Sandwich, Kent, Medieval Cinqueport - History and Guide Strand St. has one of the longest rows of timber framed houses in Europe Sandwich is one of the best preserved medieval towns in the UK Sandwich Kent - Medieval Cinque Port In medieval times and before, Sandwich was a main Kent and UK port, it was and still is, a principal Cinque Port. Before the River Stour silted up, the river was wide and deep enough for great sailing ships. Today, the ships have been replaced by smaller craft, residential and visitors moorings, but the many ancient buildings make Sandwich one of the best preserved medieval towns in England. Sandwich Origins The first recorded mention of Sandwich was around 664 AD but there was probably some kind of settlement in Roman times as the site is very close to Richborough Roman Fort (Rutupiae). The name of the town is, most likely, Saxon in origin, approximately meaning sandy place, or the place on the sand. The word sandwich as an item of food came into being centuries later ...

Sandwich for Visitors With its ancient buildings, nature reserves, golf courses, delightful country pubs, cafés and restaurants, the medieval Cinque Port of Sandwich is a must to visit for the discerning tourist. Sandwich is also surrounded by small picturesque villages, such as Eastry, Ash, Worth and Woodnesborough & within easy reach are the nearby towns of Canterbury and the Port of Dover. English Counties, Parish, etc. for Genealogists Introduction I have noticed that genealogy mailing lists, at least those I subscribe to, frequently receive requests for an explanation of aspects of the English local government system as it affects genealogists. Questions such &QUOT;What is the difference between a shire and a county?&QUOT or &QUOT;A document I consulted says this village is in county A, but my map/gazetteer says it is in county B, which is right?&QUOT;, and less frequently people want to know what is meant by a hundred or a poor law union. This page is intended to help to answer such questions, showing how the system originated and how it has changed over the centuries.

It also contains some explanation of other units of local government and types of settlement, mainly for the period prior to the reorganisation of 1974. Specific counties, etc,. will be mentioned only by way of examples, partly to keep this page to a reasonable size and partly because I simply don't know all the details of the changes in names and boundaries that have taken place. Where I become aware of them I will point to other sources of such detailed information. If you know of such sources, or if you find any errors on this page, or would like it expanded to include some additional related material, please let me know . Origins of the counties During much of what we call the Saxon period, the British Isles were divided into a number of warring kingdoms. I will deal mainly with England, because that is what I know most about, but so far as genealogy is concerned, the differences in other parts of the island are not very significant. Although the word county is derived from the Norman French comté, the boundaries of Norman counties corresponded in most respects with those of the Saxon shires of the immediate pre-Norman period.

Many of them were in turn based on much older tribal districts, which are reflected in names of Celtic origin such as Cornwall, Devon and Kent. Essex, Middlesex and Sussex were the lands occupied by the East, Middle and South Saxons respectively, while Norfolk and Suffolk were similarly the areas of the North Folk and South Folk of the Angles' kingdom of East Anglia. The shires of the more northerly east and midlands were formed later by the Danes, and named after the local military centre in each case (Bedford, Cambridge, Derby, Huntingdon, Leicester, Lincoln, Northampton, Nottingham and York). The counties of the west midlands were formed by the king of Wessex after he invaded the area which had been the kingdom of Mercia. The remaining counties of northern England were created by the Normans to produce a reasonably uniform system across the whole of England. The origins of the Welsh counties are explained on Glyn Hale's excellent website .

Various forms of county names In total contrast to the system in USA, the word "county" is a not part of the name of English counties, with the sole exception of County Durham, where it precedes the main part of the name in the same way as in all Irish counties. The American form of having the word "county" after the main name is always wrong in referring to a county in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Many, but by no means all, have the syllable "-shire" as the last part of the name, and in a few cases this was normal use once but is slowly being dropped. Examples of counties which are losing or have lost their suffix in this way are Devon(shire), Dorset and Somerset. Old documents consulted by genealogists of course show the usage which was normal at the time they were created, often differing from what is used now. (I am speaking here purely of naming conventions, not of changes in boundaries, which are covered below.) Counties which took their names from a major town within them, such as those created by the Danes listed above, were often referred to, for example, as The County of Nottingham, meaning the whole of Nottinghamshire.

A particularly confusing example of this is the common naming of Hampshire as The County of Southampton; I have even found this on a will abbreviated to "co south". Co. is commonly used in old documents as an abbreviation for the word "county" or the words "county of". Boundary changes At a detailed level there have been numerous changes to county boundaries over the years. In some cases these have been to tidy up historic anomalies, such as tiny detached pieces of one county being entirely surrounded by another. Such changes have taken place piecemeal over many years, with some such detached areas surviving to as recently as 1974 (notably the northern piece of Worcestershire containing the town of Dudley, which was entirely surrounded by Staffordshire). Certain areas, particularly the West Midlands, have undergone numerous changes, some towns having been in as many as three different historic counties at different times. In addition to the shifting boundaries described above, most of the larger towns and cities were at various times granted what was known as "county borough" status. A county borough functioned as a separate unit, independently of the county in which it was geographically situated.

This system was started in 1888, when all towns and cities with populations in excess of 50,000, plus a few others, became the first such units. To confuse the issue further, in 1974 a total review of county boundaries took place, which led to the elimination of all remaining detached parts, the combining of some counties, total elimination of others, the introduction of new county names in some places, and the end of all county boroughs. Major conurbations became independent "metropolitan" counties, each including a number of towns which had effectively merged by natural growth. An example of such a new metropolitan county was West Midlands, which combined the industrial areas of Birmingham, Coventry, Dudley and several other towns, reducing the size of the neighbouring counties of Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire in the process. The 1974 changes, because of their scale, lead to much confusion among genealogists, especially those resident in other countries, when trying to locate the homes of their ancestors and the likely location of records.

The whole of north Berkshire, for example, was transferred to Oxfordshire, so old records relating to such towns as Faringdon speak of its being in Berkshire, but modern gazetteers say it is in Oxfordshire. Similarly, Huntingdonshire, the Isle of Ely and the Soke of Peterborough were all absorbed into Cambridgeshire. Middlesex and large pieces of Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey were absorbed into London. Similar events took place also in Yorkshire and Lancashire, while further north the maps were almost completely redrawn. In 1997/8 many, but not all, of the 1974 changes were reversed. Although the name county borough was not revived, the effect was, and this time the independent status was not confined to urban areas. New local authorities called "Unitary Authorities" took over all local government functions in their areas, just like the old county boroughs and in many cases identical to them in area.

This happened in a piecemeal fashion however, with no unitary authorities being created in some areas, but in the extreme case of Berkshire the whole of what survived the 1974 shake-up was split into unitary authorities, so Berkshire as an administrative unit no longer exists. This process has continued from time to time, with Bedfordshire, for example, ceasing to exist as an administrative unit in 2010. Hundred and Wapentake These are similar sub-divisions of counties, introduced in the 10th century primarily as a unit of taxation but also having administrative, judicial and military functions. The two names relate to the division of the country into the Danelaw in the north, where the term wapentake was used, and the Anglo-Saxon south which used the term hundred. The name hundred relates to the original size of 100 hides of land (roughly 12,000 acres on average, but very variable). Parish Most parishes were originally the area served by a local church, and were (still are in many cases) synonymous with the village in which the church was situated, although outlying dwellings and farms away from the main village were normally included.

It must be realised, however, that parishes varied enormously in size, some, especially in the wilder, uncultivated areas, extending for many miles. In some areas a single parish covered a great number of separate settlements (up to 35 in one Cheshire example). Urban parishes in older cities tended to be small in area, with quite a number of separate parishes within a single city (over 40 each in Norwich and York, for example), whereas newer cities tended to have a single parish despite their large population, until they were split up in the middle of the 19th century. Parishes also varied greatly in age. Although most mediæval parishes had been formed by 1200, many were already hundreds of years old by that time. Many more were formed during the great growth in population in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The concept of a civil parish was introduced in Tudor times, when they were given responsibility for upkeep of highways, caring for the poor and for the less serious aspects of law enforcement.

Where the ecclesiastical parish was reasonably small in population it normally corresponded with the civil one, but if the ecclesiastical parish was very large it was divided up into a number of civil parishes. Like the counties, parish boundaries showed abundant anomalies, detached parts being quite common. However, in 1894 a new Local Government Act revised the entire structure, dividing the rural areas of England and Wales into 14,000 parishes with most of the anomalies and detached parts removed, although in most respects the boundaries followed the old civil parish boundaries. From that time, the affairs of the parish were controlled by an elected parish council. This is the one part of local government structure which survived the 1974 and 1997/8 reorganisations without significant change. In urban areas parishes remain as ecclesiastical units only since 1894, although the legislation bringing in the latest changes give residents the option of having civil parishes in their parts of urban areas if they choose to do so. In the above paragraph I say most of the anomalies and detached parts.

It did say all, but my attention was drawn to one anomaly which still exists, and this suggests to me there may be others. The particular case is at Romsey in Hampshire, where there is still one parish entirely surrounded by another! Romsey Extra Parish (which I assume covers a rural area) entirely surrounds Romsey Infra Parish (which more or less coincides with the small town of Romsey). John Parker, a member of Romsey Extra Parish Council, who drew my attention to this, also reminded me that many parishes which were created, by the demotion of small boroughs or otherwise cover relatively small urban areas, by the 1997/8 reorganisation, were given the option (which many, including Romsey Infra, have taken up) of being called "town councils", with the chairman of the council given the title of "Mayor", although their powers remain identical to those of other parish councils. I should also add that the Church of England still has its ecclesiastical parishes, quite separate from the civil ones, the governing bodies of which are now known as "parochial church councils".

Some large ecclesiastical parishes have a second, subordinate, church or chapel to help cope with the numbers of people or the extended area; such a church or chapel normally has responsibility for a defined area within the parish sometimes known as a chapelry, with the subordinate/daughter church or chapel often called a "chapel of ease". Genealogists need to be aware that it is these ecclesiastical parishes, not the civil parishes, which maintain the registers of baptisms, marriages and burials, although in most cases the surviving older registers have been deposited with the local county record office. Naming a Parish in Relation to Its County, Etc. I have been asked to clarify how a parish should be referred to in relation to the town/village/county of which it is a part. I have not been able to improve on the "off the cuff" reply I gave at the time: Most parishes are in rural areas, so no town name is relevant. Most, but by no means all, rural parishes coincide with a village, so normally nobody would bother to distinguish. It would then be simply parish, county, country, without the word "parish" being used.

In a few cases (I know of only one, the parish of Felkirk, covering the village of Shafton, near Barnsley in the West Riding of Yorkshire) the name of the parish is not that of either the village or of the dedication of the parish church but an entirely independent name with some historical derivation. In some cases a parish covers more than one village. There are then two possibilities: The parish may be called something like "Thaton cum Thisham" (fictional names!), meaning the parish covers the villages of Thaton and Thisham. Again it would be stated as parish, county, country, without using the word "parish". The parish may have the same name as just one village, in which case it would still be parish, county, country, but with the word "parish" after the parish name to make it clear that the whole parish, not just the village, was referred to.

In a small town, with just one parish covering the entire town, the situation could be the same as 1 above, although sometimes the parish name would be that of the dedication of the church rather than the name of the town; in this case it would usually be given as parish, town, county, country, with the word "parish" coming first, as in "Parish of St. John, Whichton, Whatshire, England" (fictional names again). In a larger town, with more than one parish, there are again two possibilities, with the two both occurring in the same town, but for different parishes, in many cases. One of the parishes may have the same name as the town, in which case it could be referred to as parish, county, country, including the word parish as in "Whichton Parish, Whatshire, England". Other parishes in the town would be of the form parish (normally that of the dedication of the church), town, county, country, as in the last example in 5 above. Poor Law Unions One of the most important duties placed on parishes by the Tudor reforms was the care of their own paupers.

Since there was no social security of any kind, this was the only way the sick, disabled and elderly could survive (although the church, mainly through abbeys and monasteries, had provided some poor relief prior to their dissolution by Henry VIII). While this certainly helped those it was aimed at, it also placed a financial burden on the parish, for which they had to tax their more affluent members. The impact of this naturally varied from place to place, depending both on the ratio of paupers to wealthy citizens and on the general prosperity of the area concerned. One particularly serious effect was that parishes were naturally very unwilling to accept into their midst anyone from another area who was likely to become a charge on the local finances. In consequence, severe restrictions were placed on the freedom of ordinary people to move around the country. The 1662 Act of Settlement defined more clearly the responsibilties of the parish and provided a means for people to move in search of work while being able to provide written evidence that they would never become a charge on the community to which they moved. This led to large numbers of court cases in local quarter sessions and the production of settlement certificates.

These certificates, as well as detailed records of the courts, where they survive, provide invaluable resources for genealogists and family historians. The entire system was revolutionised in 1834 by the Poor Law Amendment Act. This created a system of Unions, each consisting of a number of neighbouring parishes who jointly were required to finance the relief of poverty in their areas, so spreading the load a little more fairly. Each union was run by an elected board of guardians, many of whose records survive. By 1865 all unions had set up a workhouse within their area in which to house paupers. Many of the buildings erected for this purpose still survive, often as hospitals. The system remained largely unchanged until the introduction of some aspects of social security on a national basis, such as old age pensions, from 1908 onwards. The entire system was transferred from the parish unions to national government in 1919, but some workhouses continued in operation until the introduction of the modern welfare system by the National Assistance Act of 1948.

Mid-19th century boards and districts During the middle part of the 19th century more and more functions were put onto local government organisations to relieve the many problems which were emerging with the growth of population, industrialisation, and urbanisation. However, instead of using existing administrative units to carry out these new activities, a new set of boards and districts were created for each one, often with boundaries overlapping those already in existence. Each of these new authorities required elections to choose its members and each raised its own finance by imposing a local tax (often called a rate). Thus separate bodies existed to maintain highways, to provide and run schools, to provide sanitation, to provide burial facilities, etc.; in some places even the provision of hospitals and of the medical staff to operate them were provided by two separate authorities. The system (for want of a better term) was basically that a separate board was created for each function, with separate elections, separate finances, separate officials, separate premises from which to operate, etc. The waste and incompetence was tremendous. From the genealogical and historical research point of view, it is worth remembering that each of these bodies kept records, many of which survive.

Most of this chaos was cleared up in 1888, when most of the local boards were transferred to the county councils, set up by the Local Government Act of that year as elected bodies with reformed boundaries. Poor Law unions (until 1930), School districts (until 1902) and Sanitary districts (until 1894), however, continued their independent existence a little longer. Boroughs Boroughs have from pre-Norman times been towns and cities which have received a charter granting them certain privileges, mainly but not exclusively concerned with the control of various commercial activities within their boundaries. Such charters could be issued (in mediæval times) either by the monarch or by the local lord of the manor in which the town was situated. The latter were normally "seigneurial boroughs", having only a limited degree of independence from the lord of the manor. Those with corporate status had more complete independence from the lord of the manor, but the details of their powers varied enormously, depending on the detailed wording of their charters, which were all different.

Corporate boroughs were administered by a Corporation, which consisted until 1835 of leading townsmen appointed for life, with vacancies filled by appointment by the existing members. From 1835 this system was replaced by elections for three quarters of the members, with the old system of appointment remaining for the other quarter. The appointed members were known as aldermen, an office which remained (but not with life-long tenancy) until 1974. (One quarter of the members of county councils were also appointed aldermen from 1888 to 1974.) The electors in corporate boroughs, and the people actually running the seigneurial boroughs, were known as burgesses. In some places lists of burgesses survive; it is perhaps worth mentioning that although women could not vote in Parliamentary elections in Britain until 1925, nevertheless they could be, and sometimes were, burgesses, at least in the 19th century and perhaps earlier. The office of mayor has existed almost, if not quite, as long as there have been boroughs.

In past times this was a powerful office, the mayor being the most important man in the town, but gradually the powers have been reduced until today the mayor of a town functions as (at least in theory) a politically neutral chairman of council meetings, and as a public figurehead, and is elected by councillors from among their own members. In boroughs officially recognised as cities (i.e. having a charter to say they have that status), the equivalent person is known as the lord mayor, but his functions are virtually identical. In the 21st century the old idea of having an executive mayor (subject to regular direct election) has been revived in a few places, starting with London. Urban and Rural District Councils In 1894 county areas outside boroughs were divided into urban and rural districts, normally following the boundaries of the Sanitary districts. Each such district had an elected council, and its functions and structure were almost identical to those of the boroughs, but they did not have aldermen or mayors. The rural districts were further subject to division into parishes, now with elected parish councils (except very small places which had a parish meeting instead).

Definitions of types of settlement There is often confusion as to the correct terminology to use for a settlement. What is the distinction between a hamlet and a village, or between a village and a town? What constitutes a city? This section is an attempt to clear up the confusion, so far as that is possible. I should perhaps establish that when I say a settlement I mean a group of dwellings (i.e. more than one), possibly with other buildings. First it should be made clear that for most purposes the only one of those terms with a definite fixed meaning is the city. A settlement is a city if it holds a charter from the monarch to say so, and not otherwise. There is no other reliable indicator of city status, which is applied to large and small places alike, although I am not aware of any particularly small city which is not the location of a cathedral (but there are small places with cathedrals which are not cities). At the smallest end of the range, a settlement would normally be called a hamlet if it did not possess the simplest trappings of community life, such as a church or an inn or public house or a school or a post office or other shop.

A village would normally possess all of those things, but there are obviously intermediate cases which have some but not others. The loss of some such facilities from a village which once had them all would certainly not lead to people changing the way they speak of it. The distinction between a village and a town is probably even more vague. Population is certainly an element. A place with fewer than about 1,500 residents is unlikely to be called a town by anyone, while one with over 5,000 will rarely be called a village (but there are exceptions). If a place has an ancient regular market or fair it will almost certainly be called a town (if it is not a city), even if it is quite small by modern standards. A small town is much more likely than a village to have a definite commercial area at its centre, with a variety of shops, some of which may be quite specialised, whereas in a village shops will be few and tend to be general stores selling a mixture of groceries, hardware, newspapers and other items, often combined with a post office.

If a village is at the larger end of the population range, then it will usually consist of a small older core with a considerable recent expansion, often inhabited by commuters who live in the village but work in a nearby larger town. Despite all that has been said, there are certainly some places which are ambiguous in this respect. Lynton, in north Devon, for example, together with its neighbour Lynmouth and a few outlying areas is for administrative purposes a parish. However, it has a most imposing town hall, a definite commercial centre in each of the two main constituents, and a mayor to chair the council's deliberations, but the inhabitants nevertheless refer to it as a village. The population varies from about 1,500 in winter to ten times as many or more in the summer tourist season. I live in another, very different ambiguous area. Stopsley was once a typical hill-top village a few miles outside the town of Luton, but was long ago (1933) absorbed by the town.

Nevertheless the inhabitants of this part of Luton still refer to the old village centre as "the village", and a book on the history of Stopsley, published on 21st October 1998, refers in the blurb on the cover to "The hamlet of Stopsley"! Other names for particular areas In addition to the general names for specific types of place or local government unit as described above, other terms are used to name particular areas of the country. This section lists a few of them. I will add more as I think of them or when someone draws my attention to them. Contributions are invited . The Black Country is the industrial area of (pre-1974) south east Staffordshire , north east Worcestershire , north west Warwickshire, and south Shropshire. It is centred on the town of Dudley, and gained its name from the results of the massive atmospheric pollution produced by local metal-working industries, especially in the 19th century. Buildings and trees (where any survived) were black with soot, the stars were never visible in the sky, any washing hung outside was black with freshly deposited soot long before it was dry, and life expectancy was unsurprisingly short.

County boundaries in the area always have been complex and subject to many changes. Forest of Bowland is an area of wild moorland bounded in the east and south by the River Ribble (which separates it from the Yorkshire Dales ), in the north by the River Lune and in the west by The Fylde . It is (on pre-1974 boundaries) partly in Lancashire and partly Yorkshire. Craven is an area of the Yorkshire Dales subsequently adopted as a district council's official name. The Dales is the name given to most of the more northerly section of the Pennine Hills. It consists of high moorland interspersed with a series of fast rivers flowing east to the North Sea. Each river valley is a dale, named after its river (e.g. the River Swale runs through Swaledale). The Yorkshire section is a National Park, called the Yorkshire Dales National Park, but further north the Dales continue into County Durham, Westmorland and Northumberland to Hadrian's Wall, built by the Romans to keep out the barbarians across the border in Scotland.

East Anglia is usually thought of today as being the round bulge on the east side of England, extending from the Thames estuary northwards to the large rectangular shallow inlet called The Wash. On this definition it consists of the counties of Norfolk , Suffolk and Essex, with Cambridgeshire sometimes also included. However, a more strict definition based on the boundaries of the ancient kingdom would restrict it to the counties of Norfok and Suffolk, plus the eastern part only of Cambridgeshire and the north-east corner of Essex. East Midlands is a largely but by no means exclusively industrial area, as one might expect located to the east of the West Midlands . It includes the counties of Derbyshire (although the northern, moorland, part is sometimes excluded), Leicestershire , Northamptonshire and Nottinghamshire . Fenland is a term applied to an area of low-lying, very flat land (some of it below sea-level) in eastern England. Although nearly all of it is now drained and is a very fertile agricultural area, historically it was a place of marshes extending as far as the eye could see and well beyond.

The counties parts of which comprise it are Cambridgeshire (almost all of it), Huntingdonshire (all of it), parts of west Norfolk , south Lincolnshire and part of north Bedfordshire. Drainage has resulted in shrinking of the soil, to the extent that some rivers, notably much of the Norfolk part of the Great Ouse, flow well above the surrounding land and are contained only by massive earthen embankments. The Isle of Ely, miles from the sea, is so-named because it was an island in the surrounding miles of fens. Incidentally, a fen is an alkaline marsh, distinguishing it from a bog which is always acidic. The Fylde is a short broad peninsula in Lancashire, bounded in the south by the estuary of the River Ribble, in the east by the Pennines, in the west by the almost entirely urban coastline of Lytham St. Annes, Blackpool, Cleveleys and Fleetwood, and in the north by a stretch of north-facing Irish Sea coast known (I am told by a kind correspondent) as Over Wyre. The area is very flat, corresponding with its name, derived from filde, meaning plain.

Halfshire was a hundred of north-east Worcestershire. It included Dudley and three other detached parts. Hallamshire is the area around and including the city of Sheffield, in south Yorkshire. So far as I know, there has never been a county of this name, but this large industrial city set in a river valley in the midst of wild moorland is a very distinctive place. The Home Counties are those counties surrounding London. These are Essex (note the overlap with East Anglia ), Hertfordshire, Middlesex, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Surrey and Kent (that sequence is going anti-clockwise from the Thames estuary). Sussex is also sometimes included. The origin of the name is obscure. The Lake District is an area of lakes and mountains in north-west England. It includes England's longest (Lake Windermere) and deepest (Wastwater) natural lakes and highest mountains (Scafell Pike, Scafell, Helvellyn and others). It includes the whole of Westmorland, a great part of Cumberland and a small piece of north Lancashire (pre-1974 boundaries - using post-1974 boundaries it is entirely in Cumbria).

The Peak District is the southern part of the Pennine Hills. It is an area of high moorland, with deep, often very picturesque valleys and occasional gorges, mostly situated in north and central Derbyshire but also extending into Staffordshire , Yorkshire and just a little into Lancashire (using pre-1974 boundaries). It was the first National Park to be defined in Britain. Vale of York is a roughly rectangular piece of fertile lowland running north-south between the North Yorkshire Moors and the Dales . The Weald is the name given to the area between the North Downs and the South Downs in south east England. The downs mentioned are two ridges of chalk hills, running very roughly east to west across (mainly) Sussex and Kent, but meeting at the chalk hill plateau of north Hampshire and Salisbury Plain. They meet the sea at Dover (North Downs, forming the famous White Cliffs) and near Eastbourne (South Downs, forming the high cliffs of Beachy Head). The Weald itself was once heavily forested (the word weald is an Old English word meaning "woodland") and a centre for making charcoal for use in smelting iron.

Welsh Marches are the counties making up the border area of England adjacent to Wales. Normally included are Cheshire, Herefordshire, Shropshire and Worcestershire , with Monmouthshire (in Wales) normally also included. This was an area of great strategic significance in the early mediæval period, before Wales was conquered and pacified. The name comes from the old word "march" meaning border. West Country is a term applied to the counties of south west England as a group. The counties normally included are Cornwall, Devon, Dorset , Somerset and Wiltshire , and very often Hampshire and/or Gloucestershire are also included. It corresponds very roughly with the ancient kingdom of Wessex, and is sometimes given that name. West Midlands is the name given to the larger industrial area including the Black Country and surrounding towns and cities such as Birmingham, Coventry and many others. In 1974 a "metropolitan county" of this name was created to administer the area. Wirral is the roughly rectangular peninsula in north Cheshire (until 1974) lying between the estuaries of the rivers Dee and Mersey.

The 1974 changes to local government boundaries transferred the northern half to the new Metropolitan County of Merseyside with the status of a Metropolitan Borough named Wirral, with the southern half retained in Cheshire with the title of Ellesmere Port & Neston District (but usually known as South Wirral). My thanks to those readers who have from time to time drawn my attention to errors and omissions on this page, which I have endeavoured to correct. Main links within this site: h2g2 - English Counties, The Real Counties English Counties, The Real Counties Created 3 Conversations Origins of the County The origin of the term county is found in the Charlemagne region of eighth Century France as comté a term that defined a divided portion of land that fell under the auspices of a count, a companion of the king. The count had responsibility for the legal, military and administrative governance of his area of authority or ‘county’ subject to the inspection of officials of the King’s court. In England the term shire dates back over one thousand years and originated in the Anglo-Saxon communities of the fifth century.

The word shire meant a portion or sheared off piece of land and simply defined a geographical or administrative area governed from a settlement of some strategic or economic importance. This system of local government control had similarities with the system as in France. Though the title of count never evolved in England, the shire came under the authority of the ealderman or alderman who similarly to the French system were royal officials through whom the crown maintained a stronghold. The establishment of the thirty nine historic English counties which were later to become recognised developed during the tenth and eleventh centuries and originated by two means, either as lands of an ancient kingdom or tribe or as the lands gathered around a key strategic settlement. A number of kingdoms had already been in existence for many years notably Sussex, Norfolk and Northumberland for example and following their unity under the English Crown, they assumed the role of a county. Following the Norman Conquest of the eleventh century the shire system was retained, however the functions of the ealdorman were taken over by the shire-reeve or sheriff, who was directly appointed by the king.

Today in some county areas, the High Sheriff still holds a ceremonial role in his county area whilst in other counties the Lord Lieutenant has evolved and similarly acts as a representative of the monarch in that county. Six further counties were established following the Norman Conquest and the terms shire and county became synonymous terms. The power of the sheriff was greatly strengthened over time and by the fourteenth century, county courts composed of justices of the peace or magistrates had developed in order to aid the sheriff in administering the county, acting as executor of the king’s will and collector of the royal revenue. The crown appointed the magistrates whom gradually became the main administrators of the counties. Each county also became the constituency for the elections of county members to parliament. The Historic English Counties Over time, thirty-nine counties were established in England. Most of these same counties continue to be recognised today despite later Acts of Parliament, notably in 1888 which introduced the concept of an administrative county, a local authority area which whist initially being synonymous with the historical counties have over time due to successive boundary and political changes caused significant confusion over what is and is not a county or which settlement belongs to what true county.

The boundaries of those initial counties are essentially based on geographical features such as hills, mountains, rivers and streams and ancient settlements that exerted power and influence to the area around it. Those settlements, to which in most cases the area of jurisdiction thus became synonymous, developed as the seats of the courts and thus became the county town. Similarly of those ancient kingdoms prior to the establishment of a united kingdom under one crown, the capital became the designated county town. As the power and prosperity of towns changed over time, in some cases the county town also differed. Bedfordshire Yorkshire Monmouthshire* This particular county located between Gloucestershire in England and Glamorganshire in Wales is somewhat of an anomaly. Wales was claimed by the English under Edward I in 1282 and was officially brought under English administration by Royal assent in 1536 during the reign of Henry VIII. The shire system of government was thus introduced to the principality, administered by sheriffs and justices of the peace. Welsh customs and the traditional powers of the Marcher Lords were abolished and the Welsh language suppressed to restrict the quasi-independence of Wales, which had been under the absolute power of the English since the early part of the fifteenth century.

The seven shires of Brecon, Denbigh, Glamorgan, Pembroke, Radnor, Montgomery and Monmouth were created whilst Anglesey, Caernarfonshire, Cardiganshire, Carmarthenshire, Flintshire and Merionethshire were re-enfranchised as shires under English administration. The Act of Union was completed in 1543 whereby Monmouthshire was actually recognised officially as an English county even though it was still regarded as part of Wales for ecclesiastical purposes. Whilst recognised as the fortieth English county, the re-emergence of Welsh identity in later centuries (Cardiff only officially being recognised as the capital city of Wales in 1955), Monmouthshire became officially a part of Wales for most parliamentary and administrative purposes. The incorporation of Monmouthshire as an English county has been deemed to be an historical mistake. Detached Parts of Counties Owing to the gradual way the counties became established, numerous anomalies developed owing to land ownership issues and areas of land that had been awarded to certain noblemen. Many of those historical counties comprised lands that were entirely surrounded by another neighbouring county and were detached as ‘islands’ from the main county unit that would have administered them.

Most small detached parts of counties were however incorporated into the county which surrounded them in 1844, following the Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1843. Other detached areas were also tidied up in 1930 and 1931. Some detached areas however notably the northern portion of Worcestershire containing the town and later county borough of Dudley, which was entirely surrounded by Staffordshire and the Furness peninsular of Lancashire remained in the administrative sense until 1974. Certain areas owing to the alteration of boundaries have undergone numerous changes, some towns having been located in several different historic counties at different times. The Nineteenth Century The ancient system of county government, comprising centrally appointed justices of the peace who held legislative, judicial, and executive powers, had become quite inadequate by the time Victoria became queen, however the traditional system remained in place until the late nineteenth century. The industrialisation of England and the phenomenal increases in population, the expansion of government services, the extension of the suffrage and redistribution of wealth and populations necessitated the need for a new system of local government to act as the principal form of local administration, politics and law and to become more democratic and efficient.

Elected boards controlled most public services that had become available, such as education, welfare, heath and sanitary works. These boards tended to represent a particular town area or in order to deliver a more effective and cost efficient service, formed joint boards with neighbouring areas. In 1888 The Local Government Act replaced rule through the courts and boards with the formation of county councils. The sheriffs retained their judicial power as magistrates but the new authorities were based on democratically elected members being chosen to representing wards within the new council areas for a fixed term of three years. The councillors were elected aldermen and were responsible for appointing and fixing the salaries of their officers and employees for the provision of services such as education, county roads, libraries, planning, welfare services, policing, fire services and licensing. Forty eight new county councils were created and came into being in England in 1889 following the Act and in the main were based on and mirrored the ancient county boundaries, though there were only thirty nine historic English counties, with the exception of some minor alterations to boundaries over time particularly where detached areas of counties existed and where a town or settlement had grown over two or more historical county boundaries.

Once again each county was administered from the county town or eventually purpose built administrative headquarters. Several new authorities were formed based on the geographical county following the jurisdiction and history of their county courts. Thus Yorkshire was divided into the three “riding” authorities, Lincolnshire into three parts with Suffolk, Sussex Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire split into two separate administrative areas. Following the 1888 Act, the London Government Act of 1889 saw the creation of a new county of London that came into force in 1890. Despite campaigns to keep the Isle of Wight a part of the county of Hampshire, this historical county was split into two with the creation of the Isle of Wight County Council. English Administrative County Councils Established under the 1888 Local Government Act and 1889 London Government Act Bedfordshire Worcestershire County Boroughs and Municipal Boroughs Following the 1888 Act, the larger towns within the county were sub divided into districts. These were defined as either county boroughs or municipal boroughs depending on their size.

The former comprised the larger primarily industrial towns of over 50,000 inhabitants, which were given the exact same powers as the county council and were independent from the county they were geographically located within. 59 county boroughs were created following the Act. Each county borough was responsible for its own administration and the delivery of local services. The non county boroughs or municipal boroughs (metropolitan boroughs in London following the London Government Act of 1889) for which any town with a population between 20,000 and 50,000 was entitled to become created a second tier of local government under the auspices of the county council which were entitled to a certain level of autonomy in the services they provided dependant on their size. Some municipal boroughs did exist with populations in excess of 50,000 however lacked the status of a county borough possibly owing to their rapid growth or relatively inability to function outside the control of the county. Mainly however much of the administration of the smaller boroughs remained until the 1974 shake up, the responsibility of the administrative county.

In 1894, the Parish Council Acts saw the formation of urban and rural district councils, which as another form of second tier government also provided a limited amount of services to their inhabitants. Urban districts differed from the municipal borough in terms of status because they did not have the honour of having a charter of incorporation. Similarly the range of functions differed with size. Each district has an elected council and collected income for services through levying a ‘rate’ to cover both its own expenditure and that of the county as a whole. The rural district maintained the parish that held on to a limited amount of self-government and provided services such as street lighting and which had an additional rate to cover their own charges. In all there were initially 270 municipal borough councils, 535 urban district councils and 472 rural district councils in England and Wales. Several of the smaller councils were merged with each other over time or were upgraded from urban districts to municipal boroughs or in some cases even county boroughs. There were many boundary changes to the county boundaries between 1888 and 1923 to accommodate demographic changes to existing towns and cities.

A number of new county boroughs were created namely Oxford in 1889 and the London county boroughs of Croydon, East Ham and West Ham. The county borough of Hanley was merged with the smaller councils in the North Staffordshire area to create the county borough of Stoke-on-Trent in 1910 when it also acquired city status by royal assent and the county borough of Doncaster was created in 1927. In all there were 109 extensions to the county boroughs absorbing land and population and therefore rate revenue from the counties. By 1923 there were 20 new county boroughs added to the original 59 (63 including Cardiff, Merthyr Tydfill, Newport and Swansea in Wales), in 1888, thus with Doncaster, by the late 1920’s there were 79 county boroughs in England. The 1923 Onslow Report resulted in the 1926 Local Government Act (London Boroughs and Adjustments) that ruled that local authorities could only become county boroughs if their population exceeded 75,000 inhabitants. Boundaries continued to change to absorb newly expanding suburbs.

County boroughs grew at a loss to county councils. New county boroughs became generally discouraged and their formation was not allowed on local initiatives. The 1945 Local Government (Boundary Commission) Act made new county boroughs only possible for those towns with populations over 100,000 but this was repealed in 1949 back to 75,000. There were no new creations between 1927 and 1958. The 1963 London Government Act saw the abolition of the county councils of Middlesex and London. Parts of Essex, Hertfordshire, Surrey and Kent and the metropolitan boroughs, several urban districts and the three county boroughs of Croydon, East Ham and West Ham were replaced with a two-tier structure under a Greater London Council and 32 London boroughs. The ancient City of London continued to function as it had always as a unitary corporation along its medieval boundaries. The GLC and its lower tier London boroughs came into being on the 1 May 1965.

In the remainder of England, a 1958 Act took the county borough minimum population figure back up to 100,000 and designated several urban areas as conurbations defined as areas of several local government units with high population densities and expanses of urban development where a number of towns had become linked by factors such as common industrial or business interests or a common centre for shopping or education. These conurbations in England were Tyneside, West Yorkshire, South East Lancashire and North East Cheshire (Selnec), Merseyside and the West Midlands. Also between 1958 and 1968, the County Boroughs of Luton, Solihull, and Torbay were designated. Thus with the abolition of the three London County Boroughs, there remained a total of 79 County Boroughs in England in 1968.

The county borough of Smethwick was expanded to create Warley county borough and Middlesbrough merged with a number of its smaller neighbours to create Teeside county borough also in 1968 Since 1958, along with London and Middlesex county councils being abolished to form the Greater London Council, Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely were merged as were Huntingdonshire with the former Northamptonshire Soke of Peterborough. Anomalies There were a number of historical anomalies to the county system. Bristol had been given the right to call itself a county in its own right in 1393 by the charter of Edward III. Until such time, the city which dominated the banks of the River Avon lay in Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. By 1888, the City and County of Bristol had been designated as a county borough thus for administrative purposes falling outside the county structure. However the majority of mapmakers and for geographical purposes, Bristol was deemed to be wholly within Gloucestershire thus enabling the county to cross the river into Somerset.

Based on the above arguments, historically the city despite its common links under a city county borough authority would have remained part of two individual counties. This principle similarly applies to those administrative counties which were created under the 1888 Act, whereby York and Lincoln, though county boroughs were not placed similarly within a recognised county created for administrative purposed, though still existed as self governing units within Yorkshire and Lincolnshire respectively despite no such county council existing. Similarly Teeside county borough created in 1968 did not enable the county of Yorkshire to cross the Tees into Durham, though maps do depict the new enlarged authority as falling entirely within Yorkshire when it was simply split between the two. Finally Monmouthshire was recognised until 1974 as a part of England. Wales had been absorbed politically into England since the 1300s. However this issue was deemed to have been a historical mistake and thus Wales as a country though at the time with no sovereign rights officially reclaimed the said county which was renamed Gwent until 1996 before splitting for administrative reasons into a number of Welsh unitary authorities. Monmouthshire inclusive of Newport still remains a dormant true county however despite media and mapmakers and local authorities.

20th Century Review and Reform Following intensive review, the biggest change to local government in nearly 90 years took place following the 1972 Local Government Act. On the 1st April 1974, the whole local government system was totally transformed. 46 new county councils occupied the whole of England. The county boroughs were abolished and reformed as a lower tier authority or absorbed with other districts to form 296 district councils. Many of the original county councils had major boundary changes to accommodate changes in population and geography or were reshaped to make them more rational. Although the geographical county and the administrative county were two separate entities, one based on centuries of history and the latter based on acts of parliament, the county had become confused with being purely that created under law and not those geographical areas once held under the sheriff which had never been formed by parliamentary act. Thus over time lands of counties which had always been in existence were transferred altered and absorbed beginning in the nineteenth century but with haste following the 1972 Act.

Although it was seen by government that the true county should never lose its identity, subsequent county councils removed boundary signs replacing them with their own, the media and map makers alike only recognised the artificial county areas as decreed by who governed over them not how nature and ancient tribal law dictated. Prior to 1974 the boundaries of the traditional counties of Britain continued to be shown on Ordnance Survey maps in spite of the fact that some areas of the county, e.g. the County Boroughs, were no longer administered by the County Council. After 1974 Ordnance Survey chose to show only the boundaries of the new administrative counties, which led people to believe that the traditional county boundaries no longer existed. Nothing could be further from the truth, because in 1974 the government issued a statement confirming that the creation of new administrative counties had not abolished traditional counties nor changed their boundaries, they continue to exist; unlike several of the new administrative counties created in 1974 which have since been abolished.

Some counties merged to form new ones namely Hereford and Worcester and other county councils namely Cumberland, Huntingdonshire, Rutland and Westmorland totally disappeared off the maps as did seemingly 1000 years of county history. In addition to the existing county changes, four new counties were formed namely Avon, Cleveland, Cumbria and Humberside. The larger cities lost their county borough status and in 1974 followed suit with the recently formed Greater London to form metropolitan counties. There were six in all; Greater Manchester, Merseyside, South Yorkshire, Tyne and Wear, West Midlands and West Yorkshire which were subdivided into 36 metropolitan districts. In 1986, the metropolitan counties and the Greater London Council were abolished owing in the most part to bitter rivalry between the power hungry, generally Labour controlled metropolitan county councils and the Conservative government and the 36 metropolitan districts along with the 32 London Boroughs all became single tier authorities whilst the two tier system remained elsewhere in England.

1974 Local Government Reorganisation (1972 Local Government Act) On the basis that the existence of a county is reliant upon the existence of a system of local administration, the composition of upper tier local authorities following the 1972 Local Government Act was thus: Avon County Confusion The Vanishing County, Counties on the Move and the New “County” Whilst as discussed above many boundary anomalies over time were tidied up and most of the detached parts of counties were incorporated into the county that surrounded them, this was carried out under Act of Parliament for administrative purposes. It is at this point where the confusion over county identity and rightful county of origin begins. Whilst many would argue that a county is based on ancient historical and geographical factors and should not be altered, abolished or enable new so-called “counties” to be founded, others will argue that counties are dynamic and change as their populations and political structures and ideas change over time, having their boundaries redrawn and rationalised accordingly.

It is however a matter of debate that in order to accommodate the needs of local governance and in the provision of services whether under Act of Parliament, some counties which for hundreds of years have been identified as part of the fabric of England and as a place of origin, a historical centre of local administration and ceremony can simply be abolished and disappear off the face of the map. The Local Government Act of 1992 did see the apparent re-instatement of those historic counties such as Rutland, Herefordshire and Worcestershire. Whilst a County Council or any other form of local government can be created, altered and abolished to meet with demographics and make administration more financially viable, a county in its own right cannot and should not simply be abolished and then be allowed to reappear because the national government say so. The confusion all stems from the ambiguous term the “county”. This portion of land remained the standard recognised area of ones birth and residence and indeed administration for hundreds of years. Since the 1843 Act it could be argued that the confusion begun most of those detached areas were absorbed.

The 1888 Act saw the establishment of the County Council which remained almost synonymous with the historical county with the exception of subtle changes whereby any town which was situated within more than one county owing to natural, uncontrolled urban growth that town should be placed in the county which contained the greatest proportion of the population. Tamworth had spread over the boundary from Warwickshire into Staffordshire, therefore was incorporated wholly into Staffordshire. Likewise, Todmorden which was divided between both Lancashire and Yorkshire and was transferred to Yorkshire under the rule of the West Riding County Council. From those minor boundary changes, several others occurred into the twentieth century as towns grew and boundaries shifted. The next significant changes to the County boundaries occurred in 1965 following the 1963 Local Government Act in which the county council, though not county of Middlesex was abolished along with the 1888 London County Council and the administrative Greater London County Council was formed absorbing towns within Hertfordshire, Surrey, Essex and Kent. In addition Huntingdonshire and the Soke of Peterborough County Councils merged, taking in part of the Isle of Ely, whilst the rest of the Isle of Ely County Council merged with Cambridgeshire County Council.

Here we see the territories of not just Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire but also Northamptonshire, which is the historical county home of the city of Peterborough affected by changes to Local Government. The most controversial piece of legislation to affect the already altered boundaries was the 1972 Act. This single piece of legislation in popular terms caused the wipe out of a thousand years of county evolution in place of what has now become an ever changing shift in boundaries and status for those thirty-nine counties. From the 1st April 1974, Avon, Cleveland, Cumbria and Humberside were born, linking towns together that until then had no other association with each other, other than as groupings of smaller municipalities and certainly had no identity of which to claim. With the exception of Cumbria which initially saw the mergers of Cumberland and Westmorland with the Furness part of Lancashire, the other unpopular administrative counties were abolished some 22 years later. The same Act also great swathes of conurbations pushed together into similar fake counties; Merseyside, Tyne and Wear, Greater Manchester, South and West Yorkshire, West Midlands.

In one night, people assumed that they could no longer claim they were from Birmingham, Warwickshire (or Worcesteshire as the suburbs spread and the boundary of Warwickshire duly moved) but the West Midlands. Indeed despite the Government claiming that “The new county boundaries are administrative areas, and will not alter the traditional boundaries of counties, nor is it intended that the loyalties of people living in them will change, despite the different names adopted by the new administrative counties”, the removal of old and erection of new sign posts, the use of administrative areas by the media, plus services to all being provided by a COUNTY council rather than a regional or administrative council, the assumption was that, Westmorland, Cumberland, Huntingdonshire and Rutland had disappeared (though locally the latter two remained as new district councils but not widely recognised elsewhere in the country) The assumption was that Sunderland, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Gateshead no longer fell under Durham or Northumberland and the assumption was that the residents of Barnoldswick and Earby lived in Lancashire where as on the 31 January 1974, they lived in the West Riding of Yorkshire.

This therefore suggests that we need to go back to 1843 and that the detached portions of counties should still be recognised and that a simple act of parliament can not just place one settlement from one county and place it into another. On this basis where can we draw the line? Is it reasonable for one person to say they are from Merseyside whilst another is from Lancashire? Huntingdonshire remains in spirit, abolished as a County Council in 1974 following its merger with the Soke of Peterborough County Council in 1965 but only survives, once again de-merged from Peterborough as a lower tier of government under Cambridgeshire County Council. Historic Westmorland is simply not recognised by national media, national, map makers or even local government’s themselves as either a unit of any form of government or a county in its own right.

In the case of Westmorland whilst it is argued that Cumbria as a geographical area may be older and indeed recognised before the foundation of Westmorland and indeed Cumberland, Cumbria had never in history be deemed to be a county in the true sense of the word until the establishment of Cumbria County Council 1974 but had existed as a kingdom or tribal land. It is Cumberland along with Westmorland that around 1000 years ago came to be recognised as true English counties. On the other hand, counties such as Middlesex and those Lancashire towns which are now administered as part of the conurbation and former metropolitan “county” as Greater Manchester continue to be recognised albeit not officially. Since the 1992 Act, the concept of a unitary authority was born, similar in structure to the pre 1974 county boroughs. Whilst under the old structure, from an administrative point of view the likes of Bath, Nottingham and Bolton were administered completely separately from the county council which surrounded them, those same boroughs were still recognised as a part of Somerset, Nottinghamshire and the Lancashire respectively.

Since the unitary authorities have been established from 1995 to 1998, once again map makers, the media and the authorities themselves appear to have created further but smaller “counties” the most bizarre being Bath and North East Somerset. Some would argue that even the likes of Blackburn are no longer part of Lancashire just because Lancashire County Council has not administered that area since 1998. However although Berkshire no longer exists as an administrative unit, the county is still more widely recognised as an entity than those unitary authorities of West Berkshire, Reading, Windsor and Maidenhead and Bracknell Forest. Unfortunately however Slough is deemed to be part of the 1974 Berkshire, rather than being transferred to Buckinghamshire, its host county prior to that date. Happily some institutions are now being recognise once more the historic counties and their boundaries, the Royal Mail accepting such counties provided they are accompanied by a post code.

Cricket still have teams for Middlesex, a united Sussex, The worse travesty of all is the fact that the most historic and dignified member of a county , the high sheriff or lord lieutenant works within the boundaries of post 1974 and post 1995-98 county lines. Where can we draw the line? Where do we go back to in order to seek recognition of the historic counties, 1888 as the Association of English Counties suggest or 1844 and the maps of Thomas Moule before any noticeable or at least recorded change took place at all? As for regional government and current consultations to abolish the remaining two tier structure in the North West, North East and Yorkshire and the Humber Regions, does this hold any hope for the restoration of the historic county boundaries, to exist for ceremonial purposes and to give individuals a sense of belonging regardless of the now regular changes that take place to the authorities who empty our bins, educate our children or allow us to build two storey side extensions. Visit Sandwich Sandwich is one of the best preserved medieval towns in England Sandwich in Kent UK These pages are a guide to the accommodation and visitor attractions both in and near the town.

Sandwich itself, has a population of around 4,500, but it is surrounded by small villages, such as Eastry, Ash, Worth and Woodnesborough, which have always been regarded as part of the Sandwich area. The larger towns of Canterbury, Deal, Dover and Thanet (Ramsgate, Broadstairs & Margate) and their shops and entertainments are within easy reach by road and rail. The nearby towns & the channel ports plus the many golf courses, nature reserves, gardens and other attractions, all make Sandwich an ideal base to discover Kent, the Garden of England.

Question: In which English County would you find both the towns of Ham and Sandwich
Answer: Kent