Chislehurst its earlier format corresponded to the letters IMP (for "imperial"). The Chislehurst civil parish formed an urban district of Kent from 1894 to 1934. In 1934 it became part of the Chislehurst and Sidcup Urban District, which was split in 1965 between the London boroughs of Bromley and Bexley. The Walsingham family, including Christopher Marlowe's patron, Sir Thomas Walsingham and Queen Elizabeth I's spymaster, Francis Walsingham, had a home in Scadbury Park, now a nature reserve in which the ruins of the house can still be seen. A water tower used to straddle the road from Chislehurst to Bromley until
Walsingham have a further presence at the Church of the Holy Transfiguration, Great Walsingham, and also at the former Little Walsingham railway station which has been converted into the Russian Orthodox church of St Seraphim. Walsingham used to be connected to the railway network by the Norwich via Fakenham, Dereham and Wymondham route, but this was axed during the Beeching era in the late 1960s, in stages from 1964 to 1969. In 1979 work began on constructing a gauge heritage railway on the old track bed to Wells. The line re-opened in 1982 and now operates with a fleet of steam