Gillingham

Largest of the Medway towns, in Kent, England; population (2001) 98,400. The town, which includes the former village of Rainham within its boundaries, merges with Chatham. Gillingham was closely associated with the Royal Navy until the closure of the dockyard at Chatham in 1994.

The old centre of Rainham village has two old churches, one of them Norman. The Corps of Royal Engineers, with its military museum, founded in 1912, is attached to the town.

Gillingham

Town in north Dorset, England, 6 km/4 mi northwest of Shaftesbury; population (2001) 1,900. Glove-making is an important local industry. In the 1990s the town saw an expansion of housing and light industry. Longbury Barrow nearby dates from the Neolithic period.

The town's grammar school was first established in 1526. Lime Tree House dates from the early 18th century; Wyke Hall, a Tudor building, has been largely rebuilt. The annual Gillingham and Shaftesbury agricultural show is held at Motcombe, halfway between the two towns.

In the Middle Ages Gillingham was the seat of a royal hunting lodge used by Henry I, Henry II, Henry III, and King John. The lodge was destroyed by Edward III in 1369 after it had fallen into disrepair. From 1769, Gillingham developed as a mill town for silk. With the arrival of the railway at the end of the 1850s, industries, including brick-making, printing, and cheese and soap production, brought local prosperity. The painter John Constable visited Gillingham several times in the 1820s; he painted a number of pictures including Old Gillingham Bridge; the bridge has since been demolished.