Walmer
Encyclopedia
Walmer is a town in the district of Dover
, Kent
in England
: located on the coast, the parish of Walmer is six miles (10 km) north-east of Dover
. Largely residential, its coastline and castle attract many visitors. It has a population
of 6,693 (2001).
Walmer is closely associated with its adjoining neighbour, the town of Deal
- sharing many amenities and services and benefiting from Deal's High Street shopping area.
Walmer railway station
is on the Kent Coast Line
.
reputedly landed
on the beach here in 55 BC and 54 BC. It is only one possible landing place, but it is the most probable, judging from the distances given in his account of the landings in his Gallic Wars
. It was in the 19th century thought that he landed by Deal Castle
- hence a house there with SPQR
emblazoned on its gate - but the landing-point is now put half a mile further south, beyond the lifeboat station, and marked by a concrete memorial.
and its beautiful formal gardens are a major attraction for visitors. The official residence of Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports
since the 18th Century, the building is now an English Heritage
property.
Famous Lords Warden have included Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother
, Sir Winston Churchill
, William Pitt the Younger
(whose niece Lady Hester Stanhope
first created the gardens), and the Duke of Wellington
(of the Battle of Waterloo
fame). Wellington lived there for 23 years and the castle houses not only a collection of Wellington memorabilia but also the room in which he died.
The Castle was built in 1540 as one of three on this part of the Kent coast by orders of Henry VIII
. The others were nearby at Deal
(southern Deal) and Sandown
(north Deal) - the Deal one survives, the Sandown one has been lost to coastal erosion.
The development of maltings, bottling plants, brew house, stables and blacksmith's eventually made it an important local employer. Further houses were bought in Dover Road for use as offices and to house staff, and a long terrace of brick cottages was built in Belmont to house more workers.
During the 1950s, the brewery became part of the Charrington's company and its role was reduced to a bottling and distribution plant. It eventually closed in 1972 and was demolished in 1978 to make way for a housing development called Downlands. An old bell, once housed in the belfry at the brewery, was re-sited at The Thompson Bell, the last remaining public house in the village.
People who died in Walmer include:
Dover (district)
Dover is a local government district in Kent, England. Dover is its administrative centre. It was formed on 1 April 1974 by the merger of the boroughs of Deal, Dover, and Sandwich along with Dover Rural District and most of Eastry Rural District...
, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
: located on the coast, the parish of Walmer is six miles (10 km) north-east of Dover
Dover
Dover is a town and major ferry port in the home county of Kent, in South East England. It faces France across the narrowest part of the English Channel, and lies south-east of Canterbury; east of Kent's administrative capital Maidstone; and north-east along the coastline from Dungeness and Hastings...
. Largely residential, its coastline and castle attract many visitors. It has a population
Population
A population is all the organisms that both belong to the same group or species and live in the same geographical area. The area that is used to define a sexual population is such that inter-breeding is possible between any pair within the area and more probable than cross-breeding with individuals...
of 6,693 (2001).
Walmer is closely associated with its adjoining neighbour, the town of Deal
Deal, Kent
Deal is a town in Kent England. It lies on the English Channel eight miles north-east of Dover and eight miles south of Ramsgate. It is a former fishing, mining and garrison town...
- sharing many amenities and services and benefiting from Deal's High Street shopping area.
Walmer railway station
Walmer railway station
Walmer railway station serves Walmer in Kent. The station and all trains serving it are operated by Southeastern.-Service: the typical off-peak service from the station is one train per hour to Ramsgate and one train per hour to London Charing Cross via Folkestone Central and Sevenoaks.-External...
is on the Kent Coast Line
Kent Coast Line
The Kent Coast Line is railway line that runs from Dover Priory to Margate in the English county of Kent.It was electrified by BR under the 1955 Modernisation Plan.- Services :...
.
Julius Caesar
Julius CaesarJulius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....
reputedly landed
Caesar's invasions of Britain
In his Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice, in 55 and 54 BC. The first invasion, made late in summer, was either intended as a full invasion or a reconnaissance-in-force expedition...
on the beach here in 55 BC and 54 BC. It is only one possible landing place, but it is the most probable, judging from the distances given in his account of the landings in his Gallic Wars
Commentarii de Bello Gallico
Commentarii de Bello Gallico is Julius Caesar's firsthand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative. In it Caesar describes the battles and intrigues that took place in the nine years he spent fighting local armies in Gaul that opposed Roman domination.The "Gaul" that Caesar...
. It was in the 19th century thought that he landed by Deal Castle
Deal Castle
Deal Castle is located in Deal, Kent, England, between Walmer Castle and the now lost Sandown Castle .-Construction:It is one of the most impressive of the Device Forts or Henrician Castles built by Henry VIII between 1539 and 1540 as an artillery fortress to counter the threat of invasion from...
- hence a house there with SPQR
SPQR
SPQR is an initialism from a Latin phrase, Senatus Populusque Romanus , referring to the government of the ancient Roman Republic, and used as an official emblem of the modern day comune of Rome...
emblazoned on its gate - but the landing-point is now put half a mile further south, beyond the lifeboat station, and marked by a concrete memorial.
Walmer Castle
Walmer CastleWalmer Castle
Walmer Castle was built by Henry VIII in 1539–1540 as an artillery fortress to counter the threat of invasion from Catholic France and Spain. It was part of his programme to create a chain of coastal defences along England's coast known as the Device Forts or as Henrician Castles...
and its beautiful formal gardens are a major attraction for visitors. The official residence of Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports
Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports
The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports is a ceremonial official in the United Kingdom. The post dates from at least the 12th century but may be older. The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports was originally in charge of the Cinque Ports, a group of five port towns on the southeast coast of England...
since the 18th Century, the building is now an English Heritage
English Heritage
English Heritage . is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...
property.
Famous Lords Warden have included Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother
Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon
Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was the queen consort of King George VI from 1936 until her husband's death in 1952, after which she was known as Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, to avoid confusion with her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II...
, Sir Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
, William Pitt the Younger
William Pitt the Younger
William Pitt the Younger was a British politician of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He became the youngest Prime Minister in 1783 at the age of 24 . He left office in 1801, but was Prime Minister again from 1804 until his death in 1806...
(whose niece Lady Hester Stanhope
Lady Hester Stanhope
Lady Hester Lucy Stanhope , the eldest child of Charles Stanhope, 3rd Earl Stanhope by his first wife Lady Hester Pitt, is remembered by history as an intrepid traveller in an age when women were discouraged from being adventurous.-Early life and travels:Lady Hester was born and grew up at her...
first created the gardens), and the Duke of Wellington
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington
Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS , was an Irish-born British soldier and statesman, and one of the leading military and political figures of the 19th century...
(of the Battle of Waterloo
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands...
fame). Wellington lived there for 23 years and the castle houses not only a collection of Wellington memorabilia but also the room in which he died.
The Castle was built in 1540 as one of three on this part of the Kent coast by orders of Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
. The others were nearby at Deal
Deal Castle
Deal Castle is located in Deal, Kent, England, between Walmer Castle and the now lost Sandown Castle .-Construction:It is one of the most impressive of the Device Forts or Henrician Castles built by Henry VIII between 1539 and 1540 as an artillery fortress to counter the threat of invasion from...
(southern Deal) and Sandown
Sandown Castle, Kent
Sandown Castle was one of Henry VIII's Device Forts or Henrician Castles built at Sandown, North Deal, Kent as part of Henry VIII's chain of coastal fortifications to defend England against the threat of foreign invasion. It made up a line of defences with Walmer Castle and Deal Castle to protect...
(north Deal) - the Deal one survives, the Sandown one has been lost to coastal erosion.
Walmer Aerodrome
The flat grassy plateau at Hawkshill Freedown on the southern edge of Walmer parish was a World War I aerodrome and has a memorial to the pilots who flew from there and were killed fighting in France.The Walmer Brewery 1816-1978
It is believed that Upper Walmer was home to a brewery from Tudor times and possibly earlier. In 1816 a small brewery on the Dover Road just south of the old Walmer Village was acquired by Edmund Thompson who then operated it as Thompson & Sons. In 1867 John Matthews bought the business and greatly expanded and modernised it, although he retained the Thompson Brewery name.The development of maltings, bottling plants, brew house, stables and blacksmith's eventually made it an important local employer. Further houses were bought in Dover Road for use as offices and to house staff, and a long terrace of brick cottages was built in Belmont to house more workers.
During the 1950s, the brewery became part of the Charrington's company and its role was reduced to a bottling and distribution plant. It eventually closed in 1972 and was demolished in 1978 to make way for a housing development called Downlands. An old bell, once housed in the belfry at the brewery, was re-sited at The Thompson Bell, the last remaining public house in the village.
Churches
- Old St Mary's Church, Walmer
- St Saviour's Church, Walmer
- St Mary's Church, WalmerSt Mary's Church, WalmerSt Mary's or The Church of St Mary the Virgin is a church in Walmer, Kent, England.-History:It was designed by Arthur Blomfield in 1887 to take the pressure off the parish's two other churches, the small medieval Old St Mary's and St Saviour's...
People from Walmer
People born in Walmer include:- Dornford YatesDornford YatesDornford Yates was the pseudonym of the British novelist, Cecil William Mercer , whose novels and short stories, some humorous , some thrillers , were best-sellers in the 21-year interwar period between the First and Second world wars.The pen name, Dornford Yates, first in print in 1910, resulted...
- John Hassall (illustrator)John Hassall (illustrator)John Hassall was born in Walmer, Kent on 21 May 1868, died 8 March 1948 and was an English illustrator.Hassall educated in Worthing, at Newton Abbot College and at Neuenheim College, Heidelberg. After twice failing entry to The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, he emigrated to Manitoba in Canada...
People who died in Walmer include:
- Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of WellingtonArthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of WellingtonField Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS , was an Irish-born British soldier and statesman, and one of the leading military and political figures of the 19th century...
- Joseph Lister, 1st Baron ListerJoseph Lister, 1st Baron ListerJoseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister OM, FRS, PC , known as Sir Joseph Lister, Bt., between 1883 and 1897, was a British surgeon and a pioneer of antiseptic surgery, who promoted the idea of sterile surgery while working at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary...