Empire. He helped found The Society for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade (also known ...

pledged his life to the cause, and where

William Wilberforce William Wilberforce (24 August 175929 July 1833) was a British politician, philanthropist and leader of the movement to abolish the slave trade. A native of Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire, he began his political career in 1780, eventually becom ...

agreed to bring the matter before the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...

for the first time. In 1789,

Hannah More Hannah More (2 February 1745 – 7 September 1833) was an English religious writer, philanthropist, poet and playwright in the circle of Johnson, Reynolds and Garrick, who wrote on moral and religious subjects. Born in Bristol, she taught at a s ...

described the village as the "

Runnymeade Runnymede is a water-meadow alongside the River Thames in the English county of Surrey, and just over west of central London. It is notable for its association with the sealing of Magna Carta, and as a consequence is, with its adjoining hil ...

of the negroes". The village church is dedicated to St Peter and St Paul. On one wall of the church, under a window, is a memorial tablet to a former vicar, the Rev James Ramsay, he was the Rector of Teston and Nettlestead from 1781 until he died in July 1789. He was a friend of Charles Middleton, William Pitt and

and he worked with them for the

abolition of slavery Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people. The British ...

.Village History Website viewed 2007
Rev. James Ramsay, who served as a surgeon under Middleton aboard in the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

but later took holy orders and served on the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

island of

St Christopher Saint Christopher ( el, Ἅγιος Χριστόφορος, ''Ágios Christóphoros'') is venerated by several Christian denominations as a martyr killed in the reign of the 3rd-century Roman emperor Decius (reigned 249–251) or alternatively u ...

(now St Kitts), where he observed first-hand the treatment of

slave Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

s. He briefly lived with the Middletons at Barham Court, then was given the living of the Teston and Nettlestead, by Middleton. Nestor Court is named after Ramsey's servant and companion.

William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign ...

passed through Teston on Friday 5 September 1823.A Vision of Britain through Time. From Dover to the Wen:Cobbett
/ref>

Amenities

Teston has a village green, shop/Post Office, Village Hall and a Farm Shop.

Sport

In the middle of the nineteenth century, Thomas Martin began making

cricket ball A cricket ball is a hard, solid ball used to play cricket. A cricket ball consists of a cork core wound with string then a leather cover stitched on, and manufacture is regulated by cricket law at first-class level. The trajectory of a crick ...

s in a workshop above the post office. When he retired the business was taken over by Alfred Reader who expanded the business and transferred it to the factory. The current factory. on Malling Road was built in 1927. The workers at the Reader factory formed their own

trade union A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ( ...

- The Teston Independent Society of Cricket Ball Makers, to represent their interests, it was the smallest trade unions in the country, and was only de-listed in March 2006. Cricket has been played at Barham Court since 1896.History of Teston Cricket Club The current club runs two teams, the Sunday Team representing the village in the Kent Village League.

River

The

at Teston Bridge is 5.41m above mean sea level, and 7.31m upstream of the

weir A weir or low head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the river level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...

and

lock Lock(s) may refer to: Common meanings *Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance *Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal Arts and entertainment * ''Lock ...

. It lies 10.4 km upstream of Allington where the river becomes tidal. The bridge is mediaeval, being widened for river traffic in 1749. The lock was originally constructed in the 1740s, when 14 locks were built to make the river navigable from

Tonbridge Tonbridge ( ) is a market town in Kent, England, on the River Medway, north of Royal Tunbridge Wells, south west of Maidstone and south east of London. In the administrative borough of Tonbridge and Malling, it had an estimated population ...

, enabling the transport of iron products from the

Weald The Weald () is an area of South East England between the parallel chalk escarpments of the North and the South Downs. It crosses the counties of Hampshire, Surrey, Sussex and Kent. It has three separate parts: the sandstone "High Weald" in the ...

. The current lock dates from 1911 and will take craft up to 24.5m by 5.6m with a draft of 1.7m.The Medway navigation, Leaflet, March 1991, NRA-National Rivers AuthoritySignboard at Teston Lock, 2001, Maidstone Millennium River Park 2001 At Teston Bridge there is a country park on a 12 hectare meadow, with public day ticket fishing. There is a continuous footpath along the bank of the Medway, which at this point is within the boundaries of the Maidstone Millennium River Park and forms part of the Medway Valley Walk.

Media

Teston Bridge was used as a location in the 1958 feature film ''

Dunkirk Dunkirk (french: Dunkerque ; vls, label=French Flemish, Duunkerke; nl, Duinkerke(n) ; , ;) is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France.Teston church
{{authority control Villages in Kent Country parks in Kent Civil parishes in Kent