William Lambarde
William Lambarde can be said to have been Halling’s most distinguished resident. William moved to Halling in 1583 when he was already a well-known lawyer and author of the book ‘Perambulation of Kent’, published in 1576, and which was the first ever history of an English county. William’s time in Halling is honoured with the local road names of Lambarde Close, of his wife Sylvestre with Sylvestre Close, and of his son with Maximilian Drive.
William’s first wife was Jane who he married when she was aged 16 but she died of smallpox at the age of 20. William’s second wife was Sylvestre but that marriage also only lasted four years and after bearing him four children she died two weeks after the birth of twins. In her memory William had a fine brass placed in Halling church. This is thought to have been made by a Flemish craftsman and depicts a woman sitting up in a four poster bed with her children around her and twins in a cradle alongside. At the foot of the inscription William had inscribed "no lady was more full of reverence towards God than she”. William lived in Halling for fifteen years, taking a lease on the Bishop's Palace where he spent considerable sums in restoring the building.
William had many roles during his life; as a much respected lawyer, as an author of many legal books including on Ancient Anglo-Saxon law, as a Commissioner of Sewers, as a Justice of the Peace, as Deputy Keeper of the Rolls, President of Cobham College, Keeper of the Records in the Tower of London for which he was received and commended by Queen Elizabeth I. It is possible that William was Shakespeare's legal advisor. William drew up plans for the House of Correction at Maidstone, was elected to the Rochester Bridge Corporation and built alms houses for the poor at East Greenwich.
A detailed history of William Lambarde is in a chapter devoted to him in Gowers’ and Church’s book ‘Across the Low Meadow - a history of Halling in Kent’ (1979), sadly out of print but available from local public libraries.