Wouldham is a village on the bank of 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 ...
in
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 ...
,
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
. As of 2006 its population is approximately 1000 people, with the 11th-century church, one school, one
village shop, and two
public house
A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...
s, The Medway Inn and The Waterman's Arms.
History
The tusk and teeth of a mammoth were excavated in Peters Pit and displayed in Rochester Guildhall Museum. In 1982, the skull of an 18-year-old man was excavated- it was dated as 1500 BC and the museum staff have had the face reconstructed. Oral history suggests that the village was occupied when the Romans arrived, and that they constructed a ford across the Medway. The site of a temple dedicated to Mithras has been excavated and occurs on old maps.
On the Wouldham Marshes is ''Starkey House'' built in 1483: a now-restored
Grade II listed
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
medieval manor house called Starkey Castle.
In the churchyard, is the grave of
Walter Burke, who was present on board at the
battle of Trafalgar
The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French and Spanish Navies during the War of the Third Coalition (August–December 1805) of the Napoleonic Wars (180 ...
and the man who held
Nelson in his arms as he died.
Wouldham school celebrates this connection with history in many ways, its four sports teams being named after ships at the Battle of Trafalgar (''Victory'', ,
''Sovereign'', ), students being assigned into a house named after one of four famous figures at Trafalgar, which they are able to earn merit points for, and by holding an annual event at the nearby church to commemorate Walter Burke.
A
narwhal
The narwhal, also known as a narwhale (''Monodon monoceros''), is a medium-sized toothed whale that possesses a large "tusk" from a protruding canine tooth. It lives year-round in the Arctic waters around Greenland, Canada and Russia. It is o ...
was discovered in the 1940s washed up on the bank of the river, and is documented in the
Natural History Museum, London
The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...
.
Until 1963 there was a
ferry
A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi ...
crossing over the Medway to
Halling on the opposite bank.
File:Wouldham5520.JPG,
File:Wouldham5526.JPG,
File:Wouldham5525.JPG,
File:Starkey Castle from Footpath - geograph.org.uk - 1062154.jpg,
Industry
For a hundred years, Wouldham was synonymous with
cement
A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mix ...
. The Wouldham Court Cement Works was the earliest cement works opening in 1847. The works were based on the riverside in the centre of the village. In 1855, the first owners of the cement works, Thomas Freen and Co, became bankrupt and it passed
in 1856, to the Wouldham Patent Portland Cement Co. They built a tramway to connect the works with the quarry, which was 1,380 ft away. The tramline had six engines on it.
The Wouldham Hall Cement Works also fronted the river, and took in some land in Burham. William Peters started making
hydraulic lime
Hydraulic lime (HL) is a general term for calcium oxide, a variety of lime also called quicklime, that sets by hydration. This contrasts with calcium hydroxide, also called slaked lime or air lime that is used to make lime mortar, the other common ...
on the site between 1857 and 1866. He had 18 lime kilns. The first wet process cement kilns were installed by the Peters Brothers in 1877.
The cement started with
bottle kiln
A bottle is a narrow-necked container made of an impermeable material (such as glass, plastic or aluminium) in various shapes and sizes that stores and transports liquids. Its mouth, at the bottling line, can be sealed with an internal stoppe ...
s, there were 24 in 1879, making 720 tons a week. The raw materials, were obtained on site and the finished product was taken to London in capacious
Thames sailing barges
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...
, that would be about 5 barge loads. A photograph, in the care of
Maidstone museum
Maidstone Museum is a local authority-run museum located in Maidstone, Kent, England, featuring internationally important collections including fine art, natural history, and human history. The museum is one of three operated by Maidstone Boro ...
shows the waterfront with 11 moored barges. The Peters operation owned 80 barges, and employed 1000 men. In the 1880s these were replaced by
Batchelor chamber kilns (each with a capacity of 30 tons per week)- and further were added to bring up the production to 990 tons per week. In 1898 seventeen more were added, and in 1903 thee
Schneider kilns (at 330 tons) giving a total capacity of 1850.
The London demand for cement was voracious. Two
Hoffmann kiln
The Hoffmann kiln is a series of batch process kilns. Hoffmann kilns are the most common kiln used in production of bricks and some other ceramic products. Patented by German Friedrich Hoffmann for brickmaking in 1858, it was later used for lime- ...
s were installed, and then two
rotary kiln
A rotary kiln is a pyroprocessing device used to raise materials to a high temperature (calcination) in a continuous process. Materials produced using rotary kilns include:
* Cement
* Lime
* Refractories
* Metakaolin
* Titanium dioxide
* Alum ...
s. The first chamber kiln block was demolished, and the remaining chamber kilns were only used up to 1915, though six remained in commission until the sites closure.
The site was obtained by
BPCM(Blue Circle) in 1911, who combined operations with the nearby West Kent works further along Hall Road. The works closed in 1925/26 for good. There was no railway on this side of the river, so getting to the railway at Snodland involved taking the cement by barge across the river and then hauling it by horse and cart. This was far uneconomical compared to the works across the river at
Snodland, and
Cuxton and Halling, with its rail connection to the
Medway Valley line
Peters Village
![Peters Village sculpture 8435](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Peters_Village_sculpture_8435.jpg)
Before 1999, a large area of allotments were situated between the school and the recreation ground. Despite the opposition of many villagers, a housing estate was built over them, which increased the village's population by a large percentage.
Peters Village is a new area of housing currently being constructed to the south of the existing village on the former Peters Wouldham Hall Cement Works and in Peters Pit. It consists of 1000 houses grouped in three sectors: the Village Centre, Lower Peters Village and Upper Peters Village. It includes a new
primary school
A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary e ...
,
community centre
Community centres, community centers, or community halls are public locations where members of a community tend to gather for group activities, social support, public information, and other purposes. They may sometimes be open for the whole co ...
, playing fields cycle way and riverside esplanade together with a new road bridge across the River Medway. The site is sensitive as it lies adjoining a
Site of Special Scientific Interest
A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle of ...
and the
North Downs
The North Downs are a ridge of chalk hills in south east England that stretch from Farnham in Surrey to the White Cliffs of Dover in Kent. Much of the North Downs comprises two Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs): the Surrey Hills and ...
AONB
An Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB; , AHNE) is an area of countryside in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, that has been designated for conservation due to its significant landscape value. Areas are designated in recognition of thei ...
. The plans were approved in 2006 but postponed due to the economic downturn. Construction started on the infrastructure in 2014. The first apartments and houses were occupied in late 2017. The project, which received £19.5m from the government, is due to be completed around 2022.
[BBC News, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-27371752] The new crossing over the River Medway to link with the
A228 road
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes'' ...
, the Peters Bridge, opened in September 2016.
References
External links
Village History (www.wouldhamvillage.com)Parish Council with links relating to Peters Village planning processParish Councillor Tim Fulwell report*
{{authority control
Villages in Kent
Civil parishes in Kent
Lime kilns in the United Kingdom