Leigh, Kent

Historical Description

Leigh, a village and a parish in Kent. The village stands near the river Medway, 3 miles from Penshurst station on the S.E.R. It is sometimes called Lye or West Leigh, and has a post, money order, and telegraph office under Tonbridge. The parish contains also Hollanden hamlet and part of Hildenborough chapelry. Area, 4720 acres; population of the civil parish, 1480; of the ecclesiastical, 1257. The manor, with Hall Place, belongs to the Morley family. There is a mineral spring of similar quality to the springs of Tun-bridge Wells. The living is a vicarage in the diocese of Canterbury; net value,, £173 with residence. The church is ancient, had once a chantry, was restored in 1861, had formerly no tower, but has now one, and contains a curious brass without name or date, and two other brasses. An un-sectarian chapel was erected in 1871 at the expense of the late Samuel Morley, Esq.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Civil Registration

For general information about Civil Registration (births, marriages and deaths) see the Civil Registration page.

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for Leigh from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Leigh (St. Mary))

Maps

Online maps of Leigh are available from a number of sites:

• Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• Google Streetview.
• National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
• OpenStreetMap.
• old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
• Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)

Newspapers and Periodicals

The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Kent newspapers online:

• Kent & Sussex Courier
• Whitstable Times and Herne Bay Herald
• Dover Express
• Kentish Gazette
• Folkestone, Hythe, Sandgate & Cheriton Herald
• Kentish Chronicle
• Maidstone Telegraph

Visitations Heraldic

The Visitation of Kent, 1619 is available on the Heraldry page, as is also The Visitation of Kent, 1663-68.