Kingswear is not mentioned in the Domesday Book. However, it is believed that the settlement of Kingston, in the civil parish about to the east of the village, dates from the time of the Anglo-Saxons, with evidence of Stone Age settlers. The first documentary mention of Kingswear was c.1170 when William de Vinci gave the local church half of the land in the village. After the murder of Thomas Becket in 1170, Becket's tomb in Canterbury became a place of pilgrimage. Pilgrims travelling by sea from further west, and from Brittany, were known to use Kingswear as a landing place. The current church was built, and dedicated to St Thomas, as a staging point on the pilgrim route. The church was rebuilt in 1847. By 1365 a ferry was operating from Kittery Point, the westernmost tip of Kingswear, to Dartmouth. In 1636, settlers sailed from here to the mouth of the Piscataqua River in North America to found the town now known as Kittery, Maine. In 1864 the Dartmouth and Torbay Railway reached Kingswear, providing connections to Exeter and London. The line became part of the Great Western Railway in 1876. The planned extension across the river to Dartmouth never took place, and instead rail passengers used a railway-owned ferry. The Royal Dart Hotel was constructed adjacent to the station, and provided accommodation for passengers waiting to sail to overseas destinations. In the second half of the 19th century the Kingswear Regatta was held over two days in the summer. It was reestablished in 2006 and has been held annually since. During the Second World War the Royal Dart Hotel became HMS Cicala and headquarters of the British 15th Destroyer Flotilla. Journeys were made from there to the northern beaches of Brittany, landing agents and equipment for the French Resistance and bringing back escaping allied soldiers and airmen. The Free French Navy operated motor launches and motor torpedo boats from Kingswear and was based in Brookhill, a large house dating from about 1820 on the outskirts of the village. In 1948 the railway became the Kingswear branch of the newly nationalised British Rail, but by 1968 the closure of the line was being proposed. Instead, the line was purchased by a private company. Since 1973, the line has operated a seasonal steam operated service, principally as a tourist attraction. The line is now known as the Paignton and Dartmouth Steam Railway. In 2007 the village briefly figured in the national press when the parish council co-opted British National Party member Peter Pirnie as a councillor. He resigned after a row broke out over his party affiliation.
Demographics
As of the year 2001, the parish had a population of 1,332. The equivalent figures for 1801 and 1901 are 300 and 841, and the figure for 2001 is the highest census return over the last 200 years.
Transport
is located on the river front in the centre of Kingswear, and is the terminus of the Paignton and Dartmouth Steam Railway, a seasonally operated heritage railway. The nearest National Rail stations are Totnes station, on the main line from Exeter to Plymouth, and Paignton station, the terminus of a branch from Newton Abbot. The steam railway's Paignton terminus is adjacent to the National Rail station. Bus services operated byStagecoach connect Kingswear with Brixham and Paignton, and other bus services in Dartmouth can be reached by ferry. The original station was built in Dartmouth but when the railway could not cross the Dart, they had to build it in Kingswear instead. The Station Cafe in Dartmouth was the original Station. The Town is also served by Greenway Halt railway station, also on the South Devon Railway. Kingswear is linked to Dartmouth, on the other side of the River Dart, by three ferries. The Higher Ferry and the Lower Ferry are both vehicular ferries. The Passenger Ferry, as its name suggests, carries only passengers. The nearest bridge across the Dart is in Totnes, some away by road. The long South West Coast Path crosses from Dartmouth on the ferry and then follows the coast around towards Brixham.
Films and television
In recent history, Kingswear and the River Dart were used as filming locations for the movie The French Lieutenant's Woman and the television series The Onedin Line, where Kingswear represented the Old World and Dartmouth the New World, thus giving rise to the comments of the local tour guides that this was the shortest ever crossing of the Atlantic. Kingswear also figured in Down to Earth, though mainly for shots of neighbouring Dartmouth.
