Roofers in Snodland

Paper and cement turned Snodland from a village into a town. The mill by the river and the lime and cement works along the Halling border drew workers in through the second half of the nineteenth century, and after the Medway Valley railway opened in 1856 the place grew threefold within twenty years. The terraced housing built in that rush still stands, and roofs of that age fail at the nails, the ridge bedding and the shared valleys long before the covering itself gives out. Twentieth-century estate housing fills in around it under concrete tile. The setting matters too: the town sits low in the Medway valley beneath the chalk of the North Downs, where damp air and shade encourage moss on north-facing slopes and keep gutters working harder than they should. We cover Snodland, Halling and the Malling villages.