History of Maidstone
Evidence of prehistoric inhabitants includes artefacts unearthed dating as far back as Mesolithic times,[1] along with many local Neolithic finds, notably at Kit's Coty and the Countless Stones.
Heathland to the north of the town (today the suburb of Penenden Heath) was the site of shire moots or regional assemblies and the location of a key trial in the years immediately following the Norman Conquest.
Ball was subsequently freed on 11 June that year by the peasant army led by Wat Tyler, on its way from Canterbury to London to protest about the new poll tax.
On a visit to England in 1529 to contact the supporters of Tyndale and to arrange for the distribution of smuggled books such as the first English Psalter translated by George Joye, Hitton was arrested for heresy near Gravesend.
After imprisonment and interrogation he was condemned by Archbishop William Warham and Bishop John Fisher and burned at the stake at Maidstone on 23 February 1530.
On 18 June 1557 the miller of Frittenden, William Allin and his wife Katherine were burned at the stake at Fairmeadow, along with five other protestants as part of the Marian Persecutions.
[4] The town's charter was ratified in 1619 under James I, and a coat of arms was designed (see main article) On 1 June 1648, during the ‘’’Second English Civil War’’’ the Battle of Maidstone took place.
General Fairfax and a body of dragoons approached in the afternoon, following the Medway Valley from Farleigh Bridge, which had been only lightly guarded, and the first skirmishes took place on the outskirts of the town at around 7 o'clock.
Fairfax was astonished that his disciplined New Model Army soldiers were thrown into confusion; he had been observing the action from a carriage a short distance away, but he took to his horse and led his troops on a charge which, following further heavy close fighting, forced the Royalists to retreat.
[7] In 1799, King George III and Prime Minister William Pitt visited Mote Park in the town to inspect around 3,000 assembled troops of the Kent Volunteers, a local militia trained to defend the county from a possible invasion by Napoleon I of France.
On 13 June 1944, the first night of the flying bomb attacks on London, Maidstone was hit by eight shells, nearby Otham by one, and Folkestone twenty-four.
The River Len and Loose Stream provided water power to drive numerous mills that could be used for many purposes: fulling, corngrinding, papermaking etc.
In the 17th century the Wealden cloth industry reached as far north as the town; for here were deposits of Fuller's earth used for degreasing the wool and, perhaps more importantly, the means of transporting the finished products — the river.
Notable enterprises included the Whatman family and W&R Balston beginning in the 18th century and what was to become the Reed group had several paper and cardboard milling plants in Maidstone.
