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Birchington (All Saints)

BIRCHINGTON (All Saints), a parish, within the cinque-port liberty of Dovor (of which it is a member, though locally in the hundred of Ringslow, or Isle of Thanet), union of Thanet, lathe of St. Augustine, E. division of Kent, 3½ miles (W. by S.) from Margate; containing 874 inhabitants, and comprising by admeasurement 1283 acres of arable, and 290 acres of pasture land. It is said to have been anciently called Birchington in Gorend, from a place called Gorend on the seashore, where tradition reports the church to have stood until it was destroyed by the falling of the cliff. The village is on the road from Margate to Canterbury, and a pleasure-fair is held in it on the Monday and Tuesday at Whitsuntide. At Quex Park, a fine old seat, is preserved a curious gilt chair, which was used by William III. when he occupied Quex, whilst waiting for favourable winds to convey him to Holland, and was borrowed by Sir William Curtis for the use of George IV., when he embarked at Ramsgate for his Hanoverian dominions, in 1821. The living is united, with that of Acole, to the vicarage of Monkton. On the north side of the church is Quex chapel, belonging to the manor of Quex, where are interred several of the family of Crispe, to whom there are some very interesting monuments and brasses. A place of worship for dissenters was erected a few years since; and there is a school, founded under the will, dated Feb. 13th, 1707, of Mrs. Anna Gertrude Crispe, who bequeathed 47 acres of land in Birchington and Monkton for charitable purposes.

Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.

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