Sissinghurst
Sissinghurst photos (5 available)
Sissinghurst maps (2 available)
Map of Kent
Beautifully hand-drawn and coloured, dating from around 1840
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Sissinghurst books (30 available)
- 2 photos on Sissinghurst appear in 2 Frith books - View photos of Sissinghurst
- Read extracts and see photos from these books on Sissinghurst and Kent
Sissinghurst memories
Read and share memories of Sissinghurst and Kent inspired by Frith photos
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You can also read memories of nearby places in Kent below.
Kent memories
Visiting my parents in Iden Green
I have very fond memories of visiting my parents, Margaret & Percy Thorburn who owned Coveney Cottage from 1961 until 1980.
We used to come down from London on the National Coach to Benenden and then a Fuggles Garage car/taxi would take us down to Iden Green. Alternatively we would meet my parents in the pub (name temporarily forgotten) and have a drink before driving back to their cottage.
I remember the village when it had its own public house and village shop, and lots of the older residents, Fred & Lily of Lilac Cottage, Mrs Daw from the other half of Coveney Cottage, Joan Witterkoff of Seerose Cottage, to name but a few.
My parents are ...read more here
A memory of Iden Green contributed by Anne Kennedy
My home hawkhurst
I grew up in hawkhurst , i lived in gills green in hawkhurst , hawkhurst has a close community everybody knew everybody , most familys that lived there had lived there for years even generations . my dads family had lived there for many years . i have very fond memorys of hawkhurst while i was growing up , the tractors going up and down the road all day . where i lived there were farms all around us. I could smell fresh wood from the wood factory just up the road , i would wake up to the sound of sheep barring in the fields just across the road and birds singing . The kind of thing you would see ...read more here
A memory of Hawkhurst contributed by susanne jones
{Rev} Henry Doyle Sewell
My great great grandfather was the Vicar or St. Peter and St. Paul. Please see http://www.robertsewell.ca/sewell.html#gen9 for further details. I suspect his remains were interred in the churchyard of St. Peter and St. Paul. Does anyone have any knowledge of this or perhaps a photo of a headstone?
A memory of Headcorn contributed by Robert Sewell
Hop fields
Horsmonden - the end of my hop picking days. I was born in east London 1939 and hop picking was four weeks in the country, camp fire cooking in the evening, a sing along and down to the Gun or the Town House on Saturday evening. Then came 1960 and I was called up for National Service spending two years away.
I have now retired and acquired a PC. I have found the internet to which I am
new to and found your site. Lots of memories came flooding back and I can
find a use for some spare time. Thank you for a new interest.
Brian
A memory of Horsmonden contributed by Brian Long
Extracts From Sissinghurst & Kent books
Here we see the type of tile-hung and weatherboarded cottages which abound in this area. The white fencing
around the cottage gardens is very typical of villages in the Weald of Kent.
An extract from from"Kent Photographic Memories".
Here we see a fine display of weatherboarding along the empty and dusty main street. The faded pub sign is for the Bull Inn. Not far outside the village are the twin towers of Sissinghurst Castle with its beautiful gardens, once home to the author Vita Sackville West. Whilst at Sissinghurst she wrote her novel ‘All Passion Spent’, as well as poems and magazine articles.
An extract from from"Villages of Kent Photographic Memories".
Is the old chap (right) on his way to the Bull Inn for a pint of local ale or cider? If he was still around 27 years later, he no doubt would have met the poet, novelist and gardener Vita Sackville-West and her diplomat husband, Sir Harold Nicolson. The couple had just moved into Sissinghurst Castle in 1930; centuries earlier, the castle had been a prison for foreign soldiers.
An extract from from"Kent Revisited Photographic Memories".
In 1933, 70 acres of chalk
downland were acquired by
Chatham and Gillingham
councils to create this
beautiful open countryside
nature reserve between the
two towns. The local wildlife
includes several species of
orchids and butterflies. At
the centre of this picture,
we can see the horses of
travellers whose mobile
homes are among the trees.
An extract from from"Chatham and the Medway Towns Photographic Memories".
The bus advertises Fremlins’
ales outside the Red Lion,
a Style & Winch house of
flamboyant grandeur, but
now no more, sad to say.
There are now traffic lights
and a great deal more
traffic where this policeman
stands on point duty at the
junction of High Street with
Corporation Street (left) and
Star Hill (right).
An extract from from"Chatham and the Medway Towns Photographic Memories".