Mersham is a mostly agricultural large village and
civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authorit ...
near
Ashford 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 ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
. The population of the civil parish includes the area of Cheesman's Green now known as
Finberry.
History
In the mid 19th century,
John Marius Wilson
John Marius Wilson (c. 1805–1885) was a British writer and an editor, most notable for his gazetteer
A gazetteer is a geographical index or directory used in conjunction with a map or atlas.Aurousseau, 61. It typically contains informati ...
's ''
Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales'' described Mersham in the following terms:
Until the early 20th century Mersham was for its majority a farming and orchard-tending community with close ties to the local market town of Ashford. The small village dates back to Saxon times and is mentioned in the ''
Domesday Book
Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manus ...
''. The village was owned by the
Archbishops of Canterbury for over 500 years. The Anglican church is dedicated to
St. John the Baptist and is in the highest category of
listed building
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 ...
, at Grade I.
British listed buildings
retrieved 20 July 2013 It stands on the site of a Saxon church, and is part Norman. It is thought that the village gives rise to the surname Marshman.
The Knatchbulls
The village has been the home of the Knatchbull family since the times of Henry VIII. In 1638 Sir Norton Knatchbull founded Ashford Grammar School, to which pupils were not admitted until they could read the Bible in English, he was also the Member of Parliament
A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...
for Romney.
In the early 19th century Edward Knatchbull served in the Whig government and in 1830 another Sir Edward Knatchbull became M.P. for Romney and was given responsibility under Sir Robert Peel in his government of 1841.
Geography
Most of the neighbourhood of Cheesemans Green is in the parish.
The clustered village centre is in the small percentage of the parish between High Speed 1 and the M20 motorway.
There are two water mills on the East Stour river, one of which, Swanton, is still working.
Part of Hatch Park, a mixture of medieval deer park and SSSI, is in the civil parish.
See also
* Marshman
* HMS Mersham, a Ham class minesweeper
The Ham class was a class of inshore minesweepers (IMS), known as the Type 1, of the British Royal Navy. The class was designed to operate in the shallow water of rivers and estuaries. All of the ships in the class are named for British place nam ...
Notes and references
External links
VillageNet
community domain website
Statistical civil parish overview - map
{{authority control
Villages in Kent
Villages in the Borough of Ashford
Civil parishes in Ashford, Kent