St Martin of Tours Churchyard

Chelsfield is located on high ground to the east of Orpington and the name is probably of Saxon origin, meaning a 'cold place'. For centuries the area was largely farmland and its early manor houses were Woodlands, Chelsfield House, Hewitts and Court Lodge, the latter next to the parish church. The earliest part of St Martin of Tours dates from the C12th; the tower and a chapel are C13th, and the porch dates from the C15th, with later additions made in the C19th. On the north wall of the aisle is a memorial to Alderman Brass Crosby, from whom the phrase 'As bold as Brass' emanates. Lord of the Manor of Chelsfield and later Lord Mayor of London, he was a champion for the Liberty of the Press, for which he was imprisoned in the Tower of London in the late 1700s for demanding that the Minutes of Parliament be published. He was released following public support and his campaign led to the establishment of Hansard. An extension, known as the Brass Crosby Rooms, in the north-west corner of the church was completed in February 2007.

Development began after the railways reached the area in the latter part of the C19th, with Chelsfield Station opening in 1868 and Halstead for Knockholt in 1876, later re-named Knockholt in 1900. Two well-known writers are connected with the parish, Edith Nesbit (b.1858) who lived here as a girl, and Miss Read who moved here as a child in 1921. Miss Read's 'Fairacre' books were based on her early life in the village, where her parents were in the church choir, her father occasionally the organist. As a teenager Edith Nesbit witnessed the construction of the railway tunnel that ran from Chelsfield and the cuttings at Knockholt, during which a number of the construction workers were killed. She was later a founder of the Fabian Society, which was concerned for the well-being of those who, like the railway miners, worked in poor conditions. Her walks to Chelsfield station inspired her famous novel, 'The Railway Children' (1906). The railway led to the development at New Chelsfield, as it facilitated transport of coal and other materials here and of local produce into London. In the 1920s the church became isolated from the village after the construction of the Orpington Bypass. During WWII a landmine exploded near the church and many headstones in the churchyard were flattened or destroyed, and the stained glass of three lancet windows was shattered the blast also killing members of a local family and their dogs. Some of the gravestones were placed along the north wall of the churchyard, others laid flat under the ground. During the summer sections of the churchyard are covered in long grass and wild flowers, attracting a variety of wild life. Kent Archaeological Society has made a list of monumental inscriptions in the churchyard, collected by Leland L Duncan on 15 July 1890.