Introduction to Kent County

Kent is a county in England, located southeast of London. Its county seat is Maidstone. Kent borders East Sussex, Surrey and London, and is separated from Sussex by the Thames Estuary. It faces France across the Strait of Dover and even borders France through the Channel Tunnel. Kent is known as the "Garden of England", but in the past the local pastoral scenery has been replaced by farm industry. Other industries also established themselves in Kent over the centuries. Cotton spinning, ironmaking, papermaking, cement and engineering all flourished here. Fishing and tourism remain very important in coastal areas today. The East Kent coalfields were mined in the 20th century and today there is a nuclear power station in Dungeness. However, Tenet is regarded as the least developed area in the south-east of England. Famous Kentish men include Charles Dickens and Charles Robert Darwin. Chartwell is the hometown of Winston Churchill. Declan Galbraith, a British singer born in the 1990s, was born here.