| Borstal | |
Borstal from the M2 bridge. |
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Borstal
Borstal shown within Kent |
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| OS grid reference | TQ731668 |
|---|---|
| District | Medway |
| Shire county | Kent |
| Region | South East |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | Rochester |
| Postcode district | ME1 |
| Dialling code | 01634 |
| Police | Kent |
| Fire | Kent |
| Ambulance | South East Coast |
| EU Parliament | South East England |
| UK Parliament | Rochester and Strood |
| List of places: UK • England • Kent | |
Borstal is a place in the unitary authority of Medway in South East England. Originally a village near Rochester, it has become absorbed by the expansion of Rochester.
The youth prison at Borstal gave its name to the Borstal reform school system.
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Its name came from Anglo-Saxon burg-steall "fort site" or "place of refuge",[1] likely referring to the hill there. The hill is now the home to Fort Borstal.
The village is mentioned in Domesday Book.
The parish church, built in 1879, is dedicated to St Matthew.
The noted artist Donald Maxwell lived at No. 3, Borstal Villas from 1908 to 1930.[2]
Fort Borstal was built as an afterthought from the 1859 Royal Commission on the Defence of the United Kingdom, by convict labour between 1875 and 1885. It is of polygonal design and was never originally armed. An anti-aircraft battery was based there in the Second World War.
On the edge of Borstal are Rochester and Cookham Wood prisons. Rochester was originally known as Borstal Prison, and was founded in 1870. Borstal Prison was once an experimental juvenile prison of the reformatory type set up in 1902. Because it was the first detention centre of its kind in the UK, the word "Borstal" became synonymous with other detention centres for youths across the country, and elsewhere. In view of that connotation, the prison was renamed 'Rochester Young Offenders Institution'. HMP Cookham Wood was added to the site later, in 1978.