for a Robert Scudder turns up in 1800 as a witness at the wedding of an Ash farmer, Richard Thorpe, and Mary Durham. His presence on that occasion suggests that he may still have been living in these parts. Such was not the case with the last of the family to figure in the old registers. He was the Thomas Skudder who had long farmed at Hunton and who was brought thence in 1810 to join his wife and infant son in the churchyard.
   The Scudders were to remain Ash freeholders for a good many years. Thomas Skudder of Castle Farm, Leybourne figures in an Ash Voters list of 1845, but disappears not long alter. William Skudder of West Malling also appeared in the 1845 list, apparently in relation to the land near Culverstone Green, but as the Overseers objected to his inclusion he had probably parted company with it.
      That Richard Walter who has been mentioned as a

Scudder tenant was one of a family whose association with the neighbouring parish of Fawkham went back at least as far as the reign of Henry VII and whose association with Ash may well have done likewise. In point of fact, the Walters of Fawkham owned a house in Ash before they owned the house in which they lived in their own parish; in 1529, it was left by John Walter to his elder son, Thomas.⁷  Where that house was, or whether it was then occupied by any of the Walter family does not appear, but certainly before the end of the sixteenth century there were ‘poor relations’ of the Walters of  Pennis living in Ash as well as in Fawkham.
   A John Walter whose will was proved in 1348, his wile Amabilia^7a  and a John Walter, father of twins who were christened in 1597, seem to be the first. recorded Walters