page_title: Lower Halstow
section_title: Parish church
hierarchical_section_title: Lower Halstow / Parish church
caption_attribution_description: English: St Margaret, Lower Halstow, Kent - East end
context_page_description: Lower Halstow is a village and civil parish in the Swale district of Kent, England. The village is northwest of Sittingbourne on the banks of the Medway Estuary. It lies north of Newington on the A2 Roman road.
  The 2011 census recorded the parish's population as 1,180.
  The village has a long history, with evidence of constant occupation since the Iron Age. Being so close to the water, Lower Halstow has been a village that has made its living from the water. Whether it be ancient pottery making, ancient fishing, barge building, or in the 19th- and 20th-century brick-making, the water has been the lifeblood of the village.
  According to Edward Hasted in 1798, two large hospital ships, commonly called lazarettos, were moored in Halstow Creek. The lazarettos monitored ships coming to England which were forced to stay in the creek under quarantine, to protect the country from infectious diseases.
  In 1563 Queen Elizabeth ordered a survey, and Halstow Key, was made up of 24 people in houses and 14 living on boats. There were two hamlets, one beside the wharf and the other around Halstow Green on Lower Street. The rest of the northern lands were salt marsh.
context_section_description: On a bank of the Medway Estuary is the Church of England parish church of St Margaret of Antioch. It is an 8th-century Saxon church to which were added north and south aisles in the 12th century and a west tower in the 13th century. The masonry includes re-used Roman tiles. The font is Norman and was made around AD 1190. Unusually it is made of lead. In the nave and aisles are remnants of 14th-century wall paintings. For a time in the 12th century its parish priest was John de London who was a nephew to St Thomas Becket.
  The ecclesiastical parish is in the deanery of Sittingbourne, which is part of the Diocese of Canterbury. The building is Grade I listed.
caption: Inside the nave of St Margaret's, looking east to the chancel
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