FOLKESTONE, a municipal borough, seaport and watering place of Kent, England, within the parliamentary borough of Hythe, 71 m. S.E. by E. of London on the Southern railway. Pop. Folkestone is an important port of the Con tinental passenger service to Boulogne (3o m.). The older part of the town lies in a small valley which opens steeply to the shore. To the north the town is sheltered by hills of 400 to 500 ft., on several of which, such as Sugarloaf and Castle hills, are ancient Along the cliff west of the old town a broad promenade called the Leas, commanding a notable view of the channel, extends westward to Sandgate and is connected by foot paths and lifts with the shore road and gardens below, where there is also a promenade pier. On this cliff stands the old parish church of St. Mary and St. Eanswith, mainly Early English ; the original church, attached to a priory, was founded on the site of a convent established by Eanswith, daughter of Eadbald, king of Kent in 63o, the monastery being destroyed at the Dissolution. Folkestone harbour has a deep water pier, which, before the World War, had been lengthened to 1,480 ft., and has berths for eight steamers, with a railway platform and a lighthouse. The area of the inner and outer harbours is a little over 12 ac. The fisheries are important, and in addition to the passenger traffic, a large general trade is carried on. Among institutions may be mentioned the grammar school, founded in 1674, the public library and museum, the corporation technical school and a num ber of hospitals and sanatoria, including the Royal Victoria hos pital, built in 1889-90 and several times enlarged. William Har vey, discoverer of the circulation of the blood, was a native of Folkestone and is commemorated by a tercentenary memorial on the Leas. Folkestone is a member of the Cinque Port of Dover. It is governed by a mayor, seven aldermen and 24 councillors, and has its own court of Quarter Sessions and police. Shorncliffe military camp and the populous suburb of Cheriton lie to the west of Folkestone. There is a branch railway from Folkestone to Canterbury (Elham valley), while the line to Dover (7 m.) passes through a series of cuttings and tunnels in the chalk cliffs, by way of the Warren (on the east of the town overlooking East Wear bay) and Abbot's and Shakespeare's cliffs. In 1915 a serious landslip in the Warren closed the railway for four years. In 1920 the earl of Radnor presented the Warren and East cliff to the town. The remains of a large Roman villa were excavated near the East cliff in 1924 and the corporation undertook the roofing of a portion of the site.
Folkestone (Folcestan) was among the possessions of Earl God wine when he was exiled from England; at the time of the Domes day Survey it belonged to Odo, bishop of Bayeux. From early times it was a member of the Cinque Port of Dover, and had to find one out of the 21 ships furnished by that port for the royal service. It shared the privileges of the Cinque Ports, whose liber ties were exemplified at the request of the "barons" or freemen of Folkestone by Edward III. in 133o. The corporation, which was prescriptive, was entitled the mayor, jurats and commonalty of Folkestone. In 1629 the inhabitants obtained license to erect a port. By the end of the r8th century the town had become prosperous by the increase of its fishing and shipping trades, and by the middle of the 19th century one of the chief health and pleasure resorts of the south coast. Folkestone was an important embarkation point during the World War and one of the ports permitted to civilians. It is estimated that over 1oo,000 Belgian refugees passed through the port between Sept. 1914 and March 1915. There were later large numbers of Canadian and American troops stationed at Shorncliffe camp. On May 25, 1917, during an air raid, a bomb fell in a crowded street, killing 33 people.