Orlestone () is a mid-sized

civil parish In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government. It is a territorial designation which is the lowest tier of local government. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of parishes, w ...

in Ashford District,

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

, England, with a

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

of 1,593. The centre of the parish is

Hamstreet Hamstreet is a village in Kent, in South East England. The village is located 6 miles (10 km) south of Ashford on the A2070, the main road between Ashford and Hastings. The majority of the village is in the parish of Orlestone, named ...

village which falls almost entirely within it but has a small fraction in the parish of

Warehorne Warehorne is a village and civil parish in the south of the Ashford (borough), Ashford Borough of Kent, England. It is a dispersed settlement, scattered community centred on the Hamstreet to Tenterden road (B2067) around seven miles boxing the c ...

. The civil parish here reflects the very longstanding dominance of Orlestreet as its

ecclesiastical parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

boundary and provides a third alternative to most residents of Hamstreet to their village name, other than 'Ham Street'. Hamstreet is bypassed by the A2070 road, six miles south of Ashford.

Description

Most of the population live in a cross-civil parish settlement at the middle and edge of Orlestone, which is Hamstreet. Orlestone itself is a small

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

with a typical short street number of houses and the

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...

parish

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

of St Mary the Virgin, parts of which date to the 11th century. Much of the population moved to Hamstreet (originally known as Ham) when the Ashford to Hastings railway opened in 1853; there was also a better source of water at the newer place. Eponymous places in the civil parish are Orlestone

Forest A forest is an ecosystem characterized by a dense ecological community, community of trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, ...

, and buildings such as Orlestone Grange and Orlestone Riding Centre (near Shadoxhurst). Also a neighbourhood of Hamstreet built in 2006 has been named Orlestone View, in addition to the already existing Orlestone Villas and Orlestone Rise. As with Warehorne the north of the area is forested.

Transport

Ham Street railway station is central to Hamstreet and is also in approximately the midpoint of this parish. Hamstreet is also served by the 11/11A/11B bus, which is operated by Stagecoach and runs from Ashford to Lydd and New Romney.

References

External links

Parish Council website

Statistical civil parish overview - map
Borough of Ashford Civil parishes in Ashford, Kent {{Kent-geo-stub