Embedded Files
Bredgar was one of the important parishes in Our Kentish Genealogy.
Bredgar is a village 4 miles (6.4 km) to the southwest of Sittingbourne, on the road between Tunstall and Hollingbourne.
"A delightful corner to come upon suddenly, with the great pond among the elms, the peep of Silver Street with its long row of thatched cottages and it triangular green, and the ancient chantry looking sadly neglected." - Arthur Mee, KENT, p 66
"This is a fairly large village with some charm and a strong community feeling. The parish is particularly rich in fine houses, including one, Bexon, which is almost the perfect pattern pattern of a yeoman's house. Historically, the village gained distinction from the foundation in 1393 of the College of the Holy Trinity, a college of priests. The college building survives across the road from the church and towards the village pond." - Marcus Crouch, KENT, p 165
According to a report to Planning Committee 2 February 2006, much of the parish's wealth "derived from the prosperous agriculture of the surrounding countryside. Until quite recently farming was still relatively mixed in character, with orchards predominating around the edges of Bredgar itself."
The village's population was 547 in 1861.
Roman Bredgar
One of the evidences suggesting the Roman conquest began in Kent is a horde of coins found in Bredgar. They were minted between 41-43 AD, just prior to the invasion. In her book BREDGAR, THE HISTORY OF A KENTISH PARISH (p 9), Helen Allinson notes that there were too for an ordinary legionnaire, who was only paid 9 aurei a year, but they could have belonged to a centurion. Many believe that the decisive battle for Southeast Britain was fought 11 miles to the west in Aylesford. As the coins were not retrieved, it seems likely that whoever buried them was one of the casualties. In the decades to come, Kent became an area that troops passed through after they crossed over from the continent.
The Anglo Saxon Era
Bredgar got its name, "Bradegare" or "broad triangular plot," from the next wave of invaders. Swanton street, which runs through the village, also dates back to that era. It means "herdsman's farm" in Old English. Like the neighbouring parish of Stockbury, Bredgar was one of the outlying yokes of the Royal estate at Milton Regis. After the newly converted Jutes built a church in Milton Regis, daughter institutions were founded in Borden, Bredgar and Tunstall. (Allinson, p 11).
The Church
The parish church of St John the Baptist most likely stands on the site of an earlier Saxon chapel. King Henry III bestowed this church on the leprous women of the hospital of St. James, near Canterbury. A vicarage was added during the reign of king Richard II, but the first parson whose name has passed into history was Robert de Bredgare. He was one of the principal founders of the chantry college and, which was granted 3 houses and more than 400 acres in Bicknor, Borden, Bredgar, Hollingbourne, Hucking, Tunstall and Wormshill to provide an income. (Allinson, BREDGAR, p 19)
Village Manors
Allison wrote that Bredgar's most prominent manors were originally farmsteads.
Deans Hill, Manns Place, Baxton Manor and Swanton Court all take their names from the families that originally lived there. The Denes were a prominent 13th century family who held vast stretches of land across Kent. (Allison, BREDGAR, pp 12, 13) Prior to his death in 1376, John Mann held his manor for one knight's service. Sometime after John Bexon's death, the Tong family came into possession of his manor and retained it for three centuries. The Swantons held their manor from the de Leybourne family, who lived in a castle near Malling. One of the more famous owners of Swanton Court was Sir Thomas Wyatt, leader of the rebellion of 1554. During the Civil War Terry Aldersey, Swanton Court, was the Captain of a troop of Parliamentary cavalry in Michael Livesey's regiment. He helped put down the 1648 rising in Canterbury. However his neighbour James Tong, of Baxton Manor, was a Royalist.
Towards Modern Times
By 1800, Edward Hasted wrote that the road passing through Bredgar, " ... It has a tolerable thoroughfare and considerable traffic is carried on through it by carriages of various descriptions from below the hill to the keys of Milton and Sittingbourne loaded with corn, hops, wood etc. for London and other parts, and coals, ashes, coke and other material are conveyed back again and then to the different villages below Hollingbourne Hill'."
"In 1831 Bredgar had a population of just over five hundred people living in ninety four houses. Of these, seventy families worked join agriculture and twenty-eight in trade" - Allison p 99.
Our Familes in Bredgar:
Google Sites
Report abuse