England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Hackington St Stephen

The Parish

The parish of Hackington lies in northeastern Kent roughly 1 mile north of the city of Canterbury. Whilst Hackington was, at the time of this transcript, a distinct and separate village, today it is merely a suburb of the expanded city and, according to modern Ordnance Survey mapping, not even meriting a name on the map. Hackington is located a mile east of the A290 road which links Canterbury with Whitstable and sits on the northern banks of the Great Stour river. Early maps show Hackington as being grouped around its church as a distinct compact small village sitting just north of today's route of the Canterbury to Ramsgate railway line. The economy of the parish would have been dominated by farming, its proximity to the expanding city of Canterbury would have made it more diverse than is normal with market gardening for vegetables important as well as typical arable farming, at that time too almost 25% of the parish acreage was in woodland management. As Canterbury burst its medieval walls and expanded across the Great Stour, creeping suburbia has engulfed Hackington, the placement of the nearby university adding to its attraction as a suburb, better known today as Hales Place than its original village name. Hackington is drained northeastwards by the Great Stour which heads for the nearby North Sea arriving through through the port of Sandwich. Hackington is sited at just 20 metres above the sea, land rises northwards reaching local high spots at close to 70 metres within a mile or two away from the river. Hackington parish was fairly typically sized for a southern rural parish, covering just under 2,000 acres it would have supported a population of close to 500 parishioners. Hackington is not specifically mentioned in Domesday Book.

The Church

St Stephen's church sits just east of the road which heads north through Hales Place towards Tyler Hill (St Stephen's Hill) accessed by the narrow lane of Hales Place. St Stephen has ancient origins, Pevsner highlights flints laid in a herringbone and reused Roman tiles as evidence for an Early Norman origin that places the present building in the first half of the 12th century, these areas of the nave are augmented by round-headed windows of a similar date. The early church received major change in the 13th century, the western bay of the nave was remodeled to create the tower, a massive, buttressed structure, it should be noted, however, that the top-most stage is a Perpendicular era amendment.  Further work in the Decorated style may be found in the northern transept which shows unusually designed windows to its northern face. Much else is from the same period of the late 14th century as the tower's top-stage notably the three-bay chancel of the late 14th century. Whilst the is stained glass and internal fittings from the Victorian era, Pevsner for once does not mention a major restoration, the latest work he mentions being Tudor brick-work in the south transept. Hales Place leaves St Stephen's Hill at a triangular village green, the narrow lane has some parking outside the small group of shops to the east of the main entrance. The churchyard has thick boundary foliage in a rough square, unusually the church is orientated on a northwest to southeast axis making the best views from the southwest rather than the usually favoured aspects.