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KINGSTON

Volume 6 · 328 words · 1778 Edition

a town of Surry in England, situated in W. Long. 0° 21'. N. Lat. 51° 28'. It takes its name from having been the residence of many of the Saxon kings, some of whom were crowned here. It is situated on the river Thames, over which there is here a wooden bridge of 20 arches, and here the summer assizes are generally held. Medals and coins of several Roman emperors are often found about this place; and east from it, upon a gravelly hill, was a burying-place of the Romans. There are several springs in the neighbourhood, whence water is conveyed in leaden-pipes under the Thames to Hampton-court. From another spring in a cellar near the town, flows a brook so large, that it has a bridge over it at Kingston. The town is large; and has a good market for corn, a free-school erected and endowed by queen Elizabeth, an alms-house founded by alderman Cleave of London, a spacious church with eight bells. In this church the pictures of Athelstan, Ethelred I. and II. Edwin, and Edward the Martyr, who were crowned here, and of king John, who gave the town its first charter, are preserved.

a town of Ireland, in the province of Leinster, and capital of King's county. W. Long. 7° 20'. N. Lat. 53° 15'. It is otherwise called Philipstown.

a town of Jamaica, in America, seated on the north side of the bay of Port-royal. It was built after the great earthquake in 1692; and is now a large thriving place, about a mile in length, and half a mile in breadth. It is laid out into little squares and cross-roads, and has one church. The Jews have two synagogues here, and the Quakers a meeting-house. It is a place of good trade; and is much resorted to by merchants and seamen, because most of the ships come to load and unload their cargoes here. W. Long. 75° 52'. N. Lat. 17° 40'.