Maison Dieu, Ospringe
A wayside hospital Henry III founded beside Watling Street in 1234, now a small museum of Roman finds dug up nearby
Open to visitorsan English Heritage site — check opening times and admission before you go
Kings used to break their journey along Watling Street at Ospringe, resting in a chamber kept specially for them inside this hospital. Henry III founded it in 1234 as a flint and timber-framed refuge, home to three brothers of the Order of the Holy Cross under a master, who looked after the sick and gave food and shelter to travellers and pilgrims heading down the Roman road now known as the A2. Two more resident clergy prayed for the king’s soul. In 1235 the brothers took in a blind woman, named only as a local man’s daughter, as a lay sister — a rare surviving record of how a medieval community cared for disability.
The hospital is long gone, but its surviving building is now a small museum, cared for by a local trust and open on a seasonal basis with an admission charge. Cases inside hold Roman objects dug up around Faversham, including material from Faversham Stone Chapel, a ruined church not far away. Faversham itself is close by too, and Faversham Station is under a mile east.
