Sevenoaks

Sevenoaks, a pleasant town of Kent, on an eminence 22 miles SE. of London. It has a Perpendicular church with some interesting monuments, the Walthamstow Hall (1882) for 100 daughters of missionaries, and a grammar-school founded in 1432 by Lord Mayor Sir W. Sennocke, incorporated by Queen Elizabeth, and reconstituted as a first-grade modern school in 1877, at which Grote and Bishops Christopher and Charles Wordsworth were educated. Knole, the magnificent seat of Lord Sackville, is close by. It was mainly built between 1460 and 1608 by Archbishop Burchier and Thomas Sackville, first Earl of Dorset, and has a park of 1000 acres, 5 miles in circumference. Pop. (1861) 3171; (1891) 7514.