Ebony, Kent

Ebony
Ebony
Population	392 (2011) (Parish)
OS grid reference	TQ939278
Civil parish	Stone-cum-Ebony;
District	Ashford;
Shire county	Kent;
Region	South East;
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	TONBRIDGE
Postcode district	TN30
Dialling code	01233
Police	Kent
Fire	Kent
Ambulance	South East Coast
UK Parliament	Ashford;
	List of places UK England Kent

Ebony is a hamlet south of Ashford in Kent, South East England, in the civil parish of Stone-cum-Ebony, on the Isle of Oxney in the Ashford district of Kent. EBONY (St. Mary), is a parish, in the union of Tenterden, partly in the hundred of Tenterden, Lower division of the lathe of Scray, W. division, but chiefly in the hundred of Oxney, lathe of Shepway, E. division, of Kent, 4 miles (S. E.) from Tenterden. [1]

Notable residents (past & present)

Norman Forbes-Robertson - distinguished Victorian Shakespearean actor
Dave McKean - illustrator, photographer, comic book artist, graphic designer, filmmaker and musician
Sir Donald Sinden CBE - distinguished actor^[2]^[3]
Marc Sinden - film director, actor and West End theatre producer^[4]
Maria Ann Smith - orchardist and cultivator of the Granny Smith apple was married here

Ebony was formerly an island surrounded by marsh and the tidal waters of the river Rother. At the top of the most prominent part of the high ground, known as Chapel Bank, is the churchyard of the original Ebony Church, St Mary the Virgin. After lightning and fire the remains of the church, built of local ragstone, were moved by the Victorians in 1858 to the present location at nearby Reading Street, and restored. It has been suggested that references to King Alfred's base at 'Ebonia' (Evania) in the Annals of Roger de Hoveden may refer to the strategically situated Ebony in the marshlands of the South Coast, rather than to the Isle of Man or Hebrides. The fact that the church at Ebony was of Saxon foundation has been cited in support for this hypothesis; however there is no evidence for a 9th-century date and the earliest reference is from 1070.

An annual pilgrimage from the Reading Street site of the church to the original site on Chapel Bank occurs in September.

The nearby church of the village of Stone-cum-Ebony, on the Isle of Oxney, is also dedicated to St mary the Virgin and should not be confused with Ebony church