EMOR1ALS OF OLD KENT
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
CHRISTCHURCH GATE, CANTERBURY.
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
EDITED BY
The Rev. P. H. DITCHFIELD, M.A., F.S.A.
AND
GEORGE CLINCH, F.G.S.
With many Illustrations
LONDON BEMROSE & SONS LIMITED, 4 SNOW HILL, E.G.
AND DERBY 1907
[AU Rights Reserved]
TO
THE RIGHT HON. THE LORD NORTHBOURNE, M.A., D.L., F.S.A.
THE PRESIDENT OF THE KENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL SOCIETY
THESE MEMORIALS ARE 9
BY KIND PERMISSION
INSCRIBED
PREFACE
THE prominent position of Kent among the English counties is universally admitted. For many centuries it has been the high road of communica- tion between the southern half of Britain (including London) and the Continent, and it would be remark- able if it did not possess a past full of historical associations. Quite early in the Christian era — and, indeed, in pre -historic times — Kent was the centre of civilization and industrial activity. These are points which are toe^well known to require anything more than the slightest reference in this place, but they are sufficient, it is hoped, to excuse some of the omissions in this volume of Memorials. It was, of course, impossible to deal with every phase of Kent's ancient and brilliant story, and the Editors have, therefore, endeavoured to make such a selection of subjects as would fairly represent some of the more important and note- worthy features. They have been particularly fortunate, they feel, in securing the assistance of writers whose special qualifications and researches have enabled them to write monographs of real and permanent value. The monastic, ecclesiastical, military, social, and political sides have all received attention.
viii PREFACE
To the various contributors of articles the Editors tender their sincere thanks ; and to the publishers, and all others who have helped with suggestions, loans of illustrations, etc., they are not less grateful.
December, 1906.
CONTENTS
Historic Kent . . .
St. Augustine's Abbey, Canter- bury
Mediaeval Rood-Lofts and Screens in Kent
Old Canterbury .... Kentish Insurrections .
Some Kentish Castles
Penshurst Place .... Hever Castle ....
Dickens and Kent
Chillington Manor House, Maid- stone
Romney Marsh in the Days of Smuggling ....
Seventeenth Century Church Architecture in Kent
Refugee Industries in Kent
The River Medway and its Mediaeval Bridges .
PAGE
By the Rev. P. H. DITCH- FIELD, M.A., F.S.A. . i
By SEBASTIAN EVANS, Jun. 19
By AYMER VALLANCE, M.A., F.S.A. ... 44
By PHILIP SIDNEY . . no
By GEORGE CLINCH, F.G.S. . . . .132
By HAROLD SANDS, F.S.A., M.I.Mech.Eng. . .150
By PHILIP SIDNEY . . 215
By the Rev. P. H. DITCH- FIELD, M.A., F.S.A. . 228
By the Rev. CANON BEN- HAM, D.D., F.S.A. . 238
By J. H. ALLCHIN . . 253
By GEORGE CLINCH, F.G.S 264
By J. TAVENOR-PERRY . 277
By S. W. KERSHAW, M.A., F.S.A 298
By J. TAVENOR-PERRY . 320
Index
INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS
Christchurch Gate, Canterbury Frontispiece
{Front a Photograph by the Photochront\Co., Ltd,)
FACING PAGE Kits Coty House . . (From a Photograph by George Clinch) 2
Ethelbert's Tower, St. Augustine's, Canterbury ... 20
(Front an old Engraving)
Plan of Excavations at St. Augustine's, Canterbury . . 32-33
St. Augustine's Abbey : the Crypt, from the East ... 36
„ „ Norman Bench-end, Dormitory, and
Southern Side of the Crypt 38
St. Augustine's Abbey : South Side of the Crypt, and North
Side of the Chapter House 40
Northfleet Church : Doors of Rood-Screen .... 50
Minster Church, Sheppey : Painted Beam .... 54
(Front a Photograph by Aymer Vallance)
Stalisfield Church : Rood-Screen 64
(From a Photograph by Aymer Vallance)
Shoreham Church : Sketch of North-East Corner of Rood-Screen 66 „ „ Rood-Screen, Elevation of Southernmost
Bay, and Section through Screen and Loft . . . 68-69
Appledore Church : View from the Quire .... 74
(From a Photograph by Aymer Vallance)
Lynsted Church : Elevation of North Side of Nave . . 79 St. Alphege's Church, Canterbury : Sketch showing Remains of
Rood-Stair 85
Milton Church, near Sittingbourne : South-East Corner of Nave 90
Eastchurch Church, Sheppey : Detail of Rood-Screen . . 96
(Front a Photograph by Aymer Vallance) XI
xii INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE Canterbury Cathedral : Stone Screen 104
(From a Photograph by Valentine ff Sons, Ltd., Dundee)
Rochester Cathedral : Stone Screen .106
West Gate, Canterbury (From a Photograph by H. B. Collis, Canterbury) 112
"The Canterbury Weavers" „ „ „ 116
The Death of Wat Tyler . . . . . . . .136
(From an Engraving- after the Picture by J. Ntrthcote, R.A.)
Sir Thomas Wyatt 142
Sir Edward Hales . . (Fr«m an Engraving- published in 1825) 146
Dover Castle: Ground Plan . . . ... . 160
Canterbury Castle: Ground Plan . 165
„ „ South Front and West Front . „ .166
„ „ . (From an Engraving published in 1761) 1 68
Rochester Castle: Ground Plan 172
„ „ General View of the Keep . . . .174
(From a Photograph by E. C. Youens, Dartford)
Rochester Castle : Interior of the Keep 176
(From a Photograph by E. C. Youens, Dartford)
Allington Castle: Ground Plan .177
Bayford Castle : Ground Plan 179
Colebridge Castle : Ground Plan . . . . . .182
Early Map ot Canterbury, about 1570 . . . . .212
The Hall, Penshurst Place: Exterior . . . . .216
„ „ Interior . . . . .218
Hever Castle : the Gateway . 228
(Front a Photograph by the Photochrom Co., Ltd.)
Hever Castle, from the Gardens . . . . . . 232
(From a Photograph by the Photochrom Co., Ltd.)
Gadshill, seen from the Garden 240
(From a Photograph by F. Frith &> Co., Ltd., Reigate) "The Leather Bottle," Cobham (From a Photograph by George Clinch) 242
Bleak House, Broadstairs . . „ „ „ 244
Restoration House, Rochester 246
(From a Photograph by the Photochrom Co., Ltd.)
Eastgate House, Rochester ....... 248
(From a Photograph by the Photochrom Co., Ltd.)
INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS xiii
FACING PAGE _ Rochester Cathedral : West Front . . . . .250
(From a Photograph by the Photochrnn Co., Ltd.)
Chillington Manor House : South Front, 1857 . . , . 254 „ „ the Long Gallery and Cloister,
from Garden 258
New Romney Church 272
Upper Deal Church : West Tower (From a Drawing by J. Tavenor-Perry) 278
Charing Church : Benches . . „ „ „ 280
Chiddingstone Church : South Porch „ „ ,, 280
Groombridge Church : South Porch „ „ „ 282
Northfleet Church: West Tower „ „ „ 283
Plumstead Church: West Tower „ „ „ 286
Hollingbourne Church : the Culpeper Chapel .... 287
(From a Drawing by J. Tavenor-Perry)
Charlton Church : West Tower and South Porch . . .288
(From a Drawing by J. Tavenor-Perry)
Plaxtole Church : Interior, looking West 290
(From a Drawing by J. Tavenor-Perry)
Plaxtole Church : West Tower (From a Drawing by /. Tavenor-Perry) 2QO
Groombridge : Font . „ „ „ 295
Kemsing Church : Font Cover „ „ „ 296
The Blackfriars', Canterbury 302
(From a Photograph by H, B. Collis, Canterbury)
St. Clement's Church, Sandwich (From a Photograph by George Clinch) 314
The Fisher Gate, Sandwich „ „ „ 316
Hersfield Bridge . . (From a Drawing by J. Tavenor-Perry) 320
Yalding Bridge ... „ „ „ 322
East Farleigh Bridge . „ „ „ 322
Twyford Bridge . . „ „ „ 324
Lodingford Bridge . . „ „ „ 326
Teston Bridge ... „ „ „ 328
Aylesford Bridge ... „ „ „ 328
Twyford Bridge ... „ „ „ 329
HISTORIC KENT BY THE REV. P. H. DITCHFIELD, M.A., F.S.A.
GETS and poetasters have sung their sweetest lays in honour of Kent's fair county — " the Garden of England," as loyal Kentish men love to call their beautiful and attractive shire. Historians, too, love to dwell upon all the great events that have taken place within its borders. The history of Kent is in truth an epitome of the history of England — almost all the great scenes presented in the drama of the chronicles of England seem to have been enacted within this important and ancient kingdom, or to have been associated with it, from the time when Caesar's legions first gazed on its white cliffs to the present day. The county is rich, too, in the remains of the prehistoric folk — of Palaeolithic man, who made his primitive weapons and implements, hunted the woolly elephant, the Irish elk, etc, and left behind the evidences of his presence at Swanscombe and Greenhithe and other spots in the Thames valley and other Kentish river-gravels ; of the more civilised Neolithic man, whose sepulchral piles, like Kit's Coty House at Aylesford, whose dwellings at Hayes, West Wickham and Dartford Heath, and whose polished celts and axes afford interesting objects for the study of the curious antiquary.
The relics of the Bronze and Prehistoric Iron Ages are
very numerous and important. Of these much has been
written in learned treatises published in the transactions
of archaeological societies. And here I may remark that
B
2 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
few counties can boast of a more learned and industrious antiquarian society than the Kent Archaeological Society, whose Archceologia Cantiana contains a mine of wealth for all who desire to study the ancient records of this historic county.
The dawn of history arose on this fair region of ancient Britain when Caesar set sail from the Portus Itius, which is usually said to be identical with Boulogne, and first saw the white cliffs of Dover, and affected a landing at Deal, as Mr. Vine demonstrates.1 There the first contest was waged between the islanders and their formidable foes. Caesar graphically tells the story of that landing, and of the bravery of the standard-bearer of the Tenth Legion, who, calling upon the gods for the success of his venture, leaped into the waves, exclaiming, " Leap down, soldiers, unless you wish to betray the eagle to the enemy ; I at any rate shall have done my duty to the State and my general." You may still see at low water the rocks where the gallant Scaeva withstood single-handed the attack of many foes, and then, wounded, trusted himself to the waves and swam back to his comrades. Soon followed that second battle, probably near Ringwould, when the Britons were practically victors, and with shattered fleet and a reduced army the conqueror retired from the inhospitable shores of Britain.
The details of his second venture are too well known to be here recorded. Gradually the Roman power extended itself, and here in Kent we have many evidences of its mighty rule. There is the great road, Watling Street, extending from Dover to London, passing through Canterbury, Faversham, Sittingbourne, Rochester, Dart- ford, and Greenwich. Canterbury was a great centre of roadways. One leads southward to Lympne, and others to Reculver and Ramsgate, and to Sandwich. Canterbury
1 Ceesar in Kent, by Rev. F. T. Vine, 1887.
KITS COXY HOUSE, AYI.ESFORD.
HISTORIC KENT 3
was known as Durovernum, and was protected by walls, as also were Rochester, the ancient Durobrivce, and Dover, then known as Dubris. A Roman pharos or lighthouse shed its gleam on the waves of the channel, and still remains at the western end of St. Mary's Church in the castle precincts. The massive walls of Reculver (Regul- tium), Richborough (Rutupice\ and Lympne (Portus Lemanis), erected to guard the coast, bear witness to the power of Roman sway and to the skill of Roman builders. Numerous Roman relics of art and skill — houses, ceme- teries, coins — have been found in the county, and proclaim the extent of Roman colonisation and the large number of the conquerors who settled in Kent's fair county.
When the period of the decline and fall of the Roman empire set in, and the Roman legions, called to defend the heart of that empire, could no longer keep in check the turbulent Pictish tribes, the British King Voftigern invited the Saxon freebooters, who were harrying his coasts, to aid him against his northern foes. Thus the coming of the English was inaugurated ; and Bede tells that the Jutes, under Hengist and Horsa, came to Kent in three long ships, and landed at Ebbsfleet, on the southern shore of the Isle of Thanet, in 449. No spot in Britain can be so sacred to Englishmen as that which first felt the tread of English feet.1 " There is little to catch the eye in Ebbsfleet itself, a mere lift of higher ground, with a few grey cottages dotted over it, cut off nowadays from the sea by a reclaimed meadow and a sea-wall." But the scene has a wild natural beauty, and historical associa- tions of the highest importance. There, in the Thanet isle, the invaders rested, protected by the galleys that still rode the high seas, and across the narrow strait of sea were their new British allies, thankful that the kindly strait saved them from a too close proximity to their formidable
1 Green. A Short History of the English People, p. 7.
4 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
friends. The chronicles tell of the fight between the British and English at Aylesford, when the former were defeated, Horsa slain, and Hengist and ALsc, his son,1 obtained the kingdom. Romance wove pretty stories to account for the success of the pagan hosts, and Geoffrey of Monmouth tells of the enamoured Vortigern meeting the beautiful Rowen, daughter of Hengist, and of her pledging him in a golden goblet of wine with the words " Lauerd King wacht heil," and how Hengist gave her in marriage and received in return the province of Kent.
Who were these war-loving hosts that conquered Kent ? Bede calls them Jutes. They were of the same race as the northern Goths, one of the noblest of the European nations, and amongst them were numerous Frisians, whose ancient laws declare that " the race shall be free as long as the winds blow out of the clouds, and the world stands." The trace of old British rule is preserved in the name Kent, or Cantium, the only province of Britain that kept its ancient title. The freedom-loving Frisians be- queathed their national characteristic to their successors in the land of their adoption. Through all the changes of the Anglo-Saxon period, in feudal times and down to our own days, they preserved their liberties, their peculiar customs of inheritance such as gavelkind, and as Dryden wrote —
Among the English shires be thou surnamed the free, And foremost ever placed when they shall numbered be.
It was the privilege of the men of Kent to lead the van in the national army in time of war.
There is a distinction between the inhabitants of East and West Kent. The former were known as the " Men of Kent," the latter as " Kentish Men," and it has been suggested that the division of the dioceses of Canterbury and Rochester marks the ancient boundary between the
^Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, A.D. 455.
HISTORIC KENT 5
two original settlers. In Eastern Kent the Gothic tribes fixed their habitations, in Western Kent the Frisians made their settlements.1
Many relics of the Saxon age have been preserved in Kent. Saxon tombs have disclosed many a choice brooch and elaborate ornament. Runic inscriptions have been found at Dover and Sandwich, and when Christianity came to subdue the paganism of the Kentish folk, many churches were erected which are still partly preserved among the additions of later ages.
If Ebbsfleet is dear to the heart of the Englishman, as the spot where Hengist landed, it is still more sacred to us on account of the advent of Augustine and his com- panions in 597, when they came to convert England to the Christian Faith, ^thelbert was King of Kent at that period, and a powerful ruler he was. Under his sway Kent was the chiefest kingdom in England, and Canterbury its chief city. The Saxons of Essex and Middlesex bowed before him and acknowledged ^Ethel- bert as their overlord. East Anglia and Mercia were subject to Kent, whose king extended his sway as far as the Trent and Humber. We can see him sitting with his thanes on the chalk down above Minster, listening to the sermon of the Roman missionary. It was not the first time that he had heard the teaching of Christianity. His queen, Bertha, the daughter of King Charibert of Paris, was a Christian, and with her came her chaplains,
1 Origin of the Anglo-Saxon Race, T. W. Shore, p. 181, etc. My colleague, Mr. Clinch, takes a slightly different view of the matter. He states in his Little Guide to Kent that " a ' Man of Kent ' is one born east of the Medway, and the special honour of being associated with that half of the county is supposed to be derived from the tradition that it was the men of that part of Kent who went out with green boughs to meet the Conqueror, and obtained a confirmation of their ancient privileges. The expression, ' a Kentish man,' does not apply merely to the inhabi- tants of West Kent, but is used to imply a resident in Kent generally, without reference to whether his birthplace is on the east or west of the Medway."
6 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
who were allowed to use the ruined British Church of St. Martin at Canterbury for their services.
He was not, however, converted until a year elapsed after the landing of Augustine, and then thousands of Kentish men followed his example and embraced the new faith. ^Ethelbert gave land at Canter- bury for the building of an abbey, and assigned his palace in that city to Augustine and his monks, retiring to his new palace at Reculver. St. Augustine became the first Archbishop of Canterbury — the first of a long line of prelates whose influence in Church and State has been indeed remarkable. In every period of the nation's history the power of the occupiers of the metropolitan see is shown — a power that is no longer confined to Great Britain, but extends itself to every colony of our world- wide empire. A cathedral church was built by Augus- tine, but it is lost in the greater glory and beauty of its successors. Rochester, too, became a Cathedral city, and a church was built there in 604, when Justus, one of Augustine's band of missionaries, became its first bishop. But troublous times fell upon the shire, ^thel- bert's successor, Eadbald, relapsed into idolatry, and a reaction against the new faith followed. Bishop Justus fled to Gaul in 617, but was subsequently recalled by the King. When Egbert died his brother Lothair usurped the throne of Kent, and devastated the country, sparing neither church nor monastery. Then Ethelred of Mercia invaded Kent, spoiled the whole shire, and laid waste Rochester. King Ine of Wessex overthrew the last sem- blance of Kentish power. In 775 the powerful Mercian king Offa fought a great battle at Otford, near Seven- oaks, and extended his rule over the shire. Then came the Danish rovers, who ravaged Kent and spoiled the cathedrals and churches, and the land had little peace.
When Ethelred reigned in 1012 the Danish fleet came to Greenwich and laid there for several years, their army
being entrenched on the high ground of Greenwich Park and Blackheath. They over-ran the country, sacked Canterbury, and brought back to Greenwich as a prisoner Archbishop Alphege, who died at their hands a martyr. To him is the present parish church dedicated. It was woe to the Kentish men when Danish wolves were abroad.
When the Conqueror came the Kentish men preserved their freedom ; perhaps they won it with the aid of the green boughs with which they welcomed him, and their spirited demand of peace with a recognition of their ancient liberties, or war. But they did not escape the domination of strong earthworks which William threw up to overawe his new subjects. At Dover, Rochester, and Canterbury there are remains of earthworks, and at Tunbridge, Leeds, Allington, Chilham, Eynesford, and Saltwood, later castles were built, which were terrifying evidences of the power of the feudal rulers of Britain.
But the Norman builders were employed in other structures, and new cathedrals at Canterbury and Rochester, and many a noble village church, were erected at this period, and in spite of subsequent restorations still bear witness to the skill of the masons of that time. Monastic houses began to multiply, and amongst the most notable were the rival houses of St. Augustine's and Christ Church at Canterbury ; Aylesford Friary, the first Carmelite house in England ; the Benedictine houses of Davington, East Mailing (a nunnery) and Rochester ; the Cistercian Abbey of Boxley ; the Premonstratensian Abbeys of St. Rademund and West Langdon ; and some othejs.
On the death of the Conqueror, the barons, headed by Bishop Odo of Bayeux, rose in favour of Duke Robert against William Rufus. They occupied Rochester Castle, and were besieged by the king. A plague broke out amongst the garrison, and the castle was surrendered to the king, and Odo banished from the realm.
8 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
By far the most important historical event in the history of the county was the murder of Archbishop Thomas a Becket at his cathedral church in 1 1 70. Of the details of the martyrdom it is unnecessary to write. Every one is familiar with the story. The event filled Christendom with amaze. Becket was canonized, miracles were said to have been wrought at his tomb, and then began that long procession of pilgrims to the shrine, " the holy blissful martyr for to seek," who made the old British way a pilgrim's road, and by their offerings increased the stores of the monks of Canterbury, and enabled them to perfect their cathedral. Here Henry II. endured discipline at the hands of the monks for his share in the murder, and far-reaching were the effects of that impetuous crime.
The old Watling Street, the great highway between London and the Continent, has been often trod by royal and important persons. We see Richard the Lion Heart and his band of Crusaders riding along it on their way to fight the Infidel, and many a brave troop of knights and men-at-arms rode through the county to fight on French battle-fields and secure the possessions of the English crown.
King John had much to do with Kent. We find him at Barham at the head of sixty thousand men in 1213. He was at Chilham Castle during his struggle with the Pope, and despatched from that place his adherents, the Justiciary and the Bishop of Winchester, to meet Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, at Dover, in order to demand from him certain articles of concession. Stephen Langton refused, and retired again to France. In consequence of the violation of Magna Charta by King John, the barons offered the crown to Lewis, son of King Philip of France, who accepted it and landed in Kent with a large army. The hireling soldiers of John refused to fight against their French brothers, and the country,
HISTORIC KENT 9
disgusted with the king, was in favour of Lewis. Canter- bury Castle submitted to him ; Dover Castle, however, remained loyal to its English monarch. On the death of John, whose treasure was lost in the Wellstream, where Mr. St. John Hope has ingeniously located it, Prince Lewis was forced to relinquish all hopes of the English crown. An English fleet set sail from Dover, as many other fleets have done in times of national peril, and kept back the French reinforcements, which were approaching the English shore under the notorious pirate " Eustace the Monk." Then did the men of the Cinque Ports show their seamanship and bravery, as they have done in many a gallant defence of our island. The story of the Ports is one of the most fascinating in our English annals.
When war broke out again, and Simon de Montfort led the revolting barons, he assembled a large army at Barham and marched through Kent.
Landing at Dover in 1221, along the Watling Street another little army came, bent on peaceful conquest — the followers of St. Francis, the begging friars, who fixed their abodes amid the meanest hovels of the town, and strove to carry the message of the Gospel to the poor.
Crusaders have often traversed the old road on their way to the Holy Land. Edward I., on his return, came to the Castle of Tunbridge, and was sumptuously enter- tained. Here also his son, afterwards Edward II., resided for some time. Leeds Castle was also held by the first Edward, who often visited there. It was for many reigns the property of the queens of England, and many dis- tinguished guests from across the seas rested there on their way from Dover to London. The castle was besieged by Queen Isabella in 1321, who had been refused admission, and ultimately surrendered to the king. It has been the home of many royal persons, the prison of many others, and in the chapel the Duchess of Gloucester was tried for sorcery by Archbishop Chichele.
io MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Many were the incursions of the French fleet on the shores of Kent and Sussex, and gallantly did the men of the Cinque Ports guard the coast. In 1295 the foreigners attacked Dover. There was no entente, cordiale to restrain their ravages, and again and again they came to plunder and destroy, if only they could escape the watchful eyes of the Kentish mariners, who failed not to pay similar attentions to the towns on the French coast.
Eltham Palace welcomed King Edward II. and his bride Isabella in 1308, where they sojourned fifteen days. This old palace appears to have been a home for royal brides and a birthplace of princes. Isabella of Valois, the queen of Richard II., and Elizabeth Woodville, awaited here their coronations. Prince John, the second son of Edward II., better known as " John of Eltham," was born here, and also Philippa, daughter of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, and Bridget, the seventh daughter of Edward IV. Three Parliaments were held here in the time of Edward III., and a deputation from the House protested here against the proposed invasion of France by Richard II. Often did the old banqueting hall echo with the sounds of furious debate and witness the brilliant assembly of royal councils, and the prolonged feasts of the usual royal Christmas entertainments.
Stilled was the sound of gaiety when the Black Death swept through the shire, and carried off the labourers in their hovels, the nobles in their castles, and the monks in their monasteries. The harvest rotted on the ground, sheep and cattle strayed through the fields, and none were left to drive them. It was a terrible time of suffering, which gave birth to that peasant revolt, the first flames of which were kindled by a Kentish man, John Ball, the " mad priest of Kent," as Froissart calls him.
When Adam dalf and Eve span, Who was thanne a gentilman ?
was the burden of the cry which echoed through England.
HISTORIC KENT 11
The first blow was struck in Kent. A tax-gatherer, who had insulted a tiler's daughter, was killed by her enraged sire. The spark ignited the gunpowder, and a mighty conflagration ensued. Kentish men rushed to arms. John Ball was in prison at Canterbury. All the men of the city sympathised with the revolt. The gates were opened to the insurgents, the archbishop's palace and the castle sacked, prisoners released, and much private property seized. But the story of Wat Tyler's rebellion and the peasant revolt will be told hereafter in a subsequent chapter, and need not be now repeated. One result of the agitation of the time, and of a foreign invasion more serious than usual, was the building in 1385 of the strong castle of Cowling by Lord Cobham. It was sorely needed to protect the coast, as French and Spanish foemen had sailed up the Thames, captured Gravesend, and burned and destroyed every town and village near the river bank.
With Cowling Castle is associated the name of Sir John Oldcastle, who married the granddaughter of the founder, and became Lord Cobham. He was a strong supporter of Lollardry, and the castle became the head- quarters of that fanatical sect. Here came the zealous preachers of the new doctrines, and found protection in spite of royal decrees and episcopal prohibitions, until at length the vast revolt was crushed, and the poor lord of Cowling was captured in Wales and burned in chains on Christmas Day, 1417.
The shire was prolific in revolts and risings. Another forty years passed, when Cade's rebellion broke out. The French war had ended disastrously. The close of the Hundred Years War saw England stripped of all the fair provinces in France, which English valour had held and conquered, and only Calais remained. English folk were furious, and especially the men of Kent. There was then a large manufacturing population in the shire, men who took a keen interest in the war with France, and were
12 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
disgusted at the triumph of the French. Twenty thousand men flocked to the banner of the insurgents, under the leadership of Jack Cade, who called himself Mortimer. They marched to Blackheath. The " Com- plaint of the Commons of Kent " was presented to the royal council, which contained no unreasonable demands. It was rejected, and the Kentish folk defeated the royal army in a pitched battle at Sevenoaks. On to London the victorious rebels marched, slew Lord Saye in the streets of London, a graphic picture of which deed hangs in the hall of his descendant at Broughton Castle. The council became alarmed, the " complaint " was listened to, and granted. The rebels dispersed, promises were forgotten, and Cade was killed by the sheriff ere he left the county.
Just before this time was born in Kent a remarkable man who was destined to revolutionize literature — the learned printer, William Caxton. The county may well be proud of her distinguished son. After his sojourn of thirty-five years in Flanders we see him travelling along the old Watling Street with his wains bearing his precious presses and type to Westminster, where he set up his shop, printed, traded, translated, and enjoyed the favour and patronage of the nobles and great men of the age. He loved his native shire, and spoke of " Kent in the Weald, where I doubt not is spoken as broad and rude English as in any place in England."
Henry VII. loved Kent, and frequently travelled through the fair county, as the accounts of his privy purse show. Canterbury often saw him, where he visited the shrine of Becket, and gave 6s. 8d. to a heretic whom he " converted."
At Greenwich we see rising the new royal palace erected by Henry VII. on the site of the priory once inhabited by the hero of Agincourt, and by Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester. This palace added new glories to
HISTORIC KENT 13
Kent. Here were born Henry VIIL, Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth, and many other royal personages, and here Edward VI. died. Kentish palaces have added much to the history of the shire. The old Greenwich palace, which witnessed many brilliant scenes of royal splendour, was pulled down by Charles II., who built a new palace, which, by the gift of Mary, the queen of William III., is now the famous hospital for seamen.
Of the dissolution of monasteries it is unnecessary to write, or of its disastrous results on the great abbeys and other religious houses, the churches and hospitals that abounded in Kent. That is a page in English history which we care not to read too often.
The ravings and imposture of Elizabeth Barton of Aldington (where, by the way, Erasmus once was vicar) contributed to increase the monarch's antipathy to monks. Styled the " Holy Maid of Kent," a subject of hysterical fits, the tool of two iniquitous clerics, Masters and Bocking, she made pretended revelations and uttered prophecies against the innovation in religion, the royal divorce, and the king. Her ravings were listened to, and the monks and priests spread the stories throughout England, and even Bishop Fisher, of Rochester, was carried away by the . strange delusion. The " Holy Maid " and all her accomplices suffered the penalty of death, and, her impos- ture was exposed. History tells of the shameful execution of good Bishop Fisher, which was partly caused by the wild ravings of the Kentish maid.
Henry VIIL, a Kentish man, loved the shire, and he loved one of its fairest daughters, whom we shall meet again at Hever Castle. Greenwich and Eltham frequently saw him. It was at Eltham that Cardinal Wolsey took the oath as Lord Chancellor, and here he gave the king his princely palace of Hampton Court, and here the " Statutes of Eltham " were devised for the better order- ing of the royal household. Near here lived Margaret
14
Roper, the daughter of one of Henry's victims — Sir Thomas More.
Again in Queen Mary's reign the Kentish men were in revolt. The cause was the dread of the Spanish marriage. Sir Thomas Wyatt led the insurgents. A battle was fought at Strood between Wyatt's followers and the queen's army under the leadership of the Duke of Norfolk, when the Kentish men won, many of the trainbands of London deserting to the rebels with shouts of " A Wyatt ! A Wyatt ! We are all Englishmen." Six guns were cap- tured, and soon employed in an attack by Wyatt on his brother-in-law's castle of Cowling, which was defended by Lord Cobham from eleven o'clock in the morning until five in the afternoon ; but was at length forced to capitulate. For his unsuccessful defence Lord Cobham endured a short imprisonment in the Tower. The fate of Wyatt and his luckless followers is too well known to be here mentioned.
During the Marian persecutions many poor people suffered in Kent for the sake of their religion, and died bravely at the stake. In October, 1555, John Webbe, Gentleman, George Rober and Gregory Parke were burned at Canterbury. Two years later three men and four women suffered in the same city. Maidstone was also a place where martyrs were burned, and seven suffered there, amongst whom was Matthew Plaise, a weaver of Stone. Thornton, Bishop of Dover, and Archdeacon Harpsfield, were the chief inquisitors, and their examina- tions of the accused are set out in extenso in Foxe's Bock of Martyrs. He tells also of the narrow escapes of Thomas Christenman and William Watts, of Tunbridge, and other sad stories of that unhappy time.
The wise policy of Elizabeth and her succour of both. Huguenots and Flemings, brought colonies of these dis- tressed people to Kent, and Mr. Kershaw will tell how they enriched the shire by their industries. The Cinque
HISTORIC KENT 15
Ports afforded a refuge to the victims of Alva's persecu- tions, and the sea-dogs of Kent levied heavy toll on the Spanish trading vessels in the channel. Then came that grand attempt to crush England with the Invincible Armada, and when " the feathers of the Spaniard were plucked one by one," as the galleons sailed the English seas, the sea-dogs of Kent had a good share in the pluck- ing, and when just across the narrow straits the great Spanish ships rested off Calais, many a Kentish man took pleasure in sending those nreships among them to com- plete the confusion of the Dons.
Of Sir Philip Sidney and other members of his illus- trious race, some account will be given later. During the Civil War Kent was very loyal to the royal cause. In the hour of gloom, when all seemed lost, and a re-action set in against Cromwell and the Parliament, Kent, with Essex and Hertford, rose in revolt in 1648 against the Puritan regime, and off the coasts the royal standard waved on the masts of the fleet. But the effort was transitory. Fairfax and his troopers proved too powerful for the hastily levied bands of insurgents, and soon the Royal Martyr was led to execution.
There were great rejoicings at Dover when Charles II. landed there in 1660, and made his triumphal progress along the old road to Whitehall. Kentish men gave a right loyal greeting, though afterwards they had cause to sigh over his dishonoured reign. The tyranny of Charles doomed to death Kent's accomplished son, Algernon Sidney, on a charge of sharing in the Rye -house Plot, and the shameful conditions of the Treaty of Dover, con- cluded at a meeting between the king and his sister Henrietta, Duchess of Orleans, whereby he sold himself to the French monarch, show the extraordinary political profligacy of the age. Kentish men beheld with shame the bold mariners of Holland sail up the Thames, and the burning of the English ships of war that lay at Chatham,
1 6 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
while the king feasted with the ladies of his seraglio, and amused himself with hunting a moth about the supper table.
Kent also was concerned in the cowardly flight of James II., who fled across the Thames one dark winter's night, landed at Vauxhall, and then set out to Sheerness, where a hoy awaited to convey him to France. At Emley Ferry, near the island of Sheppey, the boat lay. The sea was rough, and the master was afraid to start. News of the king's flight spread like wildfire, producing lawlessness and misrule. The rude Kentish fishermen thought a Jesuit or some rich man was on board the craft, and fifty of them boarded her and seized the passen- gers, rudely hustling the king, and appropriating his watch and money. They conveyed him to an inn, where he was recognized. Sir Edward Hales, a Kentishman, whose home was in the neighbourhood, had accompanied the king, and he was much hated by the fisher folk, who soon set to work to pillage his house and slay his deer. The king was respected by them, but was not allowed to depart. The Earl of Winchelsea, hearing of the king's plight, hastened to him with a number of Kentish squires, who placed him in a more convenient lodging. But the fishermen would not let him go, and guarded well his chamber. Piteously did he plead with them, but all in vain. At length a messenger was sent to the council of Lords, imploring aid. A troop of life guards was sent to release the imprisoned monarch. They found him in a pitiable state, and removed him to Rochester, and thence he returned to Whitehall. When William arrived in London, James was ordered to retire to Ham House ; he preferred Rochester, where he was permitted to go.
History tells with shame the fright and cowardice of the king, who, in spite of the advice of his friends, resolved to seek safety across the seas. That was a strange sight which was seen in the garden of the house at Rochester —
HISTORIC KENT 17
the king stealing out at midnight, attended by Berwick, to the banks of the Medway, where a small skiff was waiting to take him to the Thames. There he boarded a smack, and was soon on the way to France, much to the joy of the Prince of Orange and his party. It was an ignominious end to an inglorious reign.
Since that period Kent does not appear to occupy a prominent place in the nation's history. The men of Kent still showed their independent spirit and fondness of rioting at the end of the eighteenth, and at the begin- ning of the nineteenth century. At Maidstone there were riots in 1798 in connection with the trial of Arthur O'Connor, and forty years later the Boughton riots took place, headed by a fanatic named Thorns, who was shot dead by the military.
In the days of the smugglers the men of Kent were not behind their neighbours of Sussex in the fearlessness of their ways in running contraband goods, and in their conflicts with the revenue officers.
When the great Napoleon threatened England, Kentish men were alert and vigorous in preparing to resist the invasion, and along the coast arose martello towers, which were erected to defend our English shores. In the old castle of Walmer, built by Henry VIIL, the official residence of the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, passed away Napoleon's most powerful enemy, the great Duke of Wellington.
Of the gallant sons and great men of Kent I have no need to write. Their names are recorded in many a page of history, and revered by their descendants. In this brief snrvey of Kentish history I have attempted to record only those great events which connected the shire with our national annals, and to show the important part which the men of Kent have played in the making of English history. Brave, sturdy, independent, they have left their mark on the character of our English race. C
1 8 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Kent's geographical position has forced it into special prominence, and in the Garden of England have bloomed many precious flowers of chivalry and knightly prowess, of brave deeds and patient suffering, which have helped to form the garland of England's glory.
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY CANTERBURY
BY SEBASTIAN EVANS, JUN.
I HE early history of this great mitred Abbey may be said to begin with the arrival, in the year 597, of the small band of missionaries headed by Augustine, a monk of St. Andrew's at Rome, sent by Pope Gregory to preach the Christian faith to Pagan Saxondom.
Ethelbert, King of Kent at the time, had received Augustine and his monks with great favour, had himself been baptised, and had placed at the disposal of the missionary an old Roman temple on the site of which was founded Christ Church.
Whether because there was not sufficient accommoda- tion at Christ Church for his monks, whether he desired to separate them from the secular clergy, or whether, as now generally seems to be accepted, burial was not allowed within the city, Augustine prevailed on Ethelbert to grant him a site outside the walls that he might found a monastery which should serve as a burial place for himself, for the Kings of Kent, and his successors. On this site, therefore, outside the walls, and about midway between Christ Church and St. Martin's Church, was founded in the year 598 the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, but not until the year 613 was it consecrated by Archbishop Laurence, and the body of Augustine, which had lain since the time of his death in 605 outside the
19
20 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Church, was translated to his appointed burial place in the north porch.
In the porch and church were also buried the bodies of nine succeeding archbishops : — Laurence, Mellitus, Justus, Honorius, Deusdedit, Theodore, Brihtwald, Tatwine, and Nothelm.
On the death of Cuthbert, the tenth Archbishop, how- ever, a dispensation was obtained from the Pope, and leave from the King also, whereby burial for himself and his successors was allowed in his own Cathedral of Christ Church. Thus early was this monastery, always jealous and a rival of the great neighbouring establishment at Christ Church, robbed of one of its most cherished privileges.
The twelfth archbishop, Janbert, was buried in the Chapter House of the Monastery, by his own directions, probably owing to the fact that he had been abbot before he was appointed archbishop ; but he was the last arch- bishop buried at St. Augustine's.
Of the kings and queens of Kent buried here may be mentioned Ethelbert and his queen Bertha ; Eadbald, the successor of Ethelbert, and his queen Emma ; and the kings Erconbert, Lothaire, and Withred. Mulus, a strange king, was also buried here. All these were most probably laid in the south porch.
Ethelbert had royally endowed the monastery, and from the first it had been the recipient of charters, privi- leges, gifts of land, and other advantages, granted by successive Saxon kings; and it obtained also great and unusual privileges from the See of Rome. The most noteworthy of these latter was the great Privilegium of St. Augustine. It is given at length by William Thorne in his history of the monastery. The purport of this " Privilege " was to exempt the monastery from episcopal control, and though in the quarrels between the arch- bishops and abbots it played an important part, there is but little doubt that this document was spurious, and the
ETHKLBERT'S TOWER, ST. AUGUSTINE'S MONASTERY, CANTERBURY.
(Front an Old Engraving.)
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 21
product of a much later date. Not only did the monastery continue to receive endowments and gifts from the Saxon kings, but Canute, the Danish monarch, was a great bene- factor to it, and it steadily advanced in splendour and stateliness until at one time it was the most opulent and important of any in the Kingdom.
After the death of Ethelbert in 616, the crown reverted to his son Eadbald, who was a pagan, and the new Christianity was in danger of total extinction until Archbishop Laurence succeeded in convincing Eadbald of the error of his ways.
The story is given by Bede that the archbishop, who intended seeking safety in flight, repaired to St. Augus- tine's, and ordered his bed to be prepared for the night in the church, and that on his falling asleep St. Peter appeared to him and scourged him for his cowardice. In the morning, instead of continuing his intended flight, he sought an interview with Eadbald, explained his dream, and showed him the marks of the scourging, whereupon Eadbald was convinced of the truth of Christianity, and allowed himself to be baptised. However little we may believe of such a story, it is certain that Eadbald, in the grounds of the monastery, just to the east of the Abbey Church, founded and built the Church of the Virgin, which was consecrated in or about the year 618.
The first four abbots were companions of Augustine, Peter being the first, who was said to have been drowned in the Bay of Amflete on his return from France, whither he had been sent on a mission by the king.
After the death of the sixth abbot, Nathaniel, in 667, Hasteo\tells us there was a " vacancy " of two years, taking his information from Bede and Thorne ; but Gervase, a monk of Christ Church, mentions that Archbishop Theo- dore appointed Benedict Biscop as abbot. Whether he was ever abbot or not — and some modern writers are inclined to agree with Gervase — there was an interval altogether of four years before the appointment of Adrian, a native
22 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
of Africa, in 671. Thorne speaks of him as "over- shadowing all others by the brilliance of his knowledge and understanding." For a considerable period he was the companion of Archbishop Theodore, and assisted him in his work of organizing the Christian Church in England. He ruled the monastery for thirty-nine years, and died in the year 708.
His successor, Albinus, was the first English abbot of St. Augustine's, and a pupil of Adrian. It is to him, per- haps, that we owe most of our knowledge of early English Church History, as Bede tells us that it was chiefly through the persuasion of Albinus that he undertook his Ecclesiastical History, and from him he received his information as to what transpired in Kent and the adjacent counties.
Albinus died in 732, and according to Thorne was buried in Eadbald's Church of St. Mary, close to his predecessor Adrian.
Very little is heard of the monastery for a period of about two hundred years beyond the gifts of various manors. The abbot was said to have been granted leave by Athelstan to coin money, but it does not seem clear in what reign this privilege was granted. Thorne mentions that it ceased at the death of Abbot Sylvester in 1 161, and merely says that several of his predecessors enjoyed the privilege.
In 955 there is another bull from a pope, John XIII., whereby he takes the monastery under his own protection, and grants it exemption from the intermediate power of the archbishop. This would seem to have been hardly necessary if the monastery already possessed the "privi- legium of St. Augustine."
During the next sixty or seventy years the abbey must have suffered in some measure from the frequent and serious incursions of the Danes. Three or four times was the city of Canterbury attacked and plundered, and it seems hardly likely that St. Augustine's, outside the walls
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 23
of the city, should have entirely escaped. The fourth time, during the abbacy of Elmer, in the year 101 1, the whole city was burnt, and even the cathedral did not escape. St. Augustine's, however, was again immune from the attack, and the historian of the abbey — Thorne — has ascribed the fact to a miracle. One of the Danes was said to have seized the valuable covering that he found on the tomb of St. Augustine. On his endeavouring to hide it, it stuck to his fingers, and he could not get rid of it, which, when his fellows saw, they were so terrified that they desisted from their pillage.
A far more likely story is that Elmer paid heavy ransom for his monastery, as we may acquit him of the charge brought against him by the Saxon Chronicle of treachery, for after being made bishop of Sherburne he returned to the Abbey of St. Augustine's to die, and was buried in the Church there.
Ethelstan succeeded Elmer, and under him the monastery received one of the largest gifts in land that it ever possessed. This abbot was in high favour with King Cnut, who would have appointed him to the see of Winchester, but he refused the offer.
The convent of St. Mildred's, at Minster, had been almost destroyed by the Danes, and it was the property belonging to it, which consisted of quite half the Isle of Thanet, that was bestowed upon the monastery. The relics of St. Mildred which had been spared by the Danes were also acquired by the Abbot, and as this saint was one of the most popular in Kent, the possession of these no doubt added largely to the fame of the abbey.
Ethelstan died about the year 1047, and was succeeded by Wulfric II.
About this time the Abbey Church and monastic build- ings seem to have been in a poor state of repair, perhaps owing to some of the previous incursions of the Danes, or from the fact that the Saxon Church had now been standing some 450 years, and the other buildings only a
24 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
little shorter period, for Wulfric obtained leave from the Pope to enlarge and rebuild his church.
Towards the end of 1056 he commenced his work by pulling down the west end of Eadbald's Church of the Virgin, with a view of connecting it with the east end of the abbey church, but his work was interrupted in 1059 by his death, which was ascribed by the people to his having pulled down part of the Church of the Virgin without asking for her sanction.
His successor Egelsin does not appear to have had any hand in the rebuilding, and after quarrelling with the archbishop, and incurring the displeasure of William L, he is said to have fled to Denmark, leaving his monastery a prey to the Conqueror, who, after confiscating some of its possessions, constituted Scotland, a Norman monk, abbot in his stead.
Possibly through his friendship with Lanfranc, the archbishop, Scotland was enabled to recover some of the lost lands of the monastery, and generally to improve it. He took in hand the work of enlarging the Church, which had been begun by Wulfric, and finding all the buildings in quite a ruinous state, he also obtained permission from the Pope to pull the whole down and rebuild them entirely.
The bodies of the kings and saints were carefully removed, and the work was proceeded with, but again it was interrupted by the death of the abbot, and it was left for his successor, Abbot Wydo, to complete the work.
In the year 1091 the new church was finished, con- secrated by Archbishop Lanfranc, and the bodies of the kings and queens, and various saints, were formally trans- lated to their new resting-places. The body of Augustine, so Thorne tells us, was translated with the rest, but at night the abbot and some ancient monks placed the remains in a stone coffin, which was hidden " in a place in the wall under the east window." Owing to the fear of thieves, or invasion, the matter was kept secret, the hiding place was forgotten, and there the remains rested
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 25
till discovered 130 years later by Abbot Hugh III. It is said that other relics of saints were hidden in various places, which have not been discovered.
These relics are not the only things which were lost, for it is said that the monks, who were in constant fear of pillage during the raids of the Danes, not only hid their saintly relics, but also their gold ornaments, of which they appear to have had a goodly number, and the hiding places of these were never found, owing either to the death of the monks who knew where they were or their being taken prisoners.
Wydo died in 1099 and was succeeded by Hugh de Floriac or Hugh Flory, a warrior who had been engaged in the wars of both the Conqueror and his successor, and it was on the occasion of his visiting the monastery in company with William Rufus that he first embraced the religious life, and refusing to quit the monastery, became a monk. Before his novitiate was ended Wydo died, and on the monks sending Hugh to petition the king that they might choose an abbot for themselves, the king recognized his companion of the wars, and told the monks that, novitiate though he was, he appointed him abbot, and if they did not choose to at once accept him, their monastery should be burnt to ashes. The monks sub- mitted, much to their welfare as it turned out, for Flory brought a large fortune with him, and gave many and costly ornaments to the abbey.
He built the dormitory, the ruins of which may still be seen, and which will be described later, and the chapter house, but of this there is nothing remaining, as it was pulled down and rebuilt about the year 1380.
Hugh Flory died in 1 1 24, and was buried in the chapter house which he had rebuilt.
The succeeding abbot, Hugh de Trottescliffe, owed his appointment to the fact of his having acted as chaplain to Henry L, but the archbishop flatly refused to give him the benediction in his own monastery. The abbot
26 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
appealed to the king and the pope, and in spite of the archbishop's protest, he duly received the benediction at the hands of the Bishop of Chichester. Thus began the long and costly wrangle between the abbots and the archbishops with regard to episcopal jurisdiction.
One of the chief works of this abbot was to build the Hospital of St. Lawrence as a sanatorium for the monks, and an almshouse for their relatives. He raised the number of monks to sixty, and created various offices in the monastery for the more convenient carrying out of the monastic business.
Hugh de Trottescliffe died in 1151, and was buried in the chapter house opposite to his predecessor.
The quarrel between abbot and archbishop grew acute when Sylvester, the successor of Hugh Trottescliffe, was elected. Theodore, the archbishop, refused his bene- diction, and the abbot refused the oath of obedience. The abbot went to Rome, the pope confirmed him in his office, and he returned to Canterbury with his letters from the Papal See, but it was not till after the Archbishop had delayed matters by various excuses from time to time that, on a very peremptory rescript from the pope, the abbot received the benediction. Nor was this all; the arch- bishop, highly incensed, excommunicated the whole monastery, deposed the abbot, and prohibited services in the church. Gervase says that at this time King Stephen's queen used to worship at the abbey whilst the abbey of Faversham was building, and owing to the silence imposed on the monks, she used to send for the Christ Church monks to come and worship. This may or may not be true ; Gervase, it must be remembered, was a monk of the rival establishment, and is only too ready to relate any story tending to belittle St. Augustine's.
The two historians, Thome and Gervase, indeed are entirely at variance with regard to the history of Abbot Sylvester; the former saying that the abbot received the benediction in his own monastery, while the latter gives
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 27
the abbot's oath of obedience at length, in which he says that he promises the archbishop " Canonical obedience in all things." This latter version is probably correct, as it is confirmed by a manuscript still in the possession of the Dean and Chapter, with the archbishop's seal attached.
Sylvester died in 1161, and there is a gap of two years which is unaccounted for, as it was not till 1163 that Henry II. appointed a fugitive Norman monk named Clarembald as abbot. But this being entirely against the wishes of the convent, the monks refused to acknowledge him, would not admit him to the chapter house, or permit him to conduct services in the church. From the year 1 163 to 1173, when he was deposed, the Abbey underwent a time of serious trouble. Clarembald never received the archbishop's benediction, and never took the oath of obedience, possibly because Becket, the Archbishop, was exiled from his see at the time. Gervase tells a story that Clarembald was immediately concerned in the death of the archbishop in that the four assassins conferred with him on the morning of the murder, and perhaps this may have had something to do with Thome's assertion that this abbot was never counted in the list of abbots, for the monks of St. Augustine's would be unlikely to admit that their abbot had anything to do with the martyrdom of St. Thomas.
In 1 1 68 a grievous misfortune befel the monastery, for the greater part was destroyed by fire, and with it many of the ancient charters, deeds of gift and manu- scripts were burnt. The Church itself suffered, and the shrine of St. Augustine and those of other saints were badly damaged.
Clarembald, whether abbot or not, had the manage- ment of the finances of the abbey, which he squandered so recklessly that he left the monastery heavily in debt. Eventually the monks appealed to the pope, on the ground that "he was a bad man and had wasted the possessions of the monastery," and he was deposed, much to the
28 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
disgust of the king, who took the Abbey with all its possessions into his own keeping for the next two-and- a-half years, and it was only on the receipt of urgent letters from the pope that he recognized Roger, a monk of Christ Church, as abbot, and restored the monastery to its own.
The election of a monk of Christ Church would seem a curious policy, but this Roger was keeper of the altar in " the Martyrdom," and there being a craze for mementos of St. Thomas, it was thought by the monks of St. Augustine's that they might thus obtain some of the coveted relics, in which they were not altogether unsuccessful.
Although hailing from Christ Church, Roger showed no disposition to take the oath of obedience to the Archbishop. The matter was referred to the pope, who, after hearing Roger himself, and the emissaries of the archbishop, decided in favour of the former, and decreed, moreover, that in the future, if the archbishop refused to bestow the benediction in the abbot's own monastery, the abbot should repair to Rome and receive it from the pope himself. In 1179, accordingly, Roger received the benediction from Pope Alexander III., and though this was followed in 1 1 82 by an agreement between the archbishop and the abbot that the former should abandon his claim to the oath of obedience, it by no means put an end to the quarrel with the various archbishops, for on the death of Roger, who had ruled for the long period of thirty-six years, his successor, Alexander, demanded benediction in his own monastery, refused the oath of obedience, and on the archbishop's refusal to comply with such terms, repaired to Rome and received benediction at the hands of Pope Innocent III.
It would be tedious to follow the trouble between the various archbishops and abbots with regard to episcopal control. In spite of protestations from the primates, the various abbots, by bribery or otherwise, obtained their
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 29
benedictions from the pope. In 1237 Archbishop Rich brought matters to a head temporarily by an agreement which was altogether in favour of St. Augustine's. It gave the abbot the right of receiving benediction in his own monastery, it exempted him from the oath of obedience, and in return the abbot was to receive the archbishop when he came to bestow the benediction as the representative of the pope. But under successive archbishops the feud continued, and it was not until 1397 that Archbishop Arundel saw the futility of continuing the struggle against the Augustinians, whose appeals to the various Pontiffs were always successful. He therefore declared the monas- tery exempt entirely from episcopal control, and subject only to the See of Rome.
For the next one hundred years the prosperity of the monastery steadily but quietly increased, various grants of money by Adam de Kingsnoth, new buildings, new cloisters, and a new refectory being chronicled, until we come to the time of Thomas Fyndon, abbot from 1283 to 1309. He was the third prior of the monastery, and received the benediction from the Bishop of London. Under his abbacy the fortunes of the monastery may be said to have reached their highest point. The abbot was in high favour with the king, who made repeated visits to St. Augustine's ; it had the direct support of Rome, and its worldly possessions were immense. New buildings were being undertaken of all descriptions. The new kitchen, which took four years building, was finished at a cost of £414 IDS., according to Thome; the roof of the dormitory was again " new made," and stalls were built in the choir. The abbot's chapel, a stone tower to the church — probably the central one — were built, and other buildings seem to have been completed. It was Fyndon who built the great gateway of the monastery, which has come-down to us in its original state with some slight restoration of the two towers.
Thorne records that during this abbacy an enormous
30 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
feast was given to all the prelates of Kent, and to all judges and lawyers at that time on circuit. The guests num- bered some 4,500, and from the accounts of the price of the various commodities consumed, it seems to have been a considerable drain on the resources of the monastery. But it was to Abbot Fyndon's successor, Ralph de Bourne, that the credit or discredit attaches of supplying a gargantuan feast. The " first " batch consisted of 6,000 persons, and Thorne gives a detailed list of the fare provided which, including as it does fifty-eight casks of beer and eleven tuns of wine, and costing the equivalent of about £7,000 of our money, can only be stigmatised as wanton waste of money, seeing that the last abbot left the monastery in a somewhat impoverished condition by his extrava- gance.
From this time the fortunes of the monastery began to decline seriously, although there were considerable bene- factions to it. In the time of this abbot, one Peter de Dene made sumptuous gifts to the monastery, among other things over one hundred vessels of silver ; and after appointing the convent his sole legatee, he was allowed to build himself a house within the monastery. For some time this curious arrangement no doubt was much to the advantage of the abbey, but Peter, whose main reason for becoming a quasi monk, and taking refuge in the abbey, was to avoid some political trouble, at length, finding that trouble overpast, was anxious once more to return to the outer world. Not being able to obtain the abbot's consent to this, his only hope lay in being able to make his escape, and with the help of his brother and the rector of St. Martin's, he actually accomplished this. But his freedom was of short duration, for after two or three days he was found by the brethren and ignominiously brought back. Peter, however, by some means or other, appealed to the pope, who requested the prior of Christ Church to enquire into the matter. The prior betook himself to St. Augustine's, but on the first day was unable to find
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 31
his man, as the convent refused to produce him. On the morrow he took two hundred men with him, with much the same result ; and again on the third day he went, when the monks produced a man who told the prior that he was a monk, a monk he intended to remain, and that he had no wish to leave the monastery.
It seems from this story that the abbot must have been rather hard pressed for money, and having got hold of a wealthy man, he and his convent meant by hook or by crook to keep him, and no doubt the man who answered the prior of Christchurch was put up in place of the real Peter de Dene. As far as can be made out, he died at the monastery, and according to Thorne, who gives his will at length, dated 1322, it profited by the fortune he left, which included a large collection of books.
A serious loss to the abbey and to the Church generally was the passing of the Statute of Mortmain in the seventh year of Edward L, by which private persons were debarred from leaving their estates to the abbey without the special license of the king. This put a stop in a great measure to the accumulation of property by the Abbey, and though various schemes were tried, such as claiming exemption from tithes and procuring privileges, the monastery sadly missed the benefactions of the laity.
Another blow to the abbey, and one costing about £600, was a rising of tenants in the Isle of Thanet, who refused to pay their dues, and when the abbey distrained for them, about six hundred men attacked the Manor Houses at Minster and Salmeston, and did enormous damage, and the rioting was not put down without the intervention of the authorities.
Abbot Ralph de Bourne died in 1334 after ruling the monastery for twenty-five years.
The next abbot, Thomas Poncy, of Poucyn, received benediction at Avignon, at a cost to his monastery of £148, as Thorne gives it, or fully £3,000 of our money. It is possibly one of the reasons for the decline in the
32 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
finances of the monastery, and therefore of the fortunes of the abbey generally, that the various abbots had to proceed to Avignon or Rome to obtain the benediction of the popes. It will be remembered that the convent prided itself on being subservient to Rome alone, but this can hardly have been an unmixed blessing.
Between the years 1334 to 1349 Abbots Poncy, William Drulege, and John Devenisse all died, and as each had to receive the benediction from the pope, the finances of the monastery were again seriously drawn upon.
We have seen the expenses of Thomas Poncy ; those of William Drulege are not mentioned, but those of John Devenisse were serious indeed. This man was a monk of Winchester, and was elected by that convent to be their bishop. For some reason or other this was against the wishes of Edward III., and at his entreaty the pope cancelled the election, but promised Devenisse some preferment if he stayed with him. The death of William Drulege taking place at this time, the pope gave the post of abbot to him. In the meantime, however, the monks of St. Augustine's had chosen their own abbot, and both they and the king resented the pope's nomination. The result was that the king refused to restore the temporalities of the abbey to Devenisse, and he was even compelled to reside at Nackington, some two miles away. He returned to the pope at Avignon, in the hope of getting some settlement of his affairs, but died there in 1348 without being in any way successful. His expenses to the monas- tery amounted, according to Thorne, to £1,000 and more ; modern equivalent about £22,000.
Thomas Colwelle, who succeeded, ruled the monastery wisely for the space of twenty-seven years, so possibly he may have retrenched a little. Thorne mentions that during this abbot's time the three bells named Austin, Mary, and Gabriel, as well as four in the tower, were cast.
The expenses of Michael Peckham, the next abbot, although spared going to Avignon for the benediction,
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ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 33
amounted to no less a sum than £"1,008 133. 8d., and it was probably owing to this that the affairs of the monastery during his tenancy were in a more parlous state than ever.
The buildings of the monastery, however, were kept in repair through the generosity of the sacrist, Thomas Ickham, and the chapter house was rebuilt after lying more or less in ruins for fully fifty years. The ruins of this chapter house may still be seen, and from the style of architecture it is evident that it was built at this period, circa 1380.
The story of William Welde's accession to the abbacy is one long series of troubles and delays. Shortly after the death of Peckham he was elected by the monks, and Thorne, to whom we are almost entirely indebted for our history, was himself despatched to the pope to sue for his sanction to the election. But in spite of protestations, gifts, and various representations, it was not till thirteen months had passed that the pope considered the case, and even then cited the abbot-elect to appear before him. This again caused further delays and expenses, so that before the abbot was finally installed, a period of two years and two months had elapsed. The expenses, as may be imagined, were extortionate ; they are given at length in Thorne, and were so great and so burdensome to the monastery that the king himself was prevailed on to forego half of what was due to him.
However badly off the monastery might be, it cannot be said that Abbot Welde was niggardly in his hospi- tality, for he entertained Richard II. on the enthroniza- tion of Archbishop Arundel, and some few years before that monarch had made the abbey his resting-place with the greater part of his court.
No_ doubt the monastery had to pay for the kingly friendship, for Hasted tells us that on two occasions the Abbot came to the rescue when money was wanted.
Abbot Welde died on the I2th June, 1405, and with his death all detailed history of the monastery also comes D
34 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
to an end, for William Thome, whose history takes us as far as 1397, died at about the same time.
The abbey itself does not appear to have produced any other historian of note except Thomas of Elmham, who died about 1414; but although he seems to have collected a vast amount of material, his actual history does not take us beyond the abbacy of Wydo, and the conse- cration of the Abbey Church in 1091. Goscelin, who was a monk of St. Augustine's in 1098, and wrote a life of St Augustine, gives no detailed history of the abbey. Thorne mentions Thomas Spot or Sprott, and says that he himself is indebted to him for some of his history.
Hasted gives a list of ten more abbots, but there is not anything to note in the abbacy of any of them, until we arrive at that of John Essex, or Foche, the last abbot. He succeeded in the year 1523, and was abbot till the time of the dissolution of the abbey in the year 1538.
In the cathedral library is his register, which was kept by the precentor, William Selling, but it shows little except that the abbey was in sore straits for money, as there are items such as the sale of twenty-five pieces of plate, and the borrowing of two sums of ;£ioo and £600, and later on another sum of £120.
We come now to the actual dissolution of the monas- tery. Parliament, some two years before, had sanctioned the dissolution of the lesser monasteries, and three years later all those who had not voluntarily submitted were suppressed.
The deed of surrender, which is printed at length in the Decent Scriptores, is dated in the chapter house, July 3Oth, 1538, and it gives over "the abbey, the site and precinct of it, the debts, chattels and goods, manors, houses, lands, advowsons, and churches, and all other possessions whatsoever and wheresoever situated," to the king for his use and that of his heirs for ever.
This document was signed by the abbot and thirty monks, all of whom are supposed to have been pensioned.
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 35
The names are given in Hasted's History of Kent, who remarks on the curious difference between the names of the thirty monks who signed the deed of surrender and of those who received pensions.
After the Dissolution, some of the abbey buildings were transformed into a palace for the king, more to serve as a halting-place on his way from London to the coast than as a royal residence, though Queen Elizabeth is said to have resided here in 1573 for several days, and held court.
It does not seem to have remained a royal palace for any length of time, for though, as mentioned, Elizabeth stayed here, it had been granted, some years previously, to Henry, Lord Cobham, on whose attainder it passed into the hands of Robert Cecil, and from him to Lord Wotton, whose son Thomas was in possession of it at the time of his death in 1630. His widow continued to reside here till she died in 1658. Her daughter Anne had married Sir Edward Hales, and this marriage entitled him to the estate, as she was co-heiress with her sisters to the property of Sir Thomas Wotton, and this presumably was her share, consequently the whole of the site of the monastery, as well as about one thousand acres of land adjoining, passed to the Hales family.
The property after this fell into the hands of various holders, and no doubt the whole of it became more and more ruinous and neglected, until at the beginning of the nineteenth century very little was left intact except the great gateway, which owed its existence to the fact that the large room formed a convenient vat for a local brewer. Perhaps it is as well to recall the words of Hasted in his History of Kent, who, writing in 1799, says : —
So little is the veneration paid at this time to the remains of this once sacred habitation, that the principal apartments adjoining the gate- way are converted into an alehouse, the gateway itself into a brew- house, the steam of which has defaced the beautiful paintings over it.
36 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
The great courtyard is turned into a bowling green, the chapel and the aisle of the church on the north side into a fives court, and the great room over the gate into a cock pit.
From this state it was rescued by the exertions of Mr. A. J. B. Beresford Hope and Dr. Edward Coleridge, who acquired the greater part of the site for the erection of the present Missionary College.
How far the old buildings were restored or adapted to their present uses is stated in a paper contributed by Mr. Beresford Hope to the fourth volume of Archceologia Cantiana, lest any of them should prove a " pitfall for future antiquaries."
The ruins of the eastern portion of the abbey church, the chapter house, the dormitory and infirmary stand in a field adjoining the college, and remained in private hands till the year 1900, when they were rescued chiefly by the efforts of Canon Routledge, who with Lord North- bourne, Mr. St. John Hope, and Mr. Bennett Goldney, acted as trustees for several antiquaries and friends, who subscribed for the purchase and subsequent excavation of these most interesting remains.
Part of the ruins of the chapel of St. Pancras are in the same field, and part in the field adjoining, belonging to the Kent and Canterbury Hospital. These were first taken in hand, and excavations which had been com- menced some sixteen years before by Canon Routledge, but could not be continued, owing to the churlishness of the then owner of the field, were completed. A full and interesting account of this chapel of St. Pancras has been given by Mr. W. H. St. John Hope in volume xxv. of Archaologia Cantiana.
Owing to these excavations, therefore, it was not till April, 1901, that attention was turned to the ruins of St. Augustine's, and operations were commenced under the superintendence of Canon Routledge, and the more immediate care of the present writer.
It seemed advisable to endeavour first of all to discover
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 3;
what remained of the great abbey church, so the work was begun at a point which was thought to be the extreme east end, and this turned out to be the case. At the outset rising ground to the west was encountered, but what originally appeared to be masses of fallen masonry turned out to be earth dug from the foundations of a malthouse in the neighbourhood, and shot here some twenty years before by the descendants of the same brewer who had used the great chamber of the gateway as a vat.
The excavations disclosed the foundation walls of a rectangular chapel about forty feet long and twenty-one feet wide, but this had evidently been an addition some- where about the end of the fifteenth century, and may possibly have been built by John Dygon, the last abbot but two, as his coffin was discovered in the centre of the chapel. He ruled the monastery from 1497 to 1509.
Inside this chapel, at the east end, was a fallen mass of masonry of early date, showing on both sides the face of a wall of flint and rough stone. Possibly this may have been a vestige of Eadbald's Chapel of the Virgin, which stood on or about this site.
Continuing to excavate westwards, the most interest- ing part was brought to light, this being no less than Abbot Scotland's crypt which he built about the year 1080. Professor Willis mentions that there are five eastern crypts founded before 1085, namely, Canterbury, Winchester, Gloucester, Rochester, and Worcester. To these, there- fore, must now be added St. Augustine's, the crypt under notice. It is very imperfect, all the vaulting having gone, and most of the ashlar facing from the piers and walls, but enough remains to show that Thome's description of a church on a grand scale with a crypt beneath is correct. The picture of the east end of the Norman church from Thomas of Elmham's history, which is preserved in Trinity Hall Library, Cambridge, also may be said to be fairly correct as showing the eastern apse of the church with its
38 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
three chapels. Whether the various shrines depicted are correct it is now impossible to say, as these were above ground level, and not a trace remains.
The crypt was about 71 feet long by 66£ feet wide, and resembles in a marked degree that at Gloucester, which was built by Abbot Serlo at about the same date. Between the two centre piers of the apse was discovered the grave of Abbot Scotland and his coffin plate, on which was engraved : —
Anno ab incarnatione domini mlxxxvii. Obiit Scotlandus Abbas V idus Septembris.
The central chapel leading out of the apse, the Chapel of the Virgin " in Cryptis," is in a fair state, with the remains of an altar-block in the middle. The north and south chapels leading out of the apse have their altar- blocks against the wall, and are slightly smaller than the central one.
The south transept is mostly in the grounds of the hospital, but the northern one, with an eastern apsidal chapel, has been brought to light, is of the same date as the crypt, and about three to four feet of the walls of the chapel are standing above ground level. North of this transept, and between it and the chapter house, is a vesti- bule or parlour, about 1 7 feet 6 inches square, which at one time probably formed a slype or passage leading into the monks' cemetery ; later one end was blocked up, making it into a room, and there is reason to believe that the library of the monastery was overhead. North of this again, and in the field, is the chapter house, but very little remains above ground. It was finished about 1380, and no trace of the earlier one, built by Hugh Flory about 1 1 20, is to be seen. Eight abbots were buried here, but none of their graves have yet been found. To the north again of the chapter house is another small chamber, with an entrance to the dormitory undercroft. To the west of this under- croft is a fine piece of Norman bench end, so that this is
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 39
no doubt part of the dormitory also built by Flory about 1 1 20. Only the north end wall of this dormitory remains above ground ; it was one of the largest in the country, measuring 204 feet long by 44 feet wide.
All the conventual buildings of this abbey were on the north side instead of being, as is more usual, on the south ; but otherwise the arrangements corresponded with those of most Benedictine abbeys. The cloisters, built about 1276 by Nicholas Thorne, which are in very fair preservation, are to the north of the nave of the church, with the chapter house leading out of them on the east, and the refectory and kitchen, of which nothing is now left, on the north side. On the west was the abbot's lodging.
The Church had three towers, two at the western end and a central one. The latter was built in the time of Thomas Fyndon, about the year 1300, but only part of the bases of the piers are to be seen. The north-west, or Ethelbert's tower, as it was called, must have been a very fine example of late Norman work, judging from prints of the eighteenth century. It suffered at the hands of the wiseacres of the town in 1822, who had it battered down as some parts were considered unsafe!
The great gateway has already been mentioned. To the south of this were the guests' and pilgrims' buildings, which are still in a good state of preservation. They include a hall, a chapel, a kitchen, and other rooms under the hall, and were probably built by Thomas Fyndon about the end of the thirteenth century.
West of the refectory was the stone court, and bound- ing this on the west side was the abbots' great hall, of which some of the undercroft may still be seen, as the old remains have been carefully preserved and worked into the present building. It was built in the latter half of the thirteenth century. The undercroft is now used as the college museum, and the hall above as the library.
From a Cottonian manuscript in the British Museum,
40 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
" The Customary of S. Augustine's Monastery at Canter- bury," which has been transcribed for the Henry Bradshaw Society by Sir E. Maunde Thompson, we gather the valuable information as to the dimensions of the various buildings. This manuscript is supposed to have been written during the latter years of Abbot Ralph de Bourne, 1330 to 1334, who succeeded Thomas Fyndon, one of the largest builders and restorers ; so that with the exception of the chapter house the buildings should have been at that time complete and in good condition. The list is given as follows : —
Length of the church, in ulnae =333 feet.
Width of church with "chambers," 24 ulnae = 72 feet.
Width of the nave without chambers, 10^ ulnae=34 (?) £ feet
Length of Chapter House, 29 ulnae = 87 feet.
Width of Chapter House, n ulnae=33 feet.
Length of dormitory, 68 ulnae =204 feet.
Width of dormitory, 14 ulnae 2 feet=44 feet.
Length of Domus Necessariorum, 64 ulnae =192 feet.
Width of Domus Necessariorum, 8 ulnae =24 feet.
Length of studies, 34 ulnae and 2 feet =104 feet. ,
Width of studies, 3 ulnae and 2 feet=u feet.
Length of Refectory, 33^ ulnae=io3^ (?) feet.
Width of Refectory, 13! ulnae=4i£ feet.
The length of the Cloister is missing, also the width, but these are respectively 1 20 feet and 115 feet.
Taking these measurements, and comparing some of them with the ruins of the present day, it will be seen that the length of the church does not include the Eastern, or Dygon's chapel, which extends about another 42 feet.
The chapter house would be the one built by Hugh Flory, as the present ruins measure three feet wider, or 36 feet, and would be that finished about 1380. There are not any remains above ground of the domus neces- sariorum, which may have been annexed to the east wall of the dormitory.
To the south-east of the abbey church, in the field belonging to the hospital, is a large mound, on which was
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 41
once the campanile, or bell tower, but when it was erected is not recorded — probably by one of the Norman builders, as it certainly existed before the middle of the thirteenth century. It must have fallen into disrepair, for there are numerous bequests and gifts towards the expense of rebuilding it in the latter half of the fifteenth century.
We are indebted to another manuscript in the Caius and Gonville Library, also published by the Henry Brad- shaw Society, for a description of some of the bells as they existed about the middle of the thirteenth century. There were four bells in the campanile, two larger and two smaller; there were four, two larger and two smaller, in the tower, " ante gradus," which would probably mean the choir steps, and therefore the central tower ; and four in " the tower," probably Ethelbert's tower. There were also several named bells, but which tower they were in, or whether some of them were the same as mentioned above, it is impossible to say. There were two Absolons (major and minor), two Richards (major and minor), two " Bubanti," two Pilcheres, one Matheus, one Wulfric, one Resecodt, and " Sunesdeies belle." Thorne says that Thomas Ickham, in 1358, gave three bells, Austin, Mary, and Gabriel, the latter costing 42 marks ; and before his death in 1391 he gave four bells in the choir (the tower " ante gradus "), two great bells in the campanile, and two in the tower at the end of the church. So it would seem that many of the bells mentioned about a century before had been re-cast. Two other bells were also given, one by Adam Kingesnoth and one by Abbot Peckham.
The abbey possessed three common seals, though there are originals or casts of at least another ten belonging to various abbots, priors, treasurers, etc., of the monastery. The earliest is a common seal of the abbey of the eleventh century, and represents Augustine robed in the " pallium," half length or seated ; the figure is indistinct, and bears the inscription : — " Sigillum Sancti Augustini Anglorum Apostoli." The second seal bears on one side the figures
42 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
and names of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the inscription : — " Hoc Sigillum factum est Anno Primo Ricardi Regis An- glorum." On the other side, Augustine is seated in a stone chair, in full archbishop's robes, and the legend reads : — " Sigill Ecclesie Sancti Augustini Cantuarie Anglorum Apostoli." Diameter 2| inches. The third seal, a large one measuring 3^ inches in diameter, represents on one side what may be the abbey church and the baptism of Ethelbert, with figures of St. Peter and St. Paul under canopies above, with the legend " Sigillum Monasterii Beatorum Apostolorum Petri et Pauli Sanctique Augustini Anglorum Apostoli Cantuarie." On the other side is Augustine seated under a canopy with figures on either side of him, and the inscription " Anglia qt. Domino Fidei Sociatur amore hoc Augustino debetur patris honore."
The arms of the abbey were: — Sable; a plain cross, argent.
At the time of the surrender the net yearly revenue of the monastery, as given by Dugdale in his Monasticon, was only £1,274, though it possessed over 19,000 acres of land. In the year 1544 Henry VIII. acknowledges having re- ceived plate, jewels, and other ornaments, but what could have become of all the valuables which must have be- longed to such a stately and magnificent house it is hard to say. No doubt, as the funds grew smaller and smaller under the later abbots, property of all sorts was sold or given as security, but of relics of saints, of which there must have been a fine collection, no mention is made.
The library at the end of the fifteenth century consisted of 1,784 MS., according to a catalogue in the possession of Trinity College, Dublin ; but at the time of the Dissolution the number was not over 600, and of these some 150 have been traced by Dr. James as being in the hands of various public libraries and colleges.
From some minutes from the ancient records in the Chamber of Canterbury we read, under the year 1 542 :
ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY, CANTERBURY 43
On the dissolution of St. Augustine's Monastery, the city are supplied with building and paving stones from its ruins, on paying a trifle to the gate keeper !
Its ruins of to-day only too well shew to what an extent quarrying operations went on. In addition to this, certain persons were granted letters patent by James I. in 1618 to search any of the dissolved abbeys for treasure supposed to have been hidden, and there is ample evidence that St. Augustine's was thoroughly searched, and the graves rifled of anything valuable.
In reviewing the history of this once magnificent abbey, it is impossible not to feel regret that the fabric of an institution, founded at the time of the revival of Christi- anity in England, should have been so ruthlessly swept away.
Pathetic indeed must have been the scene when the abbot and his companions visited for the last time the " Corpora Sanctorum," and finally handed over to the despoilers the shrines and relics of the saints, the tombs of kings, and all that they and their predecessors had held sacred for nearly a thousand years.
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT
BY AYMER VALLANCE
iMONG other researches into the life and manners of the past, none is more engrossing than the study of mediaeval religion. Nor is it possible to form a correct picture of the appearance of a pre-Reformation church without realis- ing the most prominent features of its interior, to wit, the rood on high and the loft and screen underneath it. To piece together, then, the scattered records avail- able on this subject in respect of Kent, is to supply a neglected chapter of no mere provincial interest, but one that, since the county was, from the days of Augustine, the seat of the primatial See of English Christianity, belongs to the history of our country at large.
Wills of individuals, inventories of church goods, and churchwardens' parish accounts are, necessarily, mines of information on the subject ; but the most valuable and unimpeachable documents of all are the buildings themselves. The importance cannot be over- rated of studying at first hand the actual fabrics, all the more precious because, like the Sibylline books, they are, alas! a perpetually diminishing quantity year by year, owing to unscrupulous falsification on the part of pretended " restorers," as owing also to reckless oblitera- tion of ancient landmarks to gratify the reigning whim and fashion of the moment.
44
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 45
Among these the most mischievous is that of festal •" decorations." The bad taste of piling " decoration " upon what is already itself supremely ornamental might be passed over with the contempt it deserves but that it is fraught with active harm. That being so, language fails to condemn it in terms strong enough. Within living memory these temporary decorations used to occur at Christmas only ; but nowadays so favourite a pastime have they become with irresponsible ladies and curates, that they are indulged in at Easter, Ascension Day, Whitsunday, and Trinity Sunday as well, the full height of extrava- gance culminating in the autumnal orgy of the " Harvest Festival." The consequence is that screens and other ancient woodwork, which have survived the wrack of four or five centuries, are now threatened with rapid extinction ; mediaeval mouldings and carvings — it is no exaggeration to say it — literally bristling with nails and tin tacks, the wood itself being bruised and chipped and pierced and split in a way that no householder would dream of treating the furniture in his own private dwelling, nor suffer anyone else to treat it. It is lament- able to reflect what all this involves ; so many pairs of unskilled hands being let loose to work what damage they may with hammer and nails half a dozen times per year, year after year, to the woodwork which is the venerable heritage from our fathers. The disastrous process, if and wheresoever persisted in, can end in only one result — the disappearance from ancient churches of the inestimable treasure of their wood fittings, which, once destroyed, can never, for all time, be made the same again that they were.
But, not to anticipate, attention must briefly be directed to the genesis of the rood-screen. To go back, then, to the fourth century, when Constantine (whose mother, Helena, a consensus of tradition declares to have been of British birth) sat on the throne of the Roman Empire. For hardly before
46 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
that date, when the fury of persecution was spent, did Christians, hiding hitherto in caves and cata- combs, feel secure enough to set apart, above ground, buildings of their own for congregational worship ; but well-nigh from that time onward may two main and broadly divergent types of church be said to have co- existed. The first is that of the Basilica, in its origin, of course, entirely Pagan ; but such that came to be adopted as present ready to hand, and also as preferable to the classic temple, because of the latter's necessary and intimate association with heathen worship. But so soon as ever the Christian religion became, so to speak, rooted in the soil and spread hither and thither, it asserted itself by evolving, out of its own necessities, a different form of building, peculiarly appropriate to its own spiritual instincts. The original type continued, while at the same time the newer, which for distinction may be denominated the mystery type, developed.
In the latter, as contrasted with the Basilican, the interior, instead of being thrown open to afford a vista from end to end, was subdivided, its sanctuary screened off by at least one partition from the western or more public portion of the building. The mystery type is of universal rule from the White Sea shore to Abyssinia, both in the Orthodox Church and in all the separated communions of the Eastern rite ; and although the same uniformity is not to be found throughout Western Chris- tendom, in our own land, at any rate, the mystery ideal prevailed during centuries prior to the Reformation. The fullest expression of the type in the West is embodied in the cruciform church, with its structurally- bounded quire ; but to this same type no less the simple parallelogram, under one continuous roof, such as is common in parts of Wales, for example, belongs, seeing that there it would always be divided athwart its length by a screen from side to side of the building.
Ecclesiastical ceremonial is so conservative a thing
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 47
that very often the antiquity of a usage is testified by its survival in slightly altered form ; rites now peculiar to occasions or seasons of extra solemnity having formerly been of daily occurrence. Such innovations as did from time to time gradually obtain recognition had a twofold tendency, not towards total abolition of old customs, but, on the one hand, curtailing them for practicability in ordinary workaday use, and, on the other hand, relegating them in their fulness to rarer opportunities ; at the same time attaching to them a mystical signification not originally theirs. Thus, the vesting of a priest at the altar, which must have been the general practice in old days before vestries existed, has now become stereotyped into a ceremony peculiar to a bishop when he formally pontificates. Again, to take an illustration that directly relates to the present subject, another custom, itself now extinct, but in mediaeval times of invariable observance in Western Europe, was that of completely shutting off the high altar from the nave by an enormous sheet or curtain suspended in the quire, from the first Sunday in Lent to the Thursday in Holy Week. In England this custom had become an institution at least as far back as the reign of King Alfred, who, shortly after his great victory over the Danes in the year 878, ordained a fine of one hundred and twenty shillings as the penalty for tearing down a Lenten veil in church. The bare fact of such a severely repressive measure being called for proves that a per- manent veil must have been already long since obsolete, when the temporary one could be so determinedly resented that there were persons who would not scruple to drag it down by force, unless restrained by the terrors of the law. No doubt, however, this solemn Lenten veiling represented what had been the more primitive mode of separating, all the year round, the sanctuary from the body of the church. And so, when later usage restricted the veiT to Lent only, a permanent substitute, in the shape of a screen, with a door to pass through it, at the quire
48 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
or chancel entrance, still kept up the ancient tradi- tion.
From the first planting of Christianity in Kent, or even from the days of King Alfred, to the eleventh or twelfth century, leaves a long gap to fill ; but, unhappily, no authenticated specimen of a chancel-arch of pre- Norman date survives in the county. The few Norman chancel-arches yet standing show, for the most part, the straitness of access to the chancel maintained. The size of the chancel-arch is indeed a fair index of date. " Early Norman churches," says Rev. G. M. Livett, " had small arches like that remaining in West Farleigh Church " ; whereas in later Norman work the arch is of increased size. Thus, at St. Margaret's-at-Cliffe, near Dover, built probably about 1160, "the architect . . . with admirable foresight of the incoming fashion of erecting a rood at the entrance of the chancel, designed a wide-spanned and tall chancel-arch." Further examples show what developments took place and what alternatives to wooden screen-work were resorted to in the separation wall itself. At Frindsbury Church, near Rochester, is a round-headed chancel-arch, whose narrow dimensions no less than its plainness denote it to be an early Norman work. Here the solid wall-spaces to left and right of the opening have, in after times, been pierced and squints inserted, to reduce the barrier between nave and chancel. In a later and more florid example of Norman, namely, that of Barfreston Church, the chancel- arch is flanked by a lower one on either hand. These side arches are recessed, but, if at any time pierced by smaller openings, can never have been wholly open into the chancel, since the dimensions of the latter and of the nave do not correspond ; the chancel being internally 13 ft. 7 in. wide, the nave 16 ft. 8 in. However, from blind arcading to pierced is only one step that would follow by easy and natural evolution. A later and very curious example of a mural screen, which seems to
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 49
date from about the middle of the fourteenth century, is in a church near Folkestone, Capel le Feme, where in the wall between the nave and the chancel is an open arcade of three two- centred arches, springing from octagonal shafts. The upper part of the wall is per- forated above the central arch, which is 8 ft. 6 in. high, by another, 6 ft. high by 5 ft. 6 in. wide, of depressed round-headed form. The outer order of its moulding shows traces of colour. The purpose of this opening, as Rev. G. M. Livett has pointed out, was obviously to afford a setting for the rood and its accompanying figures. The fact of a quantity of Norman material being used up with later in this arch looks as though the whole existing arrangement had immediately succeeded the original one of a Norman arch dividing nave and chancel. Four moulded stone corbels on the western face of the wall at the level of the summit of the labels of the triple arcade mark the position of the brackets that once carried the now demolished rood-loft.
Rarely though such screens as that at Capel le Feme occur, it finds in some sort a parallel in the case of Westwell Church. Of the thirteenth century, this example is of earlier style than the last named, but it was not so certainly intended for a chancel-screen. It extends from the northern to the southern arcade, and itself consists of an arcade of three trefoil-cusped arches on two cylindrical columns, 16 ft. 10 in. high, including the capitals. Viewed from the nave, with its pair of circular panels, one in each spandril on either side of the central arch, the crown of which is higher than the two others, the effect is that of a homogeneously designed screen ; but, from the east, the tall shafts, rising almost to the level of the spring of the groined roof, seem rather a contrivance adopted from the struc- tural necessity of helping to sustain the thrust of the heavy -chalk and stone vaulting, unsoundly built, without adequate abutment for its support. That there was a E
50 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
timber rood-loft erected subsequently, and that it traversed the building from wall to wall, is proved by the entrance to the rood stair being in the wall on the north, in a line with the stone screen. It is also evident from the sawn-off stumps and traces of connecting beams inserted between the columns of the stone arcade, that the latter was at some time or other adapted to rood-screen require- ments ; but whether it should be regarded as having belonged, from the outset, to the category of rood-screens is open to doubt. At the ruined church of Reculver, across the chancel opening was an arcade, if not itself Roman, at any rate on Roman foundations, which, more- over, comprised an apse. Again, at the little Romano- Saxon church of Bishop Justus and King ^Ethelbert, built between the years 604 and 616 at Rochester, the foundations, which lie principally beyond the area of the present Cathedral at the north-west corner, indicate that a similar colonnade stood between the body of the building and its apsidal eastern portion. The same features have been traced at Lyminge Church (founded in 633), and in the ruins of the ancient Church of St. Pancras, Canterbury. Possibly, therefore, the Westwell arrange- ment would represent rather a survival of the Basilican type, or — shall I say? — a compromise between the latter and the mystery type of Christian church. The whole subject opens up a train of interesting questions well worth investigating, and such that make the wanton destruction of Reculver Church at the hands of early nineteenth century vandals all the more deplorable as the severance of a link with the past which posterity could by no means afford to lose. The two columns from Reculver recovered, thanks mainly to the instrumentality of the late Mr. Roach Smith, were subse- quently set up in the open, hard by the north side of Canterbury Cathedral. Their face is indented with holes for the insertion of transverse bars or beams, just like the columns at Westwell. However, in any event, the
NORTHFLEET CHURCH.
DOORS REMOVED BETWEEN 1836 AND 1847 FROM THE ROOD SCREEN. After a Drawing, dated 1828, by William Twopeny.
MEDLEY AL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 51
instances of the peculiar structures at Reculver, Westwell, and Capel le Feme are, all three, uncommon exceptions ; nor, indeed, was it after such precedents as theirs that the development of the rood-screen proceeded. By far the more usual plan in Kentish churches, as also in fact throughout England, was that of a single chancel-arch in stone, its entrance guarded by an openwork screen in wood.
Now, whether or not the most ancient screens did consist, as it has been conjectured, of interlaced withes of wattle or trellis-work, it is not possible, at this dis- tance of time, to tell. At any rate the earliest extant instance in the country, that at Compton, Surrey, bears no trace of such origin ; but is, on the contrary, an unmistakable attempt to render in wood the salient architectural features of stone construction — the column and the arch. The county of Kent contains in situ no parish church rood-screen of an earlier date than that at Northfleet, which is of the fourteenth century. From the appearance of its lintel-beam I am disposed to believe that this was a case where the rood, instead of being placed aloft on a separate beam at a higher level than the screen, was fitted directly on to the top of the screen itself. On the other hand, from the thirteenth century fragment of carved oak beam at Doddington, it looks as though, at the church there, the rood-beam was detached and quite distinct from the structure of the screen. A painted beam, also of the thirteenth century, at Minster in Sheppey — if it was indeed the rood-beam — would seem to imply that the same arrangement existed there in the Priory Church of St. Sexburga.
But however this may have been is a detail. The one invariable object that rose conspicuous above all else, above rood-screen and above the later rood-loft also, the object from which — because of its crowning and surmounting both — both derived their name, was the great rood itself. Unless this be understood no true
52 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
conception can be formed of the aspect of a mediaeval church in England, nor will it be possible to appreciate the immense difference that the loss of the rood and its adjuncts has wrought. The date of its earliest introduc- tion belongs to the immemorial past, but countless references to it in ancient documents, and particularly in wills containing directions for the testator's body to be buried in such or such a church before the Cross, or bequests to be devoted to its service and beautifying, bear witness that, from at least the end of the fourteenth century down to the closing years of the reign of Henry VIIL, in every church or chapel in the land the rood was as indispensable almost as the font or the altar. Called by various names, such as the high cross, great cross, greatest cross, high crucifix, great crucifix, good rood, high rood, and great rood, it always pourtrayed Christ, with outstretched hands attached to the cross, the usual accompaniments being a figure of the Blessed Virgin on the one side and of the Beloved Disciple on the other. Instances are not unknown where other figures beside were added to this group, as at Canterbury Cathedral, where there were represented on the beam some of the Heavenly Hierarchy ; and from a bequest to " the All Hallows light on the Rood-loft " at Stone, by Dartford, and another for two lights " to stand before the images of the holy Rood at Tudeley and All Hallows," the two being thus coupled together, it would seem as though at both places, Stone and Tudeley, the emblematic image of All Saints was placed on the rood-beam together with the rood itself. But normally the great crucifix stood between the Mary and John only. The scale of the figures would be determined by the dimensions of the particular building in which they were set up, but it cannot be very far wrong to assume that, except in quite small churches, they would not be under life-size. Not to be dispropor- tionate, in the case of large buildings they must have exceeded life-size.
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 53
Occasionally, where the opening between the nave and chancel was low, as in the instance of the Norman chancel-arch at Frindsbury already referred to, the rood must have been placed over the summit of the arch, with the nave's eastern wall for background. Sometimes, again, as possibly at Foxdwich, the top of the arch was boarded in and the surface so formed made a setting for the relief figures. But, beyond doubt, the preference was for detached figures, the rood, with its flanking images, reared in majestic isolation and silhouetted against only the receding perspective of the quire. So commonly, indeed, was this plan adhered to that often, in order to give effect to it, the chancel-arch was rebuilt, as in the case of Gillingham Church, on a larger scale than theretofore ; or was even done away with altogether in some churches, as at Milton by Sittingbourne, and likewise at Rainham.
Among earlier references testamentary proof is furnished of the existence of a rood in each of the following parish churches at, or shortly after, the dates specified: — At Snargate in 1368; Cliffe-at-Hoo in 1413; Kingsdown, near Wrotham, in 1421 ; Ash next Ridley in 1423-4; Lydd in 1430; Cowling in 1434; Higham in 1441, and at Minster (Sheppey) in the same year ; Wouldham in 1442 ; Halsted, Offham, and St. Mary's, Sandwich, in 1444 : all these being prior to the middle of the fifteenth century. From 1450 onwards, until the attacks on images began in 1538, mention of roods occurs with such frequency that to recapitulate here the individual cases would make an unduly long cata- logue. Of the numerous legacies on record the wording does not always make it plain whether the testator meant to provide for fresh work to be carried out, or for the upkeep of an existing rood and its votive lights. Thus, in the case already cited, of Cliffe-at-Hoo, in 1413, the rector, Nicholas de Ryssheton, makes a bequest to the images of the crucifix and Blessed Mary ever virgin
54 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
and St. John Evangelist above the loft; in 1499 "our lady upon the beam " at Ash next Ridley receives a bequest from William Hodsole ; and in 1523 the "good rood" at Milton by Gravesend is likewise remembered. There are, however, examples enough of explicit instruc- tions for the erection and decoration of roods. Thus, in 1441 a bequest was made for the painting of the cross (already mentioned) at Minster in Sheppey; in 1465 towards the painting of the image of the crucifix and of the images of St. Mary and St. John in St. Margaret's Church, Rochester; in 1471 towards the painting of the crucifix at West Wickham, on condition of the work being done within a year; in 14/2 for the painting of the "greatest cross" in Hythe Church; in 1491 "to the Rode werks of the Church" at Gravesend, and, in the same year, " to the reparacion and gilting of the Cross " in East Peckham Church ; in 1 506 " to the gilding of the image of the crucifix and of Blessed Mary and St. John Evangelist " at Brenchley ; in 1513 for the making of the image of the crucifix at Capel ; in 1517 "to bye a crucifix with a pictor of our Lord thereupon and to be set in the midst of the rood-beam " at Ryarsh ; and some time between the twenty-fifth and thirty-first years of Henry VIII. (i.e., between 1533 and 1539 — the exact date is uncertain, because the manuscript pages contain- ing the reference in the parish accounts have become displaced) the churchwardens of Hawkhurst were, at their request, refunded for the amount expended by them in the gilding of the rood " now fynyshed and donne."
The rood and its attendant images were all alike, and each individually, shrouded in solemn wise with close-drawn veils during Lent; coverings as to whose colour there does not seem to have been any uniform rule. Of the " Rode cloth for Lent," which, in the third year of Henry VIII. (1511-12), is known to have been in existence at Edenbridge, the colour is not recorded ; but at Minster in Sheppey in 1536 there were "2 Rode
a 3
5 a
« aj
z <
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 55
clothes, one of crimson velvet and another of red sylke." From the general inventory taken of church goods in Kent in 1552, it appears that at that date there were several further examples, which had not been got rid of; as, for instance, at Brabourne, where a cloth, of colour unspecified, is recorded, " that laid over the Rood " ; while amongst a set of white hangings for the rood and rood- loft at Postling, obviously the covering for the rood in Lent must be included. At the same date also was " one cloth for the Rood somtyme painted," at Downe Church ; and another, for the same purpose, of " stayned linen " at Chislehurst ; but whether the item, also at Chislehurst, of " one piece of red velvet for the Cross on Good Friday " refers to an additional cloth for the same pur- pose as the foregoing examples, I very much doubt. The Lenten covering for the great rood must not be con- founded with another object, which is among the commonest items in lists of mediaeval church goods, to wit, the "cross cloth," seeing that it was a distinct thing and that it served a totally distinct purpose. The " cross cloth," then, also sometimes called a " banner cloth," was a flag or streamer of coloured stuff, embroidered or painted, attached to the processional cross. The custom, alluded to in the opening words of the ancient hymn, Vexilla regis prodeunt, yet survives in the very conservative rites of the Dominican Order, the velum crucis varying en suite with the liturgical colour of the day. Repre- sentations of such a banner are familiar enough, it being usually pourtrayed hanging from the cross-staff held by the Agnus Dei, and in the hand of our Blessed Lord in His Resurrection
One of the strangest records, judged by modern English notions, is that which tells of a pair of silver shoes fixed to the feet of the Christ upon the rood at St. Andrew's Church, Canterbury (inventory dated 1485). But this is not without its counterpart in the image, itself a rood, though always called the Holy Face of
56 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Lucca. It is said that to swear thereby was a favourite oath of King William Rufus ; in which case the Luccan image would be at least as old as the middle of the eleventh century. Its feet are encased in silver shoes, it is said, to preserve them from being worn away by the repeated kisses of pilgrims. The crucifix at Lucca is clothed in a long robe down to the ankles ; it has the head crowned with a lofty crown, and is, moreover, collared and girdled with richly-jewelled ornaments. Another phase of this kind of homage prompted the boy, St. Edmund Rich, who subsequently grew up to be, from 1234 to 1240, Archbishop of Canterbury, when at Oxford he placed a ring on the finger of Our Lady's sculptured image in the University Church. To be touched, however — as who is not ? — by this beautiful story of an undergraduate's pure devotion, is to admit the principle which underlies the one manifestation of the same instinct as also the other alike. Beside the practice of decking images with crowns and jewels, that, too, of dressing them up, even to the extent of changes of garments for festivals and ordinary days, is of no mean antiquity, and albeit frowned on in Rome itself, has continued in many places in Catholic countries down to the present time.
However, it is not often that one finds among Kentish records such explicit mention of the practice as the following bequest, dated 1523, to Rochester Cathedral : — " To the Rood at the Jesus altar, two yards of velvet, price 205., to make a garment." The inventory taken of church goods in Kent in 1552 mentions as then existing at Chilham Church a " cotte " for the rood, made of green satin of Bruges. This mantle would, of course, be forfeited under the commis- sion of i6th January, 1553, in accordance with the plan agreed upon between King Edward VI. and his council on 2 1st April of the year preceding.
Among Kentish Roods at least three had the repu- tation of wonder-working, to wit, those at Ashurst and
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 57
Gillingham Churches, and, mare famous than either, that at the Cistercian Abbey of Boxley. Whether this last, commonly known as the Rood of Grace, was actually the High Rood itself, is not clear. The name, analogous to that of Rood of Pity, which meant what is now called a Pieta — that is, a representation of the Dead Body of Christ, laid, before the entombment, in the lap of His sorrowful Mother — possibly suggests that the Rood of Grace was not strictly a crucifix, but a figure of our Lord in some other stage or aspect of His Passion. Indeed, if Lambarde is to be taken literally, the situation of this venerated image would necessitate its being quite dis- tinct from the High Rood. In his Perambulation of Kent, Lambarde relates how the Rood of Grace was, in the first instance, brought to Boxley, a stray horse, with the crucifix tied to its back, walking into the Abbey Church and halting at a certain pillar there, whence no power availed to move the image. At the same time it must be remembered that at the date of its destruction Lambarde himself was not two years old. He had no personal knowledge, therefore, but had to rely on what he learned of the affair from others. And such was his animus that he was only too eager to retail every scrap of scurrilous gossip — the more preposterous the fable, the more effective for his purpose — that might be calculated to bring contempt and ridicule upon the practices of the old religion. Lambarde does, however, so far exonerate the monks of Boxley as to own that this mediaeval Frankenstein's creation was none of their devising, but a figment due to the ingenuity of a certain mechanic taken prisoner by the French during the wars of English aggression. Nor was it inconsistent with the temper of a people who, on a false charge, could condemn Jeanne D'Arc to be burnt alive in the holy name -of religion, to be unscrupulous enough to condone other kind of fraud in things sacred. Lambarde says: —
58 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
The cunning carpenter of our country compacted of wood, wire, paste and paper, a rood of such exquisite art and excellence that it not only matched in comeliness and due proportion of the parts the best of the common sort, but in strange motion, variety of gesture, and nimbleness of joints, surpassed all other that before had been seen ; the same being able to bow down and lift up itself, to shake and stir the hands and feet, to nod the head, to roll the eyes, to wag the chaps, to bend the brows, and finally to represent to the eye both the proper motion of each member of the body, and also a lively, express and significant show of a well -con tented or displeased mind ; biting the lip and gathering a frowning, froward and disdainful face when it would pretend offence ; and shewing a most mild, amiable and smiling cheer and countenance when it would seem to be well pleased.
An interesting reference to this image occurs in a letter (undated, but of some time between 1515 and October, 1529) addressed by Archbishop Warham from his manor at Otford to the Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Wolsey. Writing at the suit of the Abbot and brethren of Boxley, who were being sore pressed to pay a levy demanded of them by the Crown, the Archbishop endeavoured on their behalf to obtain from Wolsey some respite and forbearance to enable them to discharge it. "Forasmuch as the . . . place is poor and much seeking is thither to the Rood of Grace from all parts of this realm, I should be loth," says the Archbishop, " if I might choose, to interdict the place or to put the fruits of the same under sequestration." And he concludes by expressing his confidence that, if only the delay he entreats be granted, the Abbot will not fail to fulfil his obligations, "or else it were a pity that he should live much longer to the hurt of so holy a place, where so many miracles be showed." The Abbot and brethren of Boxley are known to have owed money to a predecessor of Archbishop Warham's, Cardinal Bourchier, whose will, executed three days before the testator's death at the end of March, 1486, cancels the debt and directs that the debtors' acknow- ledgment of the same be handed back to them. The above incidents combine to prove that the Rood of Grace
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 59
cannot have been the lucrative property which its enemies made it out to be.
The will of one William Stubbs, in 1529, contains a bequest of I2d. to the Rood of Grace, but whether is meant thereby the image itself at Boxley, or another one of the same style in the testator's own parish church at Borden, near Sittingbourne, is not clear from the context.
Stow's Annals record the demolition of the Rood of Grace in the year 1538. It was on Sunday, 24th Feb- ruary ; the occasion, the delivery of a sermon at Paul's Cross by John Hilsey, successor in the See of Rochester to Cardinal Fisher, victim of judicial murder in 1535. The new bishop had been selected because, as ex-prior of Dominicans, he could safely be relied on to sustain, with all the obduracy of a renegade, a policy in every way subversive of his predecessor's. Hilsey's party, then, after the Rood of Grace had been torn from Boxley, and, in the words of J. R. Green, "paraded from market to market and exhibited as a juggle before the court," caused it finally to be brought to St. Paul's for the express purpose of giving point to the episcopal discourse. Whereupon such was his lordship's invective, and to such a pitch of ribald frenzy did he stir up the passions of the mob, that then and there they fell upon the image and broke it, nor, the preacher egging them on, did they desist until they had entirely plucked it to pieces.
The Rood of Grace appears to have been equalled very nearly by the rood at Ashurst. According to Lam- barde's account, it was reported of the latter image that it " did by certain increments continually wax and grow, as well in the bush of hair that it had on the head, as also in the length and stature of the members and body itself." Although this rood of "rare property" was, as Lambarde expressly states, no longer in existence at the date of his writing, 1570, still he records that in old time it rendered the place, else obscure, so glorious that
60 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
"many vouchsafed to bestow their labour and money upon it." In this connection may be quoted the will, dated 1524, of Sir Martin Cristofer, who, referring to Ashurst, directs "that the coat with all such brooches and rings as be thereon set before the Blessed Rood, remain during my life, and after my decease I will that they be bestowed to most honour of God and the said Rood by the discretion of Mr. William Waller and the wardens of the said church for the time being."
In contrast to the two above-named, the rood at Gillingham was, if less astounding as a portent, a medium rather of active beneficence ; and, as such, became an object of " common haunt " and pilgrimage. However, the corpse of a man unknown being washed ashore at Gillingham and buried in the churchyard there, notwith- standing Our Lady, conscious of his having died in a state of grievous sin, had already caused the body to be rejected from the precinct of her church at Chatham, brought with it so great defilement that thenceforward the Rood of Gillingham " that awhile before was busy in bestowing miracles, was now deprived of all that his former virtue . . . This tale," continues Lambarde, "received by tradition from the elders, was long since both commonly reported and faithfully credited of the vulgar sort, which, although happily, you shall not at this day learn at every man's mouth (the image being now many years since defaced) yet many of the aged number did lately remember it well."
The above words were written in 1570, by which date Queen Elizabeth having been twelve years on the throne, it is not to be supposed that any considerable number of roods had escaped the fate of the wonder-working ones. It was naturally upon these, as affording the most vulnerable point, that the onset first commenced.
But not to anticipate, in the later middle ages, the normal setting or substructure of the rood would comprise a screen surmounted by the wide platform and gallery of
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 61
a rood-loft. The latter extended without exception across the chancel opening, and also in a large number of churches across the entire width of the building from wall to wall. Under these circumstances the parochial church screen and loft constituted a far more imposing structure in proportion to the size of the building than the corresponding screen or screens were known to do in any cathedral church. In fact the parish church rood- loft, in as far as it fulfilled in its own person the functions of both the pulpitum and the rood-screen of monastic or cathedral interiors, became the equivalent of the two combined. Such, then, was the aspect and such the importance of the rood-loft at the final stage of its development. It would almost seem as though there were periodic impulses, fashions, waves, currents — call them what one will — which successively controlled the direction of church-furnishing liberality and trained it into this or that channel at one period, and at another period into another. Thus, in the twelfth century a Judaising movement introduced seven-branched candle- sticks, the fourteenth century is distinguished for the production of Easter sepulchres, and the fifteenth century, or rather the last half of it, for having inaugurated the rood-loft-building movement. There is no question but that lofts had been erected previously to the reign of Edward IV. ; yet it was certainly then that the greatest spread of the demand occurred, which practically trans- formed ecclesiastical interiors throughout the land, causing new lofts to be erected in all churches which had not a loft already, and, in churches which had, on a larger scale of magnificence than theretofore.
A series of bequests and other records, ranging from the early explicit mention of a " seller " for Cliffe-at-Hoo Church in 1413 down to 1521, enable the approximate dates of between twenty and thirty Kentish rood-lofts to be ascertained. It is known incidentally that the church of Kingsdown, near Wrotham, had its loft (camera crucifixi) in 1421 ; and although in the case
62 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
of some others — as, for instance, of Ruckinge, in 1480, Hadlow in 1510, and Swanscombe in 1517 — the bequest says merely " to the rood-loft," without specifying whether making or maintenance is intended, in other cases, again — e.g., those of the bequests for beam or loft- painting — it may usually be assumed that the woodwork referred to must have been some time, maybe months, maybe years, prior to directions being given for its colour decoration. Thus, at Shorne, between the date of the bequest towards the erection of the rood-loft in 1485, and its painting in 1491, is an interval of six years ; the painting of the high beam there being provided for in the meantime, in 1490. On the other hand, a bequest for the new painting of the rood-loft at Wingham in 1508 speaks of the rood-loft itself as new at that date. The date of the bequest to the rood- loft painting at Elham is 1464 ; Hythe, 1472 ; Sitting- bourne, 1473-4; and both Burham and Cowden, 1511. At Cuxton Church the painting of the rood-beam was provided for in 1503. A new loft was made for St. Mary's, Sandwich, in the year 1444 or thereabouts. In 1468 is recorded a bequest to the new seller before the crucifix at Cudham Church ; in 1471 towards making the rood-loft at Throwley ; and another in the same year for the same purpose at Frindsbury, followed two years later by another bequest to the making of the new beam there. A testator making a bequest " to the new work of the rood-loft in the two aisles" of Ashford Church in 1472, it is evident that the principal or central section of the loft there had been already provided for, if not actually erected and in regular use. A bequest in 1521 "to the making of the Rood-loft at the North Door" at West Wickham, probably refers to a similar extension of an existing loft across the north aisle there. In the case of six other churches explicit bequests were made toward the work of rood-loft making: thus, Murston in 1473; Westerham in 1474, "ad operacionem de Rood
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 63
loft"; and Seal in 1492. As for Higham, in 1500, a bequest runs : " I will that the masters of the work of the rood-loft have 20 shillings towards the edifying of the same " ; and a benefactor of St. Nicholas', Rochester, in 1 502, by will leaves a like sum " to the making of the rood-loft according to the patron " (pattern) " of Richard Sutton there." At Tunbridge Church either procrastina- tion on the part of the authorities, or some other obstacle, appears to have hindered unduly the erection of a rood- loft — at least, so one would be led to suppose from the phrasing of two bequests towards this purpose. In 1483 one, John Byschop, senior, leaves 35. 4d. to the work of the rood-loft in Tunbridge Church " when they make it " ; and on 6th April five years later, i.e., in 1488, John Fane, another testator, more peremptory than the former, leaves " 10 marks to the structure of the rood- loft thereof, on condition that the churchwardens build it within two years." Not that this was an altogether unprecedented stipulation, only, in this case, taken together with the previous testator, Byschop's, direction, it seems to acquire extra significance. On the other hand, that must have been an early loft which, in Stone (by Faver- sham) Church (itself now in ruins), had already come to require repairing in 1474. The same remark applies to the " seller of the Holy Cross " at Yalding ; towards the repair thereof a benefactor made a bequest in 1496. So, again, must the rood-loft in Eastry Church have been of considerable age by 1511, seeing that at Archbishop Warham's visitation in that year it was found to have fallen, owing to neglect, into so serious a condition of disrepair that the churchwardens, as responsible for the scandal, were peremptorily ordered to amend it before the next Christmas, under pain of excommunication. Another incident of the Archbishop's visitation was that the churchwardens of Hartlip presented one John Adowne as owing £6 to the painting of the rood-loft in their parish church. The churchwardens' accounts of
64 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Smarden Church show that 1508 was the date of the rood-loft being erected there.
And now as to structure and plan. I have already remarked on the fact of early wood screens imitating the appearance of stone masonry. Nor was it otherwise with the later screens. To the last they always reflected the architectural style of the period. But, underlying the outer ornament, the fundamental construction was of the soundest and most severely workmanlike — genuine timber framing of oak or chestnut, joined and held together by wooden pins or trenails ; while braces in pairs, meeting together at the upper extremities, form the arches of the open fenestration. Each of these arches, or bays, is subdivided into vertical lights by moulded mullions, or muntins, which are grooved from the top downward to the level of the springing. And into these grooves are fitted panels of pierced and cusped ornament, constituting by a combination of very simple units in each bay the appearance of a Gothic traceried window, with batement lights in the head. The dignified severity of design, as exemplified in the Eastchurch and Hernhill screens, and as contrasted with the vivacious changefulness of pattern in that at Stalisfield, is of itself sufficient to prove the late date of the last-named example. There must be a difference of some sixty or seventy years between the respective types. In some cases miniature embattled transoms, introduced into the heads of the fenestration, render one of the most notably English characteristics of Perpendicular. The variation of the positions of the transom alone is an important factor in the general composition. Thus, in the fifteenth century screen at Eastchurch (see illustration) the transom makes a single horizontal line right across the screen from north to south. This monotony is avoided in the later and more developed design of Shoreham screen, by the simple resource of breaking the transom into steps (see illustra- tion). The same device is to be seen in the very handsome
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S c
u. c
c
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 65
panelling (unhappily out of its proper position) at Lydd Church. Another device is to give the transom an oblique slope, like an obtuse chevron, upward to the centre line of each bay, as at Boughton under Blean and at Stalisfield (see illustration) ; a still further variety being obtained, as at Hackington, by making the lower extremity of each gradient terminate in an arc. In Kent the pierced tracery in the openings of screen-work, intended, of course, to be looked at from either side, is almost invariably treated on the obverse and reverse alike. The only exception I have found occurs in the southern portion of the screen at Appledore, which (see left hand of illustration) has just such a flat and unfinished appearance on its eastward face as one would see in Midland screen-work. The lower part of a typical Kentish screen from the cill to the ground (the average height being about four feet) generally consists of rectagonal panels with cusped and traceried ornament inserted in the heads. Along the rail or along the foot of the panelling, sometimes both, a band of geometrical carving runs, formed usually of a series of quatrefoils within circles, squares, or lozenges. In a line with the moulded styles, which separate and frame the panels below, the minor muntins run up above the rail, and meeting the braces are mortised into them. The principal muntins are solid posts in equal lengths, supporting the massive lintel, which is very commonly cut into at the top for housing the transverse joists of the platform of the loft. These floor-joists are sturdy, cubical timbers that have no need, like the narrow slabs of to-day, to be held in position by herringboning. Corresponding in form with the braces which keep the posts and lintel together, other braces, starting from the uprights at right angles to the line of the screen, serve to support the overhanging floor, and also as a frame- work for the wooden vaulting to be attached to, itself copied from the groining or fan-tracery of stonework. F
66 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Structurally this system of superficial vaulting is a feature to which exception might be taken, but so rich and handsome is the effect it produces that its inherent weakness is readily overlooked. The original wooden vaulting is complete in the screens at Shoreham and at Lullingstone ; that at Hackington is a modern restora- tion, well done, but unsatisfactory, because it does not project nearly far enough eastward and westward. From the screens in Boughton under Blean, Eastchurch, Herne, Stalisfield, and Tong Churches the vaulting is lost. There is another and plainer type, the rectagonal screen, to which those at Appledore, Bapchild, Chislehurst, Gillingham, Harty, Minster in Sheppey, Newenden, West Wickham and Wrotham belong. In such cases a cove would form the only visible connection between the screen and the loft over it ; for their system of rectagonal compartments does not admit of vaulting. In no case of arched openings would the intermediate spandrils ever have shown, being entirely masked behind the projecting vaulting. Therefore wherever the original vaulting has perished it is no reconstruction, but an absolute stultification of the whole of the authentic part that does remain to fill in the empty spandrils with ornamental pierced tracery, or to produce the moulding or boutel on the face of the upright posts above the point of the springing in a vertical line to the top. Both these mistakes have, I regret to note, been made in the so- called " restoration " of the fine screen at Stalisfield Church.
And next, as to the upper part of rood-screens above the lintel. The ends of the joists were not exposed dentil-wise, but mortised or housed in the breast- summer and encased in a broad and manifold series of parallel mouldings and carved insertion bands about the breast-summer. The latter, because it has come to be, since the removal of the parapet, the uppermost residuary portion of the structure, is commonly spoken of as the
.-MS
HtJBTH CORHET? Of.^OOP
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 67
cornice, which, of course, in strict accuracy, it is not. And here, not to generalise without sufficient warrant, I am reduced to describing the particular instance of Shoreham screen, because, though far from complete, it happens to have been less mutilated than any other of the kind remaining in the county. The handsome modern rood-screen in Rodmersham Church embodies some fragments of the original breast-summer ornaments, made up into a cornice, but the new work, as a whole, fails to reproduce the Kentish type ; while the sixteenth century screen at Lullingstone, complete all but the loft, is purely exotic. To those who are acquainted with the rood-lofts and screenwork of other parts of the country there is nothing unfamiliar about the beautiful band of vine ornament filling the alternate trough and swell of a wave -line, neither about the narrower strip of conven- tional Tudor leafage ; both of which favourite motifs occur in the breast-summer decorations of the Shoreham screen. But what does seem to me to be a distinguishing feature of the composition is the relative proportion of carved ornaments and of simple horizontal mouldings, the latter notably preponderating. And herein, to my mind, consists the high aesthetic quality of this particular rood-screen. The small amount of enrichment, as compared with the largeness of the space occupied by plain, straight lines, is, I take it, not a matter of accident, but, on the contrary, of deliberate purpose in the setting out of the design. The carving is not in excess of what is required to relieve and embellish the horizontal mouldings ; the latter are just dominant enough to set off to most telling advantage the grace and delicacy of the sculptured bands. That these more elaborate portions may be appraised at their full and proper value the best possible, foil is afforded in the severity and reticence of the rest. The whole expanse is so broad that, had it been too much covered with carved ornament, the effect would have been that of overloading and fulsomeness;
68 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
had there been all straight mouldings, on the other hand, monotony. The method of dealing with the insertion band is one admirably suited to the material The carving itself is executed, not on a flat plane, but on the convex face of a segment-shaped slip. This, being pierced as well as modelled, was then fitted into the grooved edges of a corresponding concave space. The contrasted effect of light and shadow produced by the piercings and the dark hollow behind them is the same as that of deep undercutting in stone.
As to the fashioning of the galleries or lofts them- selves, any peculiarity of form and detail that may have distinguished those in Kentish parish churches is now practically a lost secret, on account of the scantiness of the clues available. The height of the parapet of the rood-loft might, of course, have varied somewhat with individual circumstances; but, anyhow, it would have to be such as to afford adequate protection to its occupants, and avoid the risk, on all ordinary occasions, of their slipping over the edge and falling to the ground below. A remnant of a loft parapet in the shape of a narrow scrap of oak, 28^ inches high, preserved, I know not by what happy chance, projects from the surface of the south wall in St. Alphege's, Canterbury, opposite to the rood-stair there. Battered and broken as this fragment is, on examination can be discerned signs of a late-Gothic buttress ornament on the front of a style, which has a chamfered edge like a framing to sunk panel-work. That such a scheme of decoration as this may have been adopted for other rood-lofts, and even further elaborated with carved niches or tabernacle work, seems to be implied in the case of Smarden by an entry in the inventory taken of church goods there on 1 1 th December in the sixth year of Edward VI. Brenchley Church rood- loft is said to have been handsome, to judge by the sculptured pieces of woodwork, free and vigorous in execution, remaining there in 1 880; the upper rail
P* v A-
= ELEVATION- Of- SOU
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 69
" ornamented with carved work of scrolls and figures, supporting a panel in which is to be seen the date A.D. 1536" — a remarkably late example. From the entry already quoted, and from others analogous, it would appear to have been the practice in the reign of Edward VI. to deface the too attractive beauty of rood- lofts with a coating of uniform paint or whitewash, texts being substituted for the imagery and illuminated legends of former days. This is known to have been done in the case of the rood-loft at Faversham, as well as at Smarden, the expenses of the operation being actually met by the sale of other of the church's property — candlesticks in the first case and a chalice in the second — a proceeding that scarcely differs in kind from the forbidden inhumanity of seething a kid in its own mother's milk. At Godmersham, as recorded in 1552, a painter was employed to paint the rood-loft all over for the purpose of defacing it. As for Smarden, as though this treatment was not deemed to have produced a result drab and depressing enough, the whole structure of the rood-loft was hidden bodily under a bare sheet, with no ornament except the Royal Arms displayed upon it. This Puritan cloke is not to be confounded with the veil which, in bygone Catholic times, was always employed during the penitential season of Lent to cover up rood- lofts, eminently belonging as they did to the same category of ornamental objects as pictures and images. Thus, in 1547, in the first year of Edward VI. nineteen ells of white cloth, which had hitherto served for the above purpose in Smarden Church, being then no longer required, were sold by the churchwardens. " Three white hangings for the rood and rood-loft," still remaining at Postling in 1552 (one linen hanging of the rood-loft being mentioned as already stolen 'when the church there was broken into and robbed previously to the above date), were probably the suit of veils or shrouds for Lenten use. The rood-loft's Lent covering is again
70 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
entirely distinct from the textile decoration, in dyed or painted canvas, which in a number of churches where the loft itself was only a plain and unadorned structure, hung thereon as a permanency for enhancing the ornamental appearance of the same. An interesting example of this occurs in an inventory taken in 1485 of the church goods in St. Andrew's, Canterbury, to wit, " Item i steyned cloth hanging afore the rodeloft with the byrth of Cryst," that is to say, with a representation of the Nativity painted upon it. Inventories and old documents are not always as lucid on the subject as they might be ; but there is no mistaking the " staynyd clothe for the rode lofte" at St. Dunstan's, Canterbury, in 1 500 ; nor that which stretched along the entire length of the rood-loft's frontage, from end to end, at Minster in Sheppey in 1536; nor the elaborate votive hanging at Ashurst in 1524, before mentioned, as being decorations of the same character. The particular occasion of " one honest drapery " (pannus — the same word as that yet embodied in " counterpane ") " to hang in front of the gallery of the crucifix " in Kingsdown Church, near Wrotham, to the making of which a moderate sum was left in 1421, may have been similar; but that of " two old blue cloths of canvas for the rood loft" at Bexley in 1552; of two painted cloths belonging to the rood-loft, and another " upon the rood loft with Jesus " — probably the monogram of the Holy Name — " in the midst," at Lee in the same year is doubtful. Neither is the identification of some other items of "cloths before the Rood" absolutely certain. An inventory of church goods at Edenbridge in 1511-12 mentions, apart from, and in addition to, the rood-cloth for Lent, "a cloth to hang before the Roode." Now, whatever the last named may mean in this case, it is clearly not the same as the veil of the rood itself. I am inclined, therefore, to suppose that on the analogy of a light before the rood, i.e., in the presence of the rood,
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 71
so too a cloth before the rood must not be identified with the shroud of the crucifix, but with the hanging attached at the foot of the rood (whether during Lent or other seasons) to the coping of the rood-loft and suspended therefrom over the gallery front. If this be correct, then there is little difficulty in assigning the cloths so named to the respective category of the rood- loft's covering for Lent, or, in default of explicit statement to the contrary, for decorative use during the remainder of the ecclesiastical year. Thus, among the possessions of St. Andrew's, Canterbury, in 1485. occurs the item of a " lynnen cloth to hang afore the crosse in the forechirche " (nave) " tempore X Lme," that is in Quadragesima or Lent-time ; at Maidstone Church, according to an inventory of the first year of Edward VI., was " i piece of linen for Lent cloth that served before the Rood"; and at Eltham Church, in 1552, remained " i painted cloth that was wont to hang before the Rood in Lent." All three of the above were, I submit, Lenten coverings for the rood-loft ; while two more items, of the same date as the last, as follows: — "a cloth to hang before the Rood," sold already for -repairs at Hayes Church, and " one stained cloth to hang before the Rood " at Shadoxhurst, have reference to hangings for the rood-loft's adornment.
Evidence is wanting that the custom prevailed to any very large extent in Kent of decorating screenwork with gold and colours. Among known exceptions it may be mentioned that the rood-loft and also the east- ward side of the pulpitum at Rochester Cathedral were painted, the former by bequest in 1503 ; and traces of colour are to be found on the wood of the rood- screenwork at Appledore, Boughton under Blean, Brookland, Hernhill, Westwell, and Wingham ; and, if not now, until recently were also on screenwork at Maidstone, Ruckinge, and St. Laurence, Thanet. The three last examples are not indeed of screens
72 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
actually standing between the chancel and nave, but it follows that in any church where the side-screens were thus richly decorated the rood-screen itself, as paramount, would not have been outdone, nor treated in an inferior manner. The St. Laurence screenwork is unusual in Kentish examples, inasmuch as its panels exhibit remains of figure-painting. The rood-lofts which existed in the fifteenth century in Elham, Hythe, Shorne and (perhaps) Sittingbourne Churches were painted ; and so, too, in the sixteenth century, were the rood-lofts at Burham, Cowden and Hartlip. The new painting of the new rood-loft at Wingham in 1 508 ; of the " high beam " at Shorne in 1490, and of the "rood beam" at Cuxton in 1503, were expressly provided for in wills; and since in such documents the word " screen " is not used, but always the " rood-loft " is spoken of, it may be assumed that the two were regarded as constituting one and the same structure, and that consequently the decorative painting of the rood-loft would not be carried out to the neglect of that of the screen beneath it. The ascertained number, then, of painted screens in Kent may be put down at nineteen — to wit, those at Rochester Cathedral (2) and at Appledore, Boughton under Blean, Brookland, Burham, Cowden, Cuxton, Elham, Hartlip, Hernhill, Hythe, Maid- stone, Ruckinge, Shorne, Sittingbourne, St. Laurence, Westwell and Wingham Churches. The parclose above referred to at Maidstone, as also that at Chislehurst, was embellished with relief encrustations in the form of stars, cast in lead (after the manner of some of the ornaments at Ranworth, Norfolk) ; but I have not met with any Kentish screen decorated with gesso modelling (such as exists at Cawston, Norfolk). Two cases, however, should be recorded, namely, those of Shoreham and Tong Churches, where certain details of the carved pattern, instead of being executed throughout in wood, like the rest of the screen, were reduplicated in casts of hard plaster, presumably original. At Shoreham these plaster portions,
TONC CHURCH. KENT.
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MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 73
though threatened to be replaced with new woodwork, still (April, 1906) remain; at Tong Church they have already been supplanted.
The proportions of Kentish screens, the churches themselves not being remarkable for high pitch, are generally somewhat low and squat ; in which respect they assimilate rather to the Welsh and South-west country standard than to that of East Anglia or the Midlands.
An interesting question arises on the subject of foreign influence, and the extent to which it may, or may not, have affected the ornamentation of Kentish screens. I have noted particularly two panel-head patterns occur- ring, together or separately, at Graveney, Hackington, Headcorn and Newington (near Sittingbourne). Of these, one design is of doubtful origin ; but the other, with interpenetrating ogee arcading, blossoming into fantastic finials at the top, the sides crocketed with crockets sprouting out below, as well as above, the point of intersection, is unquestionably foreign, either Flemish, or, more likely, German. Now, the situation of all of the above places (except Headcorn) is within easy reach of a waterway: Hackington via Fordwich, on the Stour; Graveney, close to the mouth of the Swale ; Newington, at no great distance from either Milton Creek or the Medway mouth. Whereas, in an inland screen, that at Stalisfield (see the right hand lower corner of the illustration) a clumsy copy is introduced, no doubt of native product, lacking the crisp piquancy of the foreign sculpture at Newington and of another specimen, identical in design, but of provenance unknown, in the Museum at Canterbury. What is not less significant, in the Stalisfield version, out of deference to English taste, the crockets below the point of crossing are omitted. A late version of English traditional Tudor flower ornament occurs at Shoreham, and the same pattern again, worked out almost to degeneracy, at Westwell. In both cases this design is on the rail, in both cases applied, instead of being cut
74 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
out of the solid, as it should have been, had the carving been executed on the spot, rather than brought thither in ready-made lengths. My argument, then, is that if the larger and heavier timbers were moulded and otherwise shaped and prepared, and also the joinery carried out in situ, it is practically certain that some of the smaller and more delicate ornaments, which would present but slight difficulty of transport, were executed by skilled craftsmen elsewhere. The recurrence of the same patterns in different screens shows that, unless they were the work of peregrinating carvers, it was customary to produce certain stock detail pieces in quantities, and to distribute them here and there, as occasion required, from workshops established in con- venient centres at home, like Hoode's at Faversham, Button's at Rochester, Beleme's at Canterbury, and Gyllam's at Ashford ; or even, as the un-English character of some specimens indicate, abroad.
The only instance in Kent of a screen which, though made to an Englishman's order, is patently foreign throughout its length and breadth, is the Flemish one at Lullingstone Church. Nor is it difficult to account for its presence there. The donor was Sir John Peche, squire of the place, and closely connected also with the courts of Henry VII. and VIII. during the time that a large staff, selected from the cleverest artists in Europe, were engaged on the work of the chapel wherein, at the eastern extremity of Westminster Abbey Church, King Henry VII. built himself a burial-place. Sir John, therefore, with his many opportunities, might well have met and commissioned some foreign craftsman to carry out a work required for the church at the threshold of his home.
Boughton under Blean and Herne screens contain, and, further, in the woodwork at Brenchley Church there exists, or up to 1880 yet existed, details which betray the growing influence of the Italian renaissance. Again, panelling,
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 75
somewhat of Francois Premier character, is to be seen in the south aisle at Newington, near Sittingbourne ; but whether or not it ever formed part of the rood- screen or rood-loft there is no means of knowing.
The interesting feature of stone corbels for carrying the rood-loft occur at Appledore (see illustration), Capel le Feme, Chartham and Milsted Churches. At the last- named, furthermore, as also at Eastry, Eynesford, Monkton, Postling and Selling, are other corbels for the rood-beam or the lintel of the screen. At Fordwich and Igtham Churches are remains of the oak rood-beam or screen-lintel embedded in the masonry and cut away approximately to the level of its stone or plastered surface ; while at Meopham an oak beam, or part of a beam, moulded and carved, which might originally have been the rood-beam itself, lies there under the tower of the parish church.
And now, to consider the question of the purpose and uses of the rood-loft. In support of the commonest opinion, viz., that the Gospel used to be read from the top of the loft, one unimpeachable witness is forthcoming from an incidental reference in the inventory made at the Dissolution of Wingham College in the first year of Edward VI. This document, in enumerating among other things a certain processional cross of silver-gilt, and enamelled with Mary and John, states that the ownership of it is in dispute, and then goes on to recite the circumstances. The college had had possession of the cross until the Feast of Corpus Christi, four years before, on which day " when the -priest had read the Gospel in the Rood-loft? and was returning with the said cross, the churchwarden called the clerk aside into the parish chancel, and took away the cross from the possession of the college. From that time it remained in the keeping of the parish officers, until the Feast of St. John Baptist last past (? Midsummer Day, 1547), when it was delivered into the hands of James Hales,
76 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
sergeant-at-law, for him to settle the point at issue impartially between the rival claimants. Both parties, however, were left in suspense, and nothing had as yet been done in the matter.
Thus, as far as concerns the Collegiate Church at Wingham, the evidence of the Gospel being on a great festival sung from the rood-loft is conclusive. But yet, in spite of it, the practical difficulties in the way of lofts ever having come into use generally for this or any other liturgical ceremony are enormous.
In his Acts and Monuments Fox relates how, in the last year of the reign of Queen Mary, an officious justice, named Drayner, alias Dragener, out of spite against the Rector of Smarden, bored holes in the panelling of the rood-loft there, in order that from the vantage-ground on the top, himself unseen, he could command a full view of the assembled worshippers in the nave ; and if he judged the comportment of any persons during mass- time to be unsatisfactory, he would make it the pretext to trouble and punish them very sorely. Hasted calls this a ridiculous story, but if there be any truth in it, its bearing is important on the question as to whether or not the Gospel was read from the loft, in Smarden Church, for one. The rector and Drayner were admittedly on bad terms with one another, and, there- fore, had the former had occasion, when officiating, to ascend into the loft and found the justice prowling there, he would assuredly have sent him about his business. Or, supposing, on the other hand, Drayner had chosen to delay going up into the loft until after the Gospel was over, his entering the rood-stairs must then have been in the sight of the whole congregation, and, so, putting them on their guard, would have defeated the very purpose of his tyrannical espionage. The logic of the case, then, seems to me inconsistent with a common custom of reading the Gospel from the rood-loft ; nor
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 77
indeed, is there any evidence that such a usage did exist in other than monastic and collegiate churches.
Incidentally rood-lofts were used by those whose office it was to attend to the beam-light or lights, and also perhaps for the convenient storage of ladders for enabling the rood itself to be reached for its Lenten shrouding. At Fordwich Church in 1501 a "hutch," or chest, " strongly bound with iron and a key thereto," is recorded to have been situated up in the rood-loft. At Woodhouse local tradition during the last century was that the rood-loft gallery had served for keeping the parish bows and arrows in in olden times. In the rood-loft in St. Mary's Church, Sandwich, about the middle of the fifteenth century, " we know," said the late Canon Scott Robertson, " that organs were placed, and the parish paid various sums to musical priests for playing these organs." The same authority suggested that the word " procession porch " which he found mentioned in connection with the rood-loft at St. Mary's may have meant that, to make room for these organs, the platform of the loft was widened in the middle and carried forward on supports, which would give the appearance of a porch over the entrance to the chancel. I have met with such projections at Carlisle, Chester, Hexham, Newark, and in Germany in the Dom at Halberstadt, but no feature of the sort in Kent, except in the Flemish rood screen at Lullingstone Church. Anent the " procession porch," a sidelight is obtained from another Kentish will. One, John Bokeland, in 1473 directs to be buried in Stone Church, near Dartford, before the rood, and also that his executors do pave with tiles " the procession way from the chancel door," that is, of course, the door in the rood-screen, "unto the west door." This would cover the principal section of the track of the procession, which, on Sundays and Great Feasts, preceded the Solemn Mass, and, after making the appointed round of the church, before entering the
7 8 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
quire at the introit, made a " station " in front of the great rood.
Unfortunately, the universal destruction of rood-lofts throughout the county has deprived one of the evidence that might have served to determine the question of their function ; but if anything may be inferred from the analogy of Welsh lofts and the local traditional use, it would seem that their main purpose was to provide accommodation, not only for musical instruments, but also for the increasing numbers of choir-singers, whose voices the development of prick-song, or part-singing, as distinguished from the more ancient plain-song, or unison, attracted to its performance. For music could not but occupy a foremost place among the arts of peace, which the nation began to find itself free to cultivate, as soon as the enjoyment of prosperous and settled times gave it a chance to recover from the paralysing shocks of the Black Death and the absorbing waste of foreign and dynastic wars.
Now, Kent having been evangelised as far back as the seventeenth century by Augustine and his fellow- missionaries from Gregory of Rome, was, as compared with many other parts of the country, not brought thus early within the Christian jurisdiction, possessed of a long-settled ecclesiastical organisation; as witnesses the fact of its comprising, alone of the counties of mediaeval England, two bishops' seats within its borders. Its churches, of ancient foundation for the most part, had undergone repeated rebuildings and enlargements, until they had attained, so to speak, to a state of complete finality or ever the great era of rood-loft building dawned. Churches erected entirely in the Perpendicular period, like that of Maidstone or Ashford, for instance, or of Eastchurch in Sheppey, are quite exceptional. But pre-Perpendicular churches, having been constructed in accord with the requirements of their own times, which were satisfied with rood-lofts, if any, on a modest
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 79
scale, were not convenient for the accommodation of the structures of a later period. When, however, 'the demand eventually did arise, it was imperative for enormous rood-lofts to be set up somehow or other. And so, if it was too vast an undertaking that in every parish a new church should be reared from the ground on a loft- comprehending plan, the already existing buildings must perforce be altered in such wise as to take in these lofts.
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The latter alternative was in fact that which was usually adopted ; and hence a peculiar feature in a number of Kentish churches, to wit, the malformation of the eastern- most arches of the nave arcades. It was not, indeed, the only way ; but, when other devices failed, needs must that recourse was had to it.
The ugly feature in question has not, it is true, escaped the notice of the observant, yet, strange to say,
8o MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
its full significance has but recently become appreciated. It was evidently lost upon the late Sir Stephen Glynne, for one. Thus, in 1859, in his notes of Biddenden Church, he says : " The arcades of the nave are early English . . . The fourth arch next the chancel is not strictly an entire arch, but three parts of a very wide one." Again, in 1871, of Lynsted Church, having mentioned its " pointed arches on tall octagonal pillars " between the nave and aisles, he remarks : " the east arch being incomplete and without respond." Again, in his account of Doddington Church, he writes : " The third arch is not wholly complete, but about three-quarters." The above extracts precisely describe the phenomenon of which, the way having been paved by the late Canon Scott Robertson in his description of Staplehurst Church in Volume IX. of Archceologia Cantiana (1874), a learned ecclesiologist, Dr. Francis Grayling, was first to arrive at the only rational and completely satisfactory solution, namely, that, wherever it occurs, the easternmost arch of the nave arcade (or of both arcades, as the case may be) has, subsequently to its original erection, been reconstructed and heightened on its eastern side, so as to make room for a rood-loft to run underneath it at right-angles, affording headway for persons to pass, unobstructed by the overhanging arch, from one part of the loft to the other. The point is explained by Dr. Grayling in an article on the old parish church of his native town of Sittingbourne, published in Volume XXIII. of Archceologia Cantiana (1898). Therein, after setting forth the successive changes that have taken place in the fabric, the writer goes on to show how, in the fifteenth century, " the eastern respond of the nave arches was on each side removed, and the arches above were rendered rampant by large fresh voussoirs cut to a different sweep." The date of this change cannot be determined exactly, but Dr. Grayling suggests, with reason, that it occurred not long previously to the year
MEDI/EVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 81
1473-4, when a certain testator is known to have left directions to provide for " one bastard roffe or painting the rode-loft " in Sittingbourne Church. By the way, what precisely is meant by a " bastard roof " I am not sure ; but, judging from the context, which seems to show that the testator was minded to do honour, one way or other, to the rood, I believe the reference must be to a sort of inner lining of carved or painted timber, otherwise called a " celure " or " sperver," to form a canopy of peculiar dignity over the head of the rood. If such an ornament ever did exist in Sittingbourne Church, and managed to survive so late as 1762, it must certainly have perished in the destructive conflagration on I7th July of that year. The only example I know now existing in Kent is in Rainham Church, and dates from the reign of Henry VII. During the same king's reign provision was made by will for much the same kind of canopy in another church — e.g., in 1488, " to the making of a new ceiling over the rood loft " at West Mailing. A special ceiling over the rood-loft in St. Martin's Church, New Romney, existed up to 1550, when it was removed and sold at the dismantling and razing of the building in that year.
Barely seven years after the bequest, which would seem to have contributed to leave a mark, as before described, on the fabric of Sittingbourne Church, another is on record, which, perhaps, was responsible for results more momentous in the neighbouring church of Lynsted. One, William Finch, of that parish, by will dated 1st December, 1480, directs: "Item lego versus facturam unius arche de novo faciendi in ecclesia parochiali de Lyngsted, 135-. $d." How interesting it would have been if only William Finch had specified the exact site of his intended new arch! Lynsted Church contains no single arch that can certainly be identified as the one built in accordance with the terms of this bequest. The easternmost arch of the nave arcade on either side was
82 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
obviously rebuilt about that time, but this makes a pair of arches, whereas the testator distinctly says one. The discrepancy could easily be accounted for if it may be assumed that the cost of the corresponding arch being rebuilt was met by other means. Anyhow, the coincidence of date is so striking that it is scarcely an over-rash surmise that the reconstruction referred to was occasioned by the arcades having to be adapted to the exigencies of a new rood-loft.
More remote from the high road than Lynsted is Doddington Church, where the distortion is accentuated by an impost on the easternmost pier of the arcade, which impost is 3 ft. io£ in. higher than the level of the opposite one on the western pier of the same arch, and the imposts on both sides of the two other bays of the arcade. At Sittingbourne and Lynsted, Cranbrook and Goudhurst, there is both distortion and a rood- stair as well ; in numbers of churches a rood-stair is the sole remaining evidence of the former rood- loft, there being no distortion ; but wherever the latter does occur, whether in the one arcade in a church of nave and one aisle, or in both the arcades in a church of nave and two aisles, it affords conclusive proof that the loft formerly extended from side to side of the building. So infallible a token, indeed, this is, that, in the case of Doddington, where there is no rood- stair nor any other sign beyond the distortion of the arcade, this distortion alone is sufficient of itself to settle the fact of there having been a loft, and of its having reached right across the church, beyond all dispute. At Erith Church the distortion in the south arcade (the north arcade there being only a modern addition of 1877) is so exaggerated as to amount to a downright deformity. And, yet, neither in this nor in any other instance would it have shown at all as an objectionable feature, so long as the rood-loft, which was the cause of it, remained in position. It is only the removal of the latter that has
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 83
exposed the deformity in all its uncouth nakedness ; but even so the defect is of value as a memorial of the rood-loft departed.
An alternative plan, just as effective for the purpose of a passage and far less injurious to the fabric, was to tunnel openings through the walls of the arcading ; but to do this was, of course, practicable only where the abutment onto the nave's east wall afforded space enough in the arcade's easternmost spandril. Examples of this method occur at Milton next Sittingbourne and at Rainham in the one arcade of the churches there, and in both arcades at Boughton under Blean, Dartford and Teynham Churches.
As to the approach from the floor of the church on to the top of the loft, in a great number of instances it was provided for by a flight of stone steps, rising within the hollow of the wall, sometimes enlarged into a sort of annexe for this purpose, as at Bapchild, Boughton under Blean, Eastling, Lynsted, Rainham and Westwell ; or set in a turret projecting from the outer wall of the building, as at Cranbrook, Dartford, Goudhurst, Hawkhurst, and Rodmersham. Sometimes, again, the stair-turret occupies an internal position, as at Wrorham and Hythe. The latter instance is extremely remarkable, possibly unique, since there — as Rev. T. G. Hall, formerly Vicar of Hythe, has demonstrated by careful measurements — is a tapering structure, rising above the height of the wall externally, to be capped by a conical roof, and, in fine, such that has every appear- ance of belonging to the peculiar class of Irish round towers. In that event it must have existed long before the present church into which it has been incorporated. The lower part of the tower on the outside has actually been pared down to a reduced scale and refaced with ashlar on this revised plan, in order to bring its battering outline into harmony with the vertical walls of the new surroundings. The interior then only required to be
84 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
fitted with a spiral staircase and doorways pierced in the shell to convert the whole into a rood-stair turret. A notable coincidence of Hythe and Wrotham Churches is that in either case a passage branches off from the rood-stair and runs across to the opposite side in the hollow of the wall above the summit of the chancel-arch.
A further peculiarity is to be seen at Wouldham, where the rood-stair, starting in the north wall, turns south- ward and is carried on a stone bridge between two walls (not so high but that one can look over the top of them into the body of the church below) across the aisle to the north arcade wall, through which it opens into space where formerly the rood-loft used to stand.
The situation of the rood-stair is indifferently on the north or the south side ; but the entrance to it is usually from the nave or an aisle of the nave. But there are instances where, as at Cuxton, Erith, Great Chart, Herne, Meopham, Newchurch, Newington (near Sittingbourne), St. Peter's (Thanet), and Rainham, and also apparently at Appledore, the entrance led up from the east side of the boundary between nave and chancel. The openings are almost always narrow, often inconveniently so ; for they seldom exceed two feet in width ; in many cases they measure less. The jamb is not unusually provided with a couple of iron hooks or staples for hanging the door withal, but it is rare to find the original doors, or any part of them, remaining, as is the case at Shoreham. The doorway itself may be square-headed with a horizontal lintel, or it may be arched in semi-circular, two- centred (this being the commonest variety), shouldered (this being of rare occurrence, as at Rodmersham), or four- centred form. The typical doorway is remarkable only for its extreme plainness, and it seldom occurs that any example is met with which displays greater elaboration than a continuous bevel, arrested at the base by a diamond- pointed stop on either side. The rood-stair door at St. Alphege's, Canterbury, is an unusually rich example (see
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 85
51ALPHECJ CHWOIM,
illustration). The head is crowned with a graceful ogee label, with fmial and crockets, the lower extremities terminating in sculptured heads. The date of this work appears to be about the middle of the fifteenth century.
Churches which have no rood-loft nor vestige of ancient screenwork in situ yet contain a valuable record if the rood- stair remain. The height from the ground to the cill of the upper doorway of the rood- stair is so important a detail that it may be said to supply the key of the position. For, though it is true there might have been a step up or a step down onto the loft platform from the stair-head, the tread of the opening at the top
surely brings one to within six or seven inches of the original level of the loft floor. The measure of this altitude ascertained, the rest follows. Even the spacing of the screen into bays offers no insuperable difficulty, this factor being one which is necessarily dependent on the width measures of the interior of the building.
Now, from the fact that there are churches (those of Doddington and Tong among the number) having undoubtedly at one time contained rood-lofts, but yet no discernible means of access to the same, it is evident that there must sometimes have been only wooden stairs for this purpose ; structures which, either through the perishableness of the material or through having become of no further use, on the destruction of their rood-lofts, have disappeared, leaving no record behind them. It seems to me, however, just possible that the " very
86 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
antient spiral staircase of wood," mentioned by Hasted in 1799 as being in Monkton Church in his day, may have been the original rood-staircase there, more especially as no trace whatever of a stone rood-stair, of common occurrence elsewhere in the neighbourhood, is to be found in the building. True, Hasted states that the wooden staircase was in the tower at the west end, but his words do not necessarily certify that it was fixed in that position, nor, even though fixed, that it must have belonged there. Moreover, as everybody knows, church towers not unfrequently serve as receptacles for miscellaneous lumber. From the simple fact, therefore, that Hasted thought it worth while, contrary to his wont, to chronicle the existence of such an object at all, I am inclined to suppose that it was one which, lying about in the place, and its motive open to speculation, appealed to the historian from its strangeness as a curiosity not less than from its indefinite age. I put forward these suggestions as to its identity merely for what they may be worth. Unfortunately the staircase in question at Monkton has long since ceased to exist, so that the real truth of the matter can never be ascertained now.
In Mediaeval England, as is well known, it was a recognised institution that before the great rood in every church a light or lights should be burnt, towards whose maintenance it was, among our Catholic forefathers, a common custom, and such that had not died out when the Reformation overtook it, to make presents and bequests in money and in kind. Innumerable records of such gifts exist, as the wills of individuals and the parochial accounts of churchwardens abundantly illustrate.
Sometimes these benefactions would be provided for by charges upon landed property, of which two instances will suffice. Thus, Thomas Hadlow, by his will dated 4th August, 1527, left very explicit directions for the endowment of a rood-light at Seal : —
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 87
I bequeath a pound of wax to be thereof a taper perpetually every year to be made and to bum in the Rood-loft before the Rood. And the said taper every year to be new-made against the Eve of the Nativity of our Lord. And the same taper to be kept at the costs and charges of them which shall inherit and occupy a piece of land of 4 acres called Barneffelde. And for lack that and if it fortune that the said taper be not every year new-made that then I will the Churchwardens of Seal shall stress and strain for the said sum of money for the said taper.
Eight acres of " lands appertaining unto the Cross light" of Fordwich Church were producing in 1501 an annual income of 33. /d. towards its maintenance. Various testators would make bequests of cows, sheep, or corn for the same purpose. Thus, in 1515 a testator left a cow to find the means to maintain a light " to burn before the Rood from the second peal to Matins till High Mass be done, and from the second peal to Evensong till Evensong be done, for evermore," at Hailing; and in 1517 another left two sheep to endow a light in perpetuity before the rood-loft at Higham. There was yet another form of offering peculiarly characteristic of the times. In order to appreciate its significance one must remember that in the long centuries during which cane-sugar was unknown in Europe (the West Indies not being discovered until 1492), the principal ingredient avail- able for sweetening purposes was honey. At the same time a constant supply of vegetable wax was in requisition for votive candles. Apiculture, then, was bound to be an industry of far greater moment to our mediaeval fore- fathers than it is with ourselves at the present day. In early parish accounts it is no uncommon circumstance to find entries of rents of wax, discharged at first, no doubt, in kind, in later days commuted to their equivalent in money, as having been paid to the churchwardens or to the guilds which attended to the light before their respective patronal statues. A case in point is furnished by the accounts of St. Dunstan's, Canterbury. Again, a testator in April, 1407, left to the churchwardens of Bexley all his bees, the profit arising from them to be
88 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
devoted to maintaining three wax tapers perpetually burning in the church there. True, the rood-light is not of the number specified, but, anyhow, the nature of the bequest is significant. " Church bees " were owned by the parish of Fordwich, the churchwardens' accounts in 1532 showing for how much the resultant honey was sold, while the wax, it is to be assumed, was reserved to make tapers for the church withal.
The most usual manner of setting lights before the rood appears to have been on pricket spikes in the midst of bowls or basins of latten, pewter or lead ; the bowls, as at Brookland and Chilham, being fixed in a row along the beam or top of the parapet of the loft, or sometimes, perhaps, flanking the rood, on the same beam with it. Of such bowls as many as one hundred are known to have existed at one time at Chilham, twenty at Bromley, six at Cuxton, seventeen at Eastwell, twelve at Little Chart and at Midley, four at St. Paul's, Cray, twenty- four at North Cray, and sixty at Westwell. The mention of candlesticks and stocks — that is, prickets or sockets mounted on a stem — is less common, possibly because the use of bowls was safer under the circumstances. The thirty candlesticks at Bethersden in 1552 were more probably bowls, like the preceding examples. A single candlestick, however, was provided for the rood-loft at Burham, Dartford and Ryarsh ; while at Minster in Sheppey (inventory 1536) there was "a beam candle- stick and 6 bowls of latyn to the same." A " square taper" was set before the rood at Dartford in 1530; and at the close of the previous century a " torch " was endowed for the same purpose both at Horton Kirby and at Seal.
The " rare example " of the seven metal candlesticks one reads of as remaining on the screen at Wrotham is a myth. It would be all but incredible that one solitary specimen should have survived from pre-Reformation days, but a complete set of the mystic number seven
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 89
should not fail to arouse suspicion as being at once too happy and too conventional not to have been engineered. I found every one of the seven candlesticks, tested at close quarters, to be absolutely modern, of white deal, turned and gilt, not with leaf of gold nor anything that so much as glitters, but with dull paint of one of the cheap powder compositions advertised for simulating the effect of the precious metal.
Another plan of setting lights in front of the rood was a metal framework, called a " branch " or " herse," suspended from the nave roof. Chandeliers of this kind existed at the churches of Chislehurst, St. Dunstan's, Canterbury, and Milton by Gravesend, and at the now demolished church at Beckenham, the branch at the last-named holding five, if not more, tapers. In other places, as at Lydd and at Milton by Gravesend also, in 1531, there hung a "tryndill," or coiled length of wax taper ; and if, which I conclude, a sliding weight was attached, or some other self-acting contrivance for unwinding the end of the trendal as it was gradually consumed, the rotatory move- ment, which the name seems to imply, would be explained.
Lastly, as further bequests prove, in some churches a hanging lamp did duty before the rood. Such was the case at Ash next Wrotham, Bromley, Cowling, Elham, Hailing, Higham and Ryarsh Churches, and also, as shown by a bequest in 1499 expressly providing for oil for this purpose, at the now demolished church of Denton by Gravesend.
At the foot of the overarching rood-loft, against the screen's naveward front, it was not unusual to erect an altar or altars. Thus, reredoses, like the beautiful four- teenth century examples of stone tabernacling on either side of the chancel-arch at Smarden ; or piscinas, conveniently situated to the southward for an altar on one side of the chancel opening, or on both sides of it, as at Cowden and Rodmersham Churches, and also at
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Milton (next Sittingbourne) Church, where there is a pair of four-centred window recesses, opposite to one another, low in the north and south walls, that on the south having a piscina drain in the cill ; all of these tokens in their several ways witness to the same practice.
In the last-named church, from certain in- dications found under the flooring there in 1890, Dr. Grayling came to the conclusion that these side - altars must have been enclosed, each within chantry - screens of its own. The record in 1499 of a Chaplain of the Chantry of St. Cross in St. Mary's Church, Hoath, small as that building is, seems to imply the presence of a similar institution there also. That there was a " Cross altar " in the parish church of Strood is proved by the bequest of a towel for its use in
MILTON CHURCH, NEAR SITTINGBOURNE. T493 J and likewise, at
West Mailing, a testator,
Sketch of South- East Corner of the
Nave, showing South Wall beyond. m l$29> bequeathing
" half my diaper cloth to
the Roode altar" there. An altar under the rood-loft at Gillingham is known to have existed in 1525, and similarly at Cuxton, from a bequest " to the reparacion of the Rood altar" there being made in 1529. Some, if not all of the above, may have been, like that at Hoath, endowed foundations. But, whether or not, all
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 91
must eventually have shared the common fate of rood- lights and of the roods themselves.
Of the authoritative blows levelled in the Reforma- tion against the usages of the old religion, the first that struck roods was the Royal Injunction, exhibited in 1538, which ordered that all such feigned images as were known to be abused of pilgrimages and offerings must, for the avoiding of idolatry, forthwith be taken down without delay. Henry VIII. himself went no further in this direction, but a series of injunctions and enactments in the reigns of his two Protestant children left no loop- hole of escape from the logical issue of that which he began. No sooner had Edward VI. succeeded to the throne than there was re-issued, in stronger terms, his father's injunction against images, ordering the destruc- tion of as many as were liable to abuse, and, as for the rest, which were suffered for the time being to remain, undermining the principle of their devotional use by bidding the clergy instruct the people that any images permitted were meant for the sole purpose of a reminder of the holy lives of the individuals whom they represented.
However, these half-measures failed altogether to satisfy Archbishop Cranmer, who, laying aside the mask which prudence had compelled him to wear as long as Henry VIII. lived, in an inflammatory speech in Convocation, in the November following the child-king's accession, exhorted the clergy " to throw out all the Popish trash which was not yet cast out." Moreover, as was but natural, much disputing accompanied the taking down of images, for no sort of unanimity could be arrived at as to which had been idolatrously abused and which had not. The simplest course was indis- criminate condemnation of all images alike. And this shortly was done, for on 2 1st February, 1547-8, an Order in Council decreed the removal of every image without exception, and Cranmer had the gratification of being specially charged to look to it that his own diocese was so
92 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
thoroughly purged as to become, in this regard, the model for all other diocesans to emulate. Accordingly, in his Visitation in the ensuing summer he made rigorous inquiry of his clergy on this particular point. The destruction of roods went on apace all that year, until, by about November, as the Chronicles of the Grey Friars of London record, there " was pullyd downe throrrow all the kynges domynion in every churche alle Roddes with alle images, and every precher preched in their sermons agayne all images." In the room of the crucifix with the statues of Mary and John thus overthrown, the agents of King Edward VI, in his name, commanded to be set up on or above the rood-loft the Royal Arms, to signify his supreme headship over the church of the realm ; king's visitors being sent on a tour of inspection from parish to parish so as to ascertain that the order had been duly obeyed. But even the before-mentioned mandates do not appear to have been thorough enough in operation to please the authorities, for in 1548 further steps were taken in the form of an Act passed "for abolishing and putting away divers books and images." From its relentless and inquisitorial tone it would seem that certain images were discovered not to have been destroyed, but to have been conveyed out of the churches to places of temporary safety. Thither, however, the new Act would have them traced and drag them forth to share in the common destruction meted out to all such images as theretofore had not been taken out of any church or chapel. The conse- quence of all this iconoclasm would necessarily be to leave no ancient rood standing throughout the county at the death of Edward VI. and the accession of Queen Mary.
Upon Edward's decease a Catholic reaction took place, the formal restoration of the old religion and a solemn reconciliation, by Papal absolution, of the church and people of England to the unity which the Queen's
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 93
father had broken. " Likewise the cardinal " (i.e., Pole), it has been related, " caused Dr. Story to visit every parish and see the rood-lofts supplied, the crucifixes to be placed with the images of our Blessed Lady and St. John, the one on the right hand and the other on the left, and the King's arms with a lion on the one side and a dragon on the other side to be removed . . . and set in a place more convenient." Archbishop Pole's Visitation Articles, dated 1557, contain the inquiry to be made of the beneficed clergy in the archdiocese of Canterbury as to "whether they have a rood in their church of a decent stature, with Mary and John and an image of the patron of the same church." In the same year it is on record that one, Gyllam, of Ashford, supplied a fresh crucifix with the statues of Mary and John, as well as one of the patron saint, for the church at Bethersden. At this period also a new rood was erected to replace the one destroyed in Smarden and Hawkhurst Churches. But it is easier to pull down than to build up again. The brief duration of Mary's rule, from 1553 to 1558, could not suffice to repair the wholesale destruction of her brother's reign, and an uninterrupted spell of Protestant ascendancy, from the accession of Queen Elizabeth onwards, empowered the reform party to renew and to complete the work of iconoclasm.
At the end of June, 1559, was revived by injunction the previous order against images. Nay, where Edward's ministers had been content to forbear, the new Queen did not spare. It may be wondered at that those who acted in the name of Edward VI. had left anything on which subsequent iconoclasm could lay hands. And yet there is one consideration which must have had not a little weight. The life of the young King, sickly in body as he was morbid and over-wrought in mind, can never have been otherwise than precarious. The more far-seeing, therefore, among his advisers
94 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
either dared not or cared not to commit themselves to such militant extremes as must irretrievably prejudice them in the eyes of the heir to the throne. For the Princess Mary, on her part, made no secret of her unshaken adherence to the old religion. If a compromise, then, was adopted under Edward VI, and if it proceeded less from inclination than from policy, yet the net result was that, while roods were swept away, rood-lofts were saved and remained intact until the accession of Queen Elizabeth. It was under her, and not sooner, that the removal of rood-lofts was decreed, and her nominees, the Protestant Archbishops, Parker and Grindal, were instant in carrying the order into effect So thorough, indeed, was the archiepiscopal zeal in this regard that, although a certain number of rood-lofts did manage to evade the extreme penalty of the law in various other parts of the country, in the metropolitan's own archdiocese, and, in fact, throughout all Kent, with the two exceptions of the pulpitum in Canterbury Cathedral, and likewise that at Rochester, not one solitary example of a mediaeval loft has survived.
At the archdeacon's visitation in 1560 the church- wardens of Biddenden, Bishopsbourne, Brenzett, Faver- sham, Goudhurst and Sandhurst presented that, contrary to law, the rood-lofts still remained in their respective parish churches. If from this it is to be inferred that the six complained of, and a seventh and eighth which, from other sources, are known to have been in existence at this date at St. Dunstan's, Canterbury, and at West- well, were the only parish church lofts then left standing in the diocese, it does but prove with what untiring energy the Protestant Queen, since she came to the throne just two years previously, had been served. For, although it is often stated by her apologists that personally she was in favour of the retention of such ornaments, for instance, as the crucifix, in her official
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 95
capacity Elizabeth unquestionably played into the hands of the less moderate reformers.
In the second year of the Queen's reign, through her Royal Commissioners was issued a decree "that the rood-lofts as yet being at that day aforesaid untransposed, shall be so altered that the upper parts of the same, with the seller, be quite taken down unto the upper parts of the vaults, by putting some convenient crest upon the said beam towards the church, leaving the situation of the seats, as well in the choir as in the church, as heretofore hath been used." The terms of this ordinance are worthy of most careful attention, and will probably surprise anyone who is not previously acquainted with them. To remove a chancel-screen and quire-stalls, including return-stalls with their backs against the screen, where they happened to be in that position, was thus constituted an act of illegality, and such it still remains. What actually was commanded to be taken down, and no more, was the gallery parapet above the platform, " unto," but not including, " the vaulting." The latter was to be preserved, with the whole of the rest of the screen, from the breast-summer at the base of the gallery downward to the floor. By way of mitigating the bare and novel unsightliness of a screen deprived of its crowning balcony, the upper edge was to be finished off with an added cresting, or, as it is technically called, brattishing. These measures, literally carried out, would produce an effect which, howsoever sadly inferior to that of former times, was yet very far removed from that of the average church at the present day. It was, in fact, precisely that which may yet be seen in two neighbouring churches — Shoreham and Lullingstone. These two buildings, although in the latter instance the cresting is absent, retain their ancient screen- work in a greater degree of completeness than do any other parish churches in the county. But Shoreham and Lullingstone, alas! are fortunate exceptions only.
96 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Contrasted with these, in by far the greatest proportion of cases the practical result of the ordinance was some- thing much more drastic. For, in any event, the act of demolition, even on the limited scale required by law, could not but be attended with considerable risk to the sacred fabrics. Playing with edged tools is proverbially a dangerous game, and, licence once granted and the lust of destruction aroused, it was not in human nature to draw nice distinctions between one degree of sacrilege and another. Nor, although wanton outrages had become, since Elizabeth's accession, so frequent and scandalous that it was neccessary to safeguard, by proclamation in 1560, statues of Royal personages, stained glass, tombs, and other monuments, does any effective provision appear to have been made for the protection of church screen- work by restraining such acts of violence and excess as, in the execution of the edict against rood-lofts, must inevitably be committed. Nay, it is likely enough that such were the very contingencies that the Queen's wily ministers foresaw and desired. If this was, indeed, the consummation they had in view, after having drafted the ordinance accordingly, nothing more remained for them to do but to sit down, and, tongue in cheek, await the accomplishment of their designs.
This is not to say that every single screen which has — like those, for instance, at Boughton under Blean, Eastchurch, Tong, and Stalisfield — been deprived of its original vaulting, necessarily lost it at that particular juncture ; but then was certainly the beginning of ruin. For it stands to reason that, the structure once tampered with in one point, other parts, too, and more particularly the complicated system of wooden groins and vaults, would become so broken and dislocated that their final disintegration and removal would be only a matter of time. As fax as Archbishop Parker himself was concerned, it is but due to give him the credit of having been sincerely desirous to adhere
EASTCHURCH, SHEPPKV. DETAIL OF OAK ROOD SCREEN, FROM THE WEST.
( The cornice and cresting are modern?)
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 97
to the letter of his instructions. It is a fact that, on the occasion of his diocesan Visitations, he made explicit inquiries on this head. In the Articles of the Visitation of 1569, conducted by Richard Rogers, Bishop of Dover, and two other commissioners acting on the Archbishop's behalf, the latter, after asking whether images and all other monuments of idolatry and superstition — such was the language which even the soberest among the reformers used in reference to the rood and other objects that generations of their fathers had dearly venerated — were destroyed and abolished ; next, put the pertinent questions whether the old rood-lofts had been taken down, as prescribed, and whether at the same time the chancel-screens had been preserved. Again, as to these two last points, Archbishop Grindal, Parker's successor, took steps in 1576 to satisfy himself in respect of the whole of the southern province.
If the former part of the ordinance, then, was universally complied with throughout Kent, the latter part has been almost as generally disregarded. An entry of the year 1574 in the parish accounts of Hawkhurst Church shows that at that date " the partition of the chancel" was made lower and the timber that was taken down sold by the churchwardens. If this refers, as I suspect, to the chancel-screen, it would indicate the spread of further innovating tendencies. In numbers of churches the rood-screens are found to have been sawn off through the principal muntins, on a level with the cill, and only the solid part below the opening spared. Cut down screens, or portions of them, yet remain at, among other places, Biddenden, Brookland, Doddington, Faversham, Goudhurst, Headcorn, Ivychurch, Lynsted, Minster in Sheppey, Smarden, Teynham, Westwell and Wingham. Although this list is no doubt capable of being considerably enlarged, the truth remains that the majority of Kentish churches contain no vestiges of ancient screenwork at all at the H
98 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
present day. Yet, as late as 1719, Dr. Harris declared the rood-loft to be standing in Westwell Church, when his work about Kent was published. One after another screens have been mutilated or been removed, without a shadow of legal authorisa- tion, and that, too, in numbers of cases — with shame be it said! — no longer ago than in the age of the vainglorious enlightenment of the nineteenth century. Thus are accounted for the whole or the best portions of the chancel-screens now vanished from Cowden, Dartford, Erith, Farningham, Gillingham, Goodnestone by Wingham, Minster in Sheppey, Oare and Wingham Churches ; while others have been, not less arbitrarily, removed from their proper site in Challock, Cobham, Great Mongeham, Iwade and Swanscombe Churches. The screen-shifting at Great Mongeham was effected at the "restoration," begun in 1851, by an architect of repute, Butterfield by name. It should rather have been Wyatt, who shuffled the pieces in Salisbury Cathedral. At Newington and Milton Churches, both near Sittingbourne, as well as at Aylesford, Cuxton, Newenden, Ruckinge and Wood- church, portions of the original screenwork have been egregiously worked up into seats, reredoses, pulpits, or reading-desks. On the occasion of the Kent Archaeo- logical Society's visit to Cliffe-at-Hoo Church in 1876, the cleric in charge observed, " The remains of the ancient rood screen have been preserved as well as they could be, and only stay where they are until they can be replaced by a new screen, which could be done for about £80, sufficient of the original being left to serve as a guide for reconstruction." The idea of exchanging a priceless and historic heirloom of the church for a modern counterfeit, valued at a paltry sum of eighty pounds, is so monstrous and grotesque that one might be amused at it but for the fatal consequences which such misconceptions entail. Against vandalism of this
MEDIEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 99
sort there is no safeguard but that of placing all ancient churches on the footing of National Monuments, their furniture, fittings, and other ancient contents scheduled, with a heavy penalty enforced — attached merely it will be of no use — for the misplacement and " restoring " away of them under any pretext whatsoever.
The churchwardens' accounts of St. Dunstan's with- out the Westgate, Canterbury, from 1484 to 1580 (published in Volumes XVI. and XVII. of Archceologia Cantiana), afford the outline of a fairly continuous record of the fortunes of the parish church during an eventful period of close upon a century. The interest of this document consists not so much in the actual chronicle of events, confined within the limited area of a single parish, as because it may be regarded as typical of hundreds of other similar records, no longer in existence. For the present purpose it is not necessary to abstract more than those entries which concern the rood-light and the rood-loft.
To commence, then, with the light. An account, under the date 1486, rendered by the " Wardens of the Crosse lygthe," shows that, as their name implies, for keeping up the light that always burned before the rood, officers were expressly appointed, being authorised to collect and to disburse all funds raised for this object. As regards the wardenship, it appears from an entry of the following year, 1487, and of the successive years, wherein the same two office-holders' names recur up to 1490, that, unlike churchwardens, they were not elected annually, but for a term of three or four years. Their accounts were rendered with tolerable regularity up to 1545, which is the date of the last item relating to this matter, on the very eve of the Edwardian Reformation. Sometimes the receipts were of the nature of individual offerings, as when, in the Michaelmas account from 1525 to 1526, the gift of 2d. is registered "for two penny tapers before the Rode"; or when, again, between 1538
ioo MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
and 1540, one, Walter Ledes, made a "special gift" of is. " towards the croslight." Sometimes they took the form of grants or subscriptions from the parish board, or guild, of the Schaft. This term, not being met with elsewhere, has presented some difficulty. There can, however, be little doubt but that (on the analogy of the official title of " Gold Stick " or " Black Rod ") the members of this body were collectively so called in allusion to one of the most obvious of their manifold duties, to wit, the charge of the parish shaft or may-pole. (For illustration the origin of the name of the London City Church of St. Andrew's Undershaft will readily be called to mind.) But that the before-named were not the only sources of the rood- light revenue is proved by other entries variously phrased, from time to time, as " due to the crosse," and " her lakkith the receitis of the rodelought (or ' Rode Lygth ') mony," beside specific mention, in this connec- tion, of " allowances " and " rentalls." Thus, under the head of rents in 1490 — " in primis, resseyuid of the Vycary for the Croste, 2s." From the same year's accounts it appears that six tenements in the place were held under an obligation of " wax rents," fixed at so many pounds of wax, or their equivalent in money, to be paid to the Church of St. Dunstan's. Further entries manifest the careful economy exercised in dealing with this prized commodity. The swalings and stump ends of wax "spared of the branch before the Rode" would periodically be gathered up, and after having been weighed and a memorandum of the quantity duly entered in the wardens' books, handed to the wax-chandler (whose business should not be confused with that of tallow- chandler) to melt down and re-make, who, in his turn, delivered the tapers " newe strekyn," together with a statement of his charge for the work done and of the cost of the additional wax supplied. The latest of these accounts is dated 5th April, 1545, when 35 Ibs. of old wax and of new 15 Ibs. at 6d. per Ib. were made into
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 101
tapers weighing 2 Ib. apiece, whereof the apportioned value of 8s. nd. was debited to the rood-light fund. By this date, it should be remembered, all other lights in churches had been proscribed, except those which were burnt ceremonially in service-time, annually at the Easter Sepulchre, and perennially before the Reserved Sacrament. Thenceforward, touching the light that had been, from time immemorial, sedulously kept burning before the rood at St. Dunstan's, nothing but ominous silence prevails in the accounts.
And now, as regards expenses under the other head. In 1498 was bought one pennyworth of Sandwich cord for the cloth before the rood, while, from an inventory taken of the church's goods in 1550, it appears that St. Dunstan's possessed " a staynyd clothe for the rode lofte." The next time Sandwich cord was purchased (somewhere between 1504 and 1508) it cost fourpence, and was explicitly stated to be "for to pulle uppe the Cloth before the Rode on Palme Sonday." A like sum again was spent, between Michaelmas, 1508 and 1514, for cords for the rood-loft. The next entry in relation to the loft would seem to imply that the woodwork was getting out of repair. For, between Michaelmas, 1524, and Michaelmas, 1525, nails and "prigs," that is the same as sprigs or pins, were purchased for the rood-loft, and an additional small sum spent on mending the Cross itself. The next item is : " For the leddyng of the newe wyndow ayen the Rode, $s." Similarly a testator left a sum of money in 1525 towards the making of the window before the foot of the rood in Speldhurst Church. Windows set in such a position that they must have been intended expressly for lighting up the rood, or the loft, are not of very common occurrence. There is one such window, however, in Capel le Feme Church, another in Erith Church, and other examples have been noted in Willesborough and Sevington Churches, both near Ashford. At the present day no window
102 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
in St. Dunstan's can be identified as answering to this description. Seven years subsequently to the previous repairs, that is between Michaelmas, 1532, and Michaelmas, 1533, the Cross in St. Dunstan's was again mended ; but the rood-loft was either past repair or found to be inadequate for the developing needs of the time. It was, therefore, taken down and the old material sold. The next entry shows that it was promptly replaced by a new loft, towards the expenses of which, on St. John's Day, 1532 or 1533, a bequest was received from Sir William Borges ; the wardens of the Schaft also contributing to the same purpose from the funds at their disposal. Payments to the carver are next recorded, followed, later, by amounts paid to one Robert Beleme — not unreasonably identified with the carver before-named — for the rood-loft, the last payment taking place on " the reckoning day, the 25th year of the " (here occurs a hiatus, to be filled, no doubt, by the words) " reign of King Henry the Eighth."
The next entry, coincident with the early years of the reign of Edward VI., tells a very different tale. Between November, 1548, and November, 1549, payments were made for "fasynge," that is defacing, the several images in the church, among which would, of course, be included that of the Christ upon the High Rood with the accompanying figures of Mary and John. No further expenditure in connection with the rood-loft occurs during the remainder of the reign ; neither during Queen Mary's, which is evidence, of a negative kind, that at St. Dunstan's Church, at any rate, no restoration of the rood was ever effected. Meanwhile Mary died and Elizabeth came to the throne. And yet it was not until some time after Easter, 1561, as the accounts running on from that date to August 22nd, 1563, show, that the rood-loft, in compliance with the general order of 1560, was pulled down. It had then been standing just thirty years. The sale of it fetched los. ; the boards of the loft and a
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 103
" carved piece," presumably from the same structure, together raising /s. additional. The churchwarden, John Parkyn, who made himself responsible for the work of demolition, charged the accounts with 33. 4d. for his pains. In 1568 were purchased a lock and key to a little door in the chancel, the same, perhaps, which had formerly led to the rood-loft, and which, now become superfluous, was to be fastened up thenceforward. And so, with this last item, the chronicle of the rood-loft in St. Dunstan's Church is brought to a close. At the present day there is no trace of a rood-stair entrance, nor of any door whatever in the chancel nor chancel-aisle, save one in the south wall of the latter, leading into the church- yard. But this door being situated in the Roper Chapel, any expenses connected with it would have been charge- able to that family, and not to the churchwardens. If, then, a lock and key were provided out of parish funds, it follows that the item in question refers to some other door now demolished in the chancel itself.
I have kept the consideration of the two Cathedral Churches of Kent purposely apart from the rest, because there is a broad distinction between the system of screening in secular parish churches on the one hand, and on the other, Cathedral, or at least monastic churches, to which class the cathedrals of Canterbury and Rochester, both being attached to houses of the Benedictine rule, belonged. Whereas the former, i.e., secular parish churches, never had but one screen each, the monastic custom was to erect two, the pulpitum, a fairly solid structure at the western boundary of the quire, and the rood-screen with the rood and loft, to westward of the pulpitum. At High Mass on great Feasts the Epistle and Gospel were solemnly sung from the pulpitum. It so happened that from the middle of the thirteenth century to the Reformation the screening arrangements, both at Canterbury and Rochester, though differing in details, were in their main outlines identical.
104 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
An oft-quoted passage from the Monk Gervase, describing the work of Archbishop Lanfranc (1070- 1089) at Canterbury Cathedral as it was previously to the fire of 11/4, mentions the "pulpitum" or loft which separated the quire from the nave, and tells how, in the middle of the screen-wall, facing naveward, the altar of the Holy Cross stood, and also how, above the "pulpitum," at the crossing there was fixed a beam that supported a very large cross and two images of Cherubim with those of St. Mary and St. John beside it How much of all this perished in the fire is not clear. At any rate, it is certain that Lanfranc's Norman nave stood, and that the altar of the Holy Cross continued to be the principal altar within it, until the first quarter of the fifteenth century. At that time the nave was taken down and reconstructed in its present form. As soon as the new work was sufficiently advanced to admit of it, the altar of the Cross, temporarily removed for the rebuilding, was set up again as before in its old position. Its existence there till as late as 1532-3 is explicitly recorded, and implicitly by the mention of a " vestment for the Crosse aulter" occurring in an inventory of 1540, the date of the suppression of the monastery. The screen which formed the reredos of the altar of the Cross was the rood-screen proper. It was probably pierced on either hand of the altar by a north and a south door. No trace of it now remains, but it is possible that of the ornamental stone braces erected during the priorship of Thomas Goldstone the second (1494-5 to 1517), between the central tower piers to sustain the enormous weight of the new Angel Steeple, that one inserted in the western crossing may have served the additional purpose of a beam to carry the great rood. Behind and east- ward of the site of the rood-screen, and at the top of Prior Chillenden's majestic flight of steps ascending from the nave towards the quire, stands the Perpendicular sculptured stone pulpitum (see illustration), occupying
BBBBBB
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 105
the entire space between the line of the eastern and western faces of the great piers of the eastern crossing. This, also, is the work of Thomas Chillenden, who held the office of Prior from February, 1390-1, to August, 1411. That this cannot have been the first and only structure of the kind erected on the same site is certain. Nay, it would only be in keeping with the method pursued in the treatment of the piers, if Prior Chillenden's pulpitum had been of the nature of an outer casing, incorporating the greater part of an earlier structure. This seems the more probable from the fact that the central doorway includes, at the back of its deep recess, another and smaller opening, the arch of which springs from a lower level than the outer one, and leaves an awkwardly-shaped tympanum to fill with panelling on the ramp between the upper and lower arches. The western elevation of the pulpitum, from the summit of the embattled parapet to the 6 ft. 6 in. wide platform whereon it stands (including the shallow step that forms its plinth) is 24 ft. J\ in. high, and the greatest length of the facade 32 ft., while the loft platform at the top measures 10 ft. across from front to back.
At Rochester the placing of the screens in the original Norman Church differed from that adopted at Canter- bury. It was not, however, the final arrangement here. In Gundulph's Monastic Church, finished by the end of the eleventh century or of the first decade of the twelfth century, the rood-screen, with the parochial altar of St. Nicholas in front of it, would seem to have divided the nave latitudinally between the sixth and seventh bays (reckoned from the west), the ritual quire itself extending, westwards of the crossing, into the nave. But, subsequently, that is in or shortly before 1240, the quire having in the meantime been moved further east- ward, the eastern end of the nave was rebuilt and a new rood-screen set up at the present western crossing. The appearance of this screen is not recorded, but its site
106 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
is definitely determined by the witness of the piers opposite to one another at the crossing. The clustered shafts, from which spring the orders of the western crossing arch, instead of being continuous from the spring downward, stop short of the ground by a distance of some 14 feet, and are, at that elevation, finished with bases all complete, thus marking the height of the screen-wall between the two piers. The wall itself is gone, and the junctions of its masonry with that of the piers cut away to a wedge-shaped ridge on either side of the nave. This arrestation of the thirteenth century shafting shows, moreover, that screen and arch were erected together and that they belonged to one and the same integral design. The northern pier has a greater bulk of masonry than the corresponding one on the south side, of which inconsistency the local explanation is that the rood-stair is situated on the north side. Whether there is or ever was a stair within at this spot there is no index on the surface. Above the rood-screen in the archway of the western crossing rose the great rood, at the foot of it in the nave below, as at Canterbury, an altar. At Rochester it was dedicated to St. Nicholas, and, being solely a parochial institution, was the occasion of frequent disputes, sometimes becoming tumultuous, between the respective factions of the parish and the monastery, until the year 1423. At that date a new church, hard by the northern side of the cathedral, having been finished and consecrated under the invocation of St. Nicholas, the parish altar was transferred thither, and the parishioners made a formal renunciation of all claims and privileges within the Cathedral Church itself. If the transfer of the " altar " means that the mensa was transported to the new environment, its old place was filled by an altar of the Holy Cross ; if only that its parochial status ceased, while the altar itself continued standing on the same spot as before, it was re-dedicated under the last-named title, as is illustrated by a will,
ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL. STONE SCREEN, VIEWED FROM THE^NAVE, AS IT WAS BEFORE
MEDIAEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 107
dated 1480, mentioning the rood-altar in the cathedral. A bequest of ten marks for the painting of the rood-loft there was made as late as 1503.
As for the pulpitum in Rochester Cathedral, its history appears to be briefly as follows. The alterations and re-buildings, already mentioned, during the first quarter of the thirteenth century, removed the western boundary of Gundulph's ritual quire, and carried it further eastward. This new work, completed by 1227, settled the ritual quire conterminous with the new structural quire, as it is still, at the eastern crossing, and left it enclosed on the west by a substantial screen, or rather a double screen, of wainscoting. That on the east measures 28 ft. 6 in., the exact width of the quire itself. This boarding presenting a plain surface toward the quire was painted originally with a pattern which Canon Scott Robertson described as " resembling a rough copy of some Scottish tartan." The pulpitum platform rested on the top of these parallel wainscot walls. This arrangement continued to the close of the thirteenth century, when, the great structural works of the cathedral all finished allowed attention to be bestowed once more upon the pulpitum and the rearing it on a grander scale than theretofore. Early, then, in the fourteenth century a new wall of masonry took the place of the western of the two wooden partitions at the eastern crossing, the face of it being virtually in alignment with the westernmost extent of the piers. At the same time, so I believe, in order to bring the boarding which remained to eastward up to the height of the new stonework, without which being done the floor of the pulpitum would not be level, a wooden blind arcading of trefoiled arches between banded polygonal shafts, the latter 2 ft. 10 in. high, was added at the top of the Early English wainscoting. Excellent drawings of this work were contributed by Mr. Mickleth- waite to the second volume of the Spring Gardens Sketch Book, but I venture to think that he overrates the
io8 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
antiquity of the screen, for it is not by any means " the earliest remaining in England." Eventually the whole of the woodwork was painted afresh, the original " tartan " pattern of the lower part being covered over with new decoration of the period. The present painting, mechani- cally uniform, is a modern reproduction only, but fragments of boarding with remains of the fourteenth century colouring upon them are exhibited under glass in ^the south-eastern transept. The design consists of a diaper of red quatrefoils, charged each with a heraldic lion, the engrailed interspaces blue with a gold fleur de lys in each. The stone wall of the pulpitum was, of course, pierced by a door in the middle admitting to the quire. The faqade was remarkable for its absence of ornament (see illustration). It possessed, however, certain interesting features. To the left of the doorway, which is four-centred under a label terminating in small sculptured heads, was a sunk moulding, shaped like two parts of a seg- mental arch, and ending abruptly in a vertical hollow sunk in the stone near the north end of the screen. Mr. St. John Hope suggests that these were the traces of a recess of an altar standing on the top of the steps, against the screen. About halfway between this vertical line and the door had been inserted a little trefoil- headed Perpendicular window, of a single light, to ligHt the interior of the pulpitum underneath the platform. These landmarks have recently been cleared away to give place to a showy frontage of tabernacles and statuary, alike spurious as historic documents and mediocre as art One, Pearson, by profession an architect, did it. The only relic saved from this sorry job is the discarded lead glazing and the moulded stone frame of the little window, which have been relegated to the crypt, where, even if they do not get broken, and thus, as is greatly to be feared, perish altogether, what they were and whence they came is only too likely, in a few years' time, to be forgotten.
MEDLEVAL ROOD-LOFTS AND SCREENS IN KENT 109
In conclusion, I have to acknowledge my indebtedness to many contributors to the volumes of Archceologia Cantiana, a very storehouse of information in all matters relating to the antiquities and architecture of the county; to Mr. Leland Duncan, from whose tabulated researches, published in the third volume of the Proceedings of the St. Pauls Ecclesiological Society, I have drawn largely ; to my friend Dr. Grayling, of Sittingbourne, whose encyclopaedic knowledge of mediaeval buildings in Kent has been frequently and freely placed at my disposal ; to the many clergy who have granted me facilities to take photographs and to make requisite investigations within the churches in their charge ; and, lastly, and very specially indeed, to my friend Mr. James Richardson, architect, of North Berwick, who made the measured drawings of Shoreham and Tong screens, and the diagrams and remaining sketches in this paper, and, moreover, afforded me valuable assistance in measuring and other researches. The five illustrations to which no note is appended are reproduced from photographs taken by myself.
AYMER VALLANCE.
OLD CANTERBURY
BY PHILIP SIDNEY
HE ancient Metropolitan City of Canterbury is so famous for its magnificent Cathedral that modern pilgrims are apt to visit it and go away again without paying sufficient attention to the other ancient churches, walls, and monastic remains still standing within the boundaries of the mother city of our English race. As a rule, with the sole exception of St. Martin's Church, the tourist (especially the American) leaves Canterbury labouring under the comfortable impression that when he has once " done " the Cathedral he has seen everything at all worth inspecting within the city, totally oblivious of the fact that there are to be found, in addition to the Cathedral and St. Martin's Church, any number of objects of intense interest to the antiquary, archaeologist, and historian, all located in the immediate vicinity of Bell Harry Tower. The splendour of the Cathedral, in fact, has dimmed all its surroundings, and the visitor forgets (if he ever knew) that mediaeval Canterbury was not merely renowned for being the seat of the Primate, but that it was also a habitation of monasteries, and that many of their remains, hidden away behind more or less modern houses, exist in a sufficient state of preservation to bear ample witness to their pristine glory.
It is, thus, too often forgotten that, in the exterior of the house of the Grey Friars, Canterbury possesses one of the finest examples in these islands of a convent, built not merely close by, but right over, a running stream,
no
OLD CANTERBURY in
supported simply by single pillars, whose firm foundations sink deep down into the river-bed. Then there is the Castle, the keep of which occupies a larger area of ground than those of either Dover or Rochester. Then, again, we have that long unbroken portion of the town walls, firm enough to bear pedestrians, who can examine the six remaining watching-towers or turrets looking out over what was formerly the deep moat. Then there are the ruins of the once-famous Benedictine Abbey of St. Augus- tine, with its beautiful vaulted gateway, in a large chamber of which — formerly the state bedchamber of the monastery — remaining in a perfect state of preservation, Queen Elizabeth slept, and Charles I. and his Queen, Henrietta Maria, used as their bridal chamber after their wedding in the Cathedral ; whilst Charles II. stayed here at the period of his Restoration. Of the old mural gate- ways only one, alas ! is still to be found, but this one survivor, the Westgate, ranks of its kind in England facile princeps.
This solitary survivor of the ancient gateways extant in Canterbury to-day, the historic Westgate, which, owing to the pains and energy of the present Corporation, in the spring of the year 1906, after having been cleaned out and renovated from top to bottom, was opened at last, after several decades of total neglect and disuse, to the public, now serves as an armoury and museum. The treatment of this splendid specimen of fourteenth-century architecture during the nineteenth century is typical of the spirit of vandalism once prevailing in Canterbury. Not only was it wickedly allowed to lapse into and remain in a filthy and uncared-for condition, but, in the middle of the same century, it was nearly demolished altogether, under the most surprising circumstances, that must sound almost incredible ! A proprietor of a travelling circus and menagerie, finding that the passage through the gateway, lofty though it is, was not quite high enough to admit of the procession through it of some triumphal cars of his,
ii2 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
to be drawn by pairs of elephants, actually petitioned the Mayor and Corporation to be allowed to pull it down, irrespective of the undeniable fact that there was plenty of room for his theatrical procession to go round the gate on the left-hand side. The Corporation not only listened to this impudent appeal, but even regarded it favourably, and it was only at the eleventh hour, by the casting vote of the Mayor himself, that the gate was saved from demolition.
The situation of the gate is, or rather was, of great importance, as it constituted the principal means of ingress and egress to and from the city Londonwards ; and the great majority of the innumerable pilgrims travelling to Canterbury to pay their devotions at the shrine of Saint Thomas entered by this gate. Under this now existing edifice, too, have passed many English Kings and Queens en route from London to the Continent, amongst whom may be mentioned Henry IV., Henry V., Henry VIIL, Katharine of Arragon, Queen Elizabeth, Charles I, Henrietta Maria, Charles II., William III. and Mary, Queen Victoria, Edward VII. and Queen Alexandra. The present Westgate was constructed, in 1379-1380, by the celebrated Archbishop Simon, of Sudbury, upon the site occupied by a Norman structure used for similar purposes, which was surmounted by a chapel dedicated to the Holy Cross. This chapel was removed on the erection of the new gate, and the present church of the Holy Cross was set up close to the gateway. The Archbishop was determined on building a gatehouse to be as strong as a fortress, formidable enough, in fact, to withstand a siege, and at his command the towers were embattled, portcullised, and machicolated. It was a pity, perhaps, that, not being then in Canterbury, he could not seek refuge within its massive walls on the sudden outbreak of Wat Tyler's rebellion, when he was captured in London by the mob and summarily beheaded on Tower Hill. He has left behind him, however, a wonderful memorial in
WEST GATE, CANTERBURY.
OLD CANTERBURY 113
the still stout walls and unimpaired towers of this historic gate, than which no better example of its kind can be discovered in any of our ancient towns — not even in Chester, York, Conway, Southampton, or Carlisle. From the later period of the reign of King Henry VIII. until the year 1829 the Westgate was used as the town gaol, and the condemned cell is still shown inside the guard-chamber situated over the arch. Until the year 1775, the lowest chamber in the south tower contained a large circular iron cage, where debtors and prisoners convicted of minor offences were casually permitted to solicit alms from the passers-by.
In the guard-chamber above the arch is now arranged on view an interesting collection of trophies, fire-arms, and armour, as well as a machine-gun which the East Kent Company of Yeomanry took out with it to the Boer war. In a turret chamber above hangs a fine bronze bell of English make inscribed with the date 1597. It was formerly in the belfry of the Church of St. Mary de Castro. From the summit of the tower, ascended by a strong newel staircase, and surmounted by an old culverin and another ancient cannon, magnificent views are obtained of the Cathedral and of the whole city, embracing, indeed, a wider expanse of country than could ever have been scanned from the summit of any other of the mural gates so unfortunately demolished, but whose names are worth recording — viz. : Newingate, Burgate, Worthgate, Ridingate, and the Wincheap Gate.
Distant about a third of a mile from the castellated Westgate, within the heart of the city, is the curious house of the Grey Friars, standing over a branch of the river Stour, running underneath it here in a very weedy and malodorous condition. In spite, however, of the condition of the river and the shameful manner whereby this house, the last remnant of the once extensive monastery of the Franciscans, has been allowed to fall into decay, it presents a most picturesque and pleasing
I
ii4 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
old-world aspect, leaning upon the support of its graceful pillars and shapely arches over the river. The Fran- ciscans first came to Canterbury in the year 1224, but they did not become possessed of this present piece of land until about 1271, when, by the benevolence of a local alderman, John Diggs, they were given a slice of an island in the river Stour known as Bynnewith, into which, however, they did not enter into undisputed and undisturbed possession until they had resisted several attempts to dislodge them made by the monks of St. Bene- dict. In the reign of Henry VII. the Friars, submitting to the revival of the primitive rule of St. Francis, became known as the Friars Observants. At the dissolution of the monasteries, in 1534, the lands and priory were granted by the Crown to Thomas Spelman, but they were acquired in Queen Elizabeth's reign by the Kentish family of Lovelace. The best-known member of this family was Richard Lovelace (1618-1657). He resided here for a small portion of his stormy and unfortunate career. That he was born here, as has been asserted, is not corroborated by historical testimony, for all the evidence tends to show that he first saw the light at Woolwich, at the principal seat of his father, Sir William Lovelace. But it is not unlikely — although it is not quite certain — that this cavalier-poet wrote amongst the strangely beautiful and romantic surroundings of his river- home in Canterbury many of his verses, among the best known of which are the lines :
Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage ; Minds innocent and quiet take
That for a heritage.
It was from Canterbury that he set out to take part in the great Civil War, and it was here probably that he dedicated his ode " To Lucasta, going to the Wars." On leaving Canterbury he seems to have experienced one misfortune after another, and after having been imprisoned
OLD CANTERBURY 115
more than once by the Parliamentarians, and after having been badly wounded at the battle of Dunkirk, " he grew," according to Anthony a Wood, " very melancholy, became very poor in body and purse, was the object of charity, went in ragged clothes, and lodged mostly in obscure and dirty places, more befitting the worst of beggars and poorest of servants." He died eventually, in 1657, in Gunpowder Alley, London, and was buried in St. Bride's Church, Fleet Street. Such was the sad and lonely end of this gallant cavalier and sweet-singing bard, the owner of the old house of the Grey Friars in Canterbury, who in the hey-day of his youth, when the world was a far brighter and happier place for him than in after years, had been described by Wood as " the most amiable and beautiful person the eye ever beheld ; a person, also, of innate modesty, virtue, and courtly deportment."
Just before its dissolution, the monastery of the Franciscans in Canterbury had achieved fame or notoriety by the connection of two of its members — one of whom was its Superior, Hugh Rich — with the case of Elizabeth Barton, the so-called " Holy Maid of Kent." This peculiar person was born at Aldington, in Kent, and became an inmate of the Benedictine Convent of St. Sepulchure's, Canterbury, founded by Anselm, where she achieved a saintly reputation on account of her trances, in which she claimed to be favoured directly by divine revelations. Unfortunately, these so-called revelations led her to "prophesy" concerning events and affairs that certainly were of a strictly political nature, with the obvious result that, after being sent up to London to be examined before Archbishop Cranmer, in May, 1534, she and seven of her foolish friends, or accomplices, including Father Hugh Rich, were hanged at Tyburn. Since the death of Hugh Rich, and the subsequent dissolution of his house, with the exception of the brief period of Richard Love- lace's occupation of the monastery, the history of the secluded remains of the Grey Friars' Priory has been
ii6 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
uneventful and obscure. Its present neglected condition is a crying scandal, and it seems a thousand pities that this almost unique specimen, in England at any rate, of a thirteenth century friary, supported only by pillars standing over a river, should not be bought up and preserved by some archaeological society or association, or by the Corporation of Canterbury itself, and thus ensure its freedom from further vandalistic molestations and outrages. That this quaint " haunt of ancient peace " — wherein once lived two friars who became Archbishops of Canterbury, whence the intrepid Hugh Rich started on his fatal journey to Tyburn Tree, and where luckless Richard Lovelace dwelt and wrote some of his lays — should now be allowed to remain desecrated, neglected, and well nigh forgotten, constitutes, beyond doubt, little less than a national reproach!
But the Grey Friars, it need scarcely be said, by no means represents the sole edifice in Canterbury occupying a picturesque position in close proximity to the river Stour. Only about 150 yards down the stream from the Grey Friars we come to a group of ancient houses known as " The Canterbury Weavers," adjoining the King's Bridge, that are now occupied by a little band of ladies who have revived the old weaving industry for which Canterbury was formerly so famous. During the last decade of the seventeenth century, in fact, it has been calculated that there were over two thousand people in Canterbury employed in this thriving trade, which had been started entirely by the efforts of the French and Walloon refugees, who had fled their respective countries rather than promise to embrace the Roman Catholic faith, and whose descendants still worship in the part of the Cathedral known as the " Black Prince's Chantry," that was officially assigned to their worship by Queen Elizabeth in 1575. The oft-told story, however, that these Walloons and Huguenots, generally known then as " the Strangers," used to carry on their occupation of weaving
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in the crypt, is a legend devoid even of a scrap of truth. Common sense, indeed, should have told those writers, who, without possessing one iota of original evidence to support their statements, have repeated this legend, that the insufficiency of light at so great a distance below the ground would have rendered such operations practically impossible. Since the commencement of the nineteenth century, until a recent date, the weaving industry had, after falling into complete neglect, practi- cally died out. But in the year 1897, owing to the energies and abilities of two especially accomplished ladies, Miss C. F. Phillpotts and Miss K. Holmes, this once important Canterbury industry was once more revived, and within the period that has elapsed since then the most extraordinary success has attended the courage and perseverance of its pioneers, whose large staff now under their direction is insufficient to meet all the orders with which their establishment is incessantly inundated.
The extremely picturesque house, now usually known as " The Canterbury Weavers," dates back, so far as the present walls are concerned, to about the year 1561 ; but the foundations are very much older, and are proved to have been laid in the reign of King Stephen. On the present house being renovated and re-opened in the year 1899, the foundations were carefully examined deep down into the river-bed, and were discovered still to exist in such a thorough state of unimpaired preservation as to astound in no small degree the architect and masons examining them, who one and all pronounced that they had never hitherto seen any other work of a similar nature to be compared with these in regard to the capability of their strength and endurance. The erection of the gables in the roof of the existing house was directly due to the inspiration of its first Flemish inhabitants, since they planned the buildings in imitation of their own establish- ments abroad, and used these gables as a storehouse for their goods and merchandise, which were carried up to their
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abode by river and then hauled up to the top storey by pulleys. An examination of these gables in 1 899! brought to light many interesting objects, which had for so many years been completely hidden away, belonging to the former inhabitants. Among these objects were many old English and foreign coins ; fragments of looms, pieces of wool, bobbins, and other odds and ends ; an antique lantern, belonging probably to an early period in the seventeenth century ; some shreds of the original silk, quite unfaded, spun by the Walloons ; an interesting mural painting representing the embarkation of Walloons at a Flemish port ; and many old English tokens and Dutch tiles. Opposite " The Canterbury Weavers," on the other bank of the river, used to stand a water-mill, known as the " King's Mill," whose foundations remain, and date back to the same period as those of the " Weavers."
One notable feature in connection with the re-occupa- tion of " The Canterbury Weavers " is concerned with the discovery of a lost secret, namely, that of how to weave, after the eighteenth century fashion, Canterbury muslins. In the year 1787, when the great majority of the weavers had migrated from Canterbury to Spitalfields, John Callaway, master of the silk weavers, invented what became known as " Canterbury muslin." In lieu of pro- longing the traditional rivalry with the cotton trade, he hit upon the notion of " combining the thread with silk," and used hydraulic power, derived from the Stour, to develop his novel machinery. " Canterbury muslin " then became all the rage,2 and enjoyed for a long time a wide popularity ; but the secret of its manufacture died with its
1 In the period intervening between the decadence of the weaving industry in Canterbury and its revival in 1897, " The Canterbury Weavers " had been used as an inn, known as " The Golden Lion," when its gables once became the scene of a murder.
2 In the year 1789 I saw in Mr. Calla way's silk looms the richest and most beautiful piece of silk furniture for the Prince of Wales's palace at Carlton House. — Hasted.
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inventor. Since the year 1897, however, his lost secret has been discovered by dissecting a piece of muslin — a very rare piece indeed — the property of Mrs. Sebastian Evans, who entrusted it to Miss Holmes and Miss Phillpotts for that purpose. On their submitting it to an expert, its examination proved happily so successful that the methods of its texture were readily understood, and John Callaway's process once more became popular and fashionable.
The pretty houses now known as " The Canterbury Weavers " occupy a very central position, and they must have been some distance off any portion of the walls that formerly encircled the city, a large portion of which was thrown down by the forces of the Parliament in the turbulent days of the Civil War. In the reign of the first Richard the city was defended by a wall and moat, with twenty-one towers. The number of these watch- towers seems, later on, to have been increased. Nowa- days almost the only portions of the city walls existing, in good condition, is the semi-circular rampart flanking the exterior of the Dane-John, and the stretch, with segment of a tower, at the back of Lady Wootton's Green. The open ditch, formerly the moat, lying beneath the rampart flanking the Dane-John, has, by the muni- ficence of Mr. Bennett-Goldney, F.S.A., been cleaned out, grassed over, and planted with trees and shrubs, thus converting what had become a very bare and squalid patch of waste land into a flourishing and fertile garden.
The Dane-John owes its curious name to the fact that there was once a manor attached to Canterbury Castle known as the Donjon Manor, of whose lands the present public pleasure-grounds forming the Dane-John formed a part. In the fifteenth century the Dane- John grounds practically passed into the possession of the citizens, who beheaded an Alderman called William Pennington a century later "because of the grudge which the city had against him " for endeavouring to prevent them using
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the grounds, which he claimed to hold on lease. The indignant citizens, nevertheless, would not have ventured to have killed him solely on the charge of having com- mitted this offence alone had it not been for the fact that William Pennington, who was a staunch Lancastrian, had exposed himself to the fury of the mob by the defeat of his party by the Yorkists — to whose side the majority of the citizens seem to have belonged — at Northampton. The earthen mound standing in the Dane-John was slightly altered in shape and height towards the end of the eighteenth century by Alderman James Simmons, by cutting away a portion of its base and carrying the soil on to the summit of the mound, thus elevating it to a height of eighty feet ; whilst winding walks were con- structed up its sloping sides, and a spacious terrace (twelve feet wide) raised and laid out for several hundred yards on the top of the neighbouring rampart. Before this " restoration " some three-quarters of its base had been surrounded by a ditch, the character of which evidently proves that the mound is an earth-work belonging probably to pre-historic times. That it was, at any rate, thrown up before the earliest walls were ever constructed round this portion of the city can be clearly demonstrated, for their old line abruptly bulges out beyond the boundary of the moat, so as to include this mound within their circuit.
The verdant Dane-John lies at an opposite extremity of the city to that where the West Gate is located, and further still from Harbledown (Herbaldown), of which various capital views can be obtained, both from the top of the Dane- John mound and from the summit of the West Gate. The roadway leading from the West Gate to Harbledown formed the final portion of the journey of most of the pilgrims to Archbishop Becket's shrine, and on their first catching sight of the Cathedral the pilgrims would dismount from their horses and complete their toilsome journey on foot; whilst some would even
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take off their shoes and change their garments for a hair- shirt, as in the case of Henry II. on his memorable pilgrimage of expatiation to the shrine of " St. Thomas of Canterbury." It was up this winding road from the West Gate to Harbledown that Erasmus travelled on proceeding to London after his visit to Canterbury ; and his description of the steep road leading towards the hospital of St. Nicholas, a hospital for lepers (founded by Lanfranc about the year 1081), with its adjacent chapel and " Black Prince's Well " — of whose most pure waters the victor of Cressy is said to have drunk — reads almost as accurately as if he had visited it to-day ; whilst the alms-box into which he dropped a coin is still preserved. Says Erasmus •.
In our journey to London, not far from Canterbury there is a narrow, hollow, steep way, and a cragged, steep bank on either side, so that you cannot escape it, for there is no other way to go. Upon the left hand of that way there is a little cottage of old mendicants. As soon as they espy a man on horseback coming one of them runs out and sprinkles him with holy water, and then offers him the upper leather of a shoe with a brass ring to it, in which is a glass, as if it were some gem. Having kissed it, you give a small piece of money. . . . Gratian1 rode on my left hand, next to this cottage ; he was sprinkled with holy water, and took it pretty well ; but upon presenting the shoe he asked what was meant by that? "This," says the poor man, "was the shoe of St. Thomas." Gratian fell into a passion, and turning to me, said, "What would these Brutes have? Will they make us kiss the shoes of all that have been good men ? "
This lazar-house of St. Nicholas was endowed by Archbishop Lanfranc for the sole support of lepers of both sexes, who resided in separate tenements ; but the whole of these have long since disappeared, and low, modern alms-houses occupy their quiet site. In the hall of the hospital several relics are kept, such as the alms- box referred to above, a maple " mazer," old pewter dishes, a fourteenth century chest, and some fifteenth century fire-dogs. The ivy-clad little church, dedicated also to
1 " Gratian " was the famous John Colet (1467-1519), Dean of St. PauPs Cathedral and founder of St. Paul's School.
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St. Nicholas, facing the front of the hospital, has, like the Grey Friars, suffered severely from neglect. It possesses some characteristic Norman work, contains a fifteenth-century font, and has a number of frescoes on the walls nearly all round the interior. In the church- yard stands a venerable yew tree. On the hill, up which Dean Colet and Erasmus travelled on returning to London in 1513, between Harbledown and the West Gate, stands that landmark of the Canterbury pilgrims, the Church of St. Dunstan. The exact position of the site of this Church is, as has been pointed out by Dr. Sebastian Evans and Mr. Bennett-Goldney, F.S.A., in their profusely illustrated monograph on Ancient and Modern Canterbury, one of considerable interest and importance. To quote their own words, this church stands
Where the high road turns at an obtuse angle to the right. Before speaking of the church, however, attention may be called to the fact that Canterbury itself stands at the north-west corner of a military quadrilateral, which in early ages must have been of primary strategic importance to those who were masters of the island. The eastern angle of the quadrilateral was at the great port of Sandwich, guarded by the strong fortress of Richborough, known to the Romans who built it as "Rutupiae." The South-eastern angle was at Dover, "Dubris," where the Roman " pharos " still keeps watch and ward over the narrow Channel sea ; and the south-western at Stutfall Castle, near Lympne, on the edge of the Romney marshes, where the old fort, called by the Romans " Portus Lemanis," was for many ages hardly less frequented than that of Dover. Straight roads from Sandwich, Dover, and Lympne, still for the most part used for traffic, converged at Canterbury, while a road, equally straight, from Woodnesborough, near Sandwich, to Dover, and continued along the coast thence to Lympne, completed the outer lines of the quadrilateral. Another road connected Canterbury with Reculver, the old " Regulbium," on the north coast of Kent, at the northern end of the arm of the sea called the Wantsoum, which formerly stretched thence to Sandwich and divided the Isle of Thanet from the mainland. It will thus be seen that from the time of the Roman occupation of Britain at least, and most probably from a much earlier date, Canterbury was not only the first inland watering-place for visitors from the Continent, whether commercial, friendly, or hostile, but was also the focus of an extended system of coast defence against invaders
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along the most easily accessible and vulnerable portion of the English shore. The angle in the road at Saint Dunstan's Church has, in fact, a story of its own to tell. No trace is here visible of the old road that once ran almost due east from Canterbury to Sandwich, nor of the old road that ran almost south to Lympne. But the clearly perceptible corner at this point still indicates exactly the angle at which the old road to Dover diagonally intersected, and still intersects, the great military quadrilateral.
The architecture of St. Dunstan's Church, which was originally attached to the Convent of St. Gregory, belongs mainly to the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, with some portions also belonging to the fifteenth. In this Church King Henry II. stopped on his way from Harbledown to the Cathedral, divested himself of his shoes and kingly costume, put on the garb of an ordinary penitent, and proceeded thence barefooted to the Cathedral. This was on Friday, July 8th, 1174 — a very wet day, as it is recorded. On reaching the Cathedral, when the soles of his feet were bleeding from the pricks of the stones, he first visited the precise spot where Becket died, and kissed the stone marking the spot where that prelate fell. He then went into the crypt, where he knelt and paid his devotions before Becket's shrine, and humbly submitted himself to receive the flagellations of the monks. The weary night was spent by him prostrate on the bare stone floor, fasting. Next morning he travelled to London (he had come to Canterbury from France), but his privations had evidently too severely taxed his system, for he was nearly a week on the road, and became very ill by the tirne he got there.
At St. Dunstan's Church, in later times, worshipped the family of Roper, one of whom married the favourite daughter of Sir Thomas More. Their vault is within the church, underneath what is called the Roper Chancel, founded in the reign of Henry IV., extending from the south aisle. Margaret, wife of William Roper (1496-1578),
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on the execution of her father, Sir Thomas More, managed to secure his head after it had been exposed on London Bridge, and at her death it was interred in the Roper vault, where it is said still to be, inside a leaden box, with an aperture in front shut by an iron grate. The mansion of the Ropers (whereof an archway remains) stood close to the church, in St. Dunstan's Street, and Sir Thomas More is reported to have paid at least one visit there. Margaret, his devoted daughter, died in 1544, nine years after her father, but her husband lived to be an octogenarian, dying in the year 1578. He was for several sessions a member of Parliament during the reigns of Henry VIII. and Mary, but his Roman Catholic tendencies got him into trouble under Queen Elizabeth, and he was summoned before the Privy Council to explain them, but was eventually allowed to go in peace on entering upon a bond for his good be- haviour in future.
Of the many famous men who have been born or lived in Canterbury, the city has hardly been sufficiently grate- ful in keeping their memory green in the way, for instance, of erecting public memorials in any shape or form to them. But to the memory of one of Canterbury's most distinguished sons, at any rate, a public monument has been erected, namely, Christopher Marlowe, the author of Doctor Faustus, who was baptized in the Church of St. Thomas, Canterbury, in the year 1564, about two months before the birth of William Shakespeare. He was born in a two-storied house still standing in St. George's Street. His father, although generally described as a shoemaker, seems to have been a bowman. Educated at the King's School, Canterbury, he took his degree at Cambridge, and spent the greater part of his subsequent life in London. In the year 1593 he was ignominiously killed in a tavern brawl at Deptford, after having thus, and deservedly, succeeded in achieving fame at an early
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age. He was one of those poets and writers, indeed, who bloomed young, and though he lived longer than Keats, he was younger at the time of his death than were Sir Philip Sidney, Lord Byron, and Shelley.
Among other memorials erected outside the precincts of the Cathedral to inhabitants of Canterbury and its neigh- bourhood, we ought not to forget that plain but neat column, surmounted by a cross, erected on what was known as the " Martyrs' Field," to the pious memory of forty-one persons, male and female, who were burnt on this spot between the years 1556 and 1558, during the sorrowful reign of Mary Tudor, on account of their uncompromising adherence to the Reformed religion. These martyrs seem to have belonged to the middle or lower classes, and many were not citizens of Canterbury, but were brought here simply for the purpose of execution. Other Protestants died before reaching the stake, in the castle, where they had been subjected to the straits of hunger and thirst, and had been placed in damp, unhealthy cells. The fate of those perishing in the flames was witnessed by a large crowd standing the while on the Dane-John mound.
Of other celebrities of whom the city of Canterbury can claim to be the birthplace, but to whom no public memorial, no matter how humble, has yet been erected, may be mentioned Stephen Gosson, dramatist and con- temporary of Shakespeare ; Richard Lovelace, the poet ; many illustrious members of the ancient Kentish families of Wootton (or Wotton) and of Hales ; the Rev. William Gostling (1696-1777), author of A Walk in and about the City of Canterbury ; the Rev. Richard Harris Barham (1788-1845), Canon of St. Paul's, and author of the Ingoldsby Legends ; William Somner (1598-1669), the antiquary ; and Thomas Sidney Cooper, R.A., who was born in a house in St. Peter's Street, September 26th, 1803, and died shortly before completing his hundredth
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year. Titian alone excepted, no other artist has ever maintained his powers, unimpaired by advancing age, for so long a period as did Sidney Cooper. His birthplace, with the building next to it, was presented by him to his native city in 1882 as a school of art, many of whose students, male and female, have since greatly distinguished themselves with brush and pencil. Some pictures of his hang in the gallery within the local museum. At St. Mildred's Church, Izaak Walton was married, in 1620, to his first wife, Rachael Floud.
The Canterbury Museum, or Royal Museum (it received the permission of the Crown to use the term "Royal" in 1900), is generally known as the " Beaney Institute," owing to the fact that the present building is indebted for its existence chiefly to the munificence of a Dr. Beaney, who, after residing many years in Aus- tralia, did not forget the town of his boyhood in his will. The " Institute " comprises a Free Library (Lending and Reference), a Picture Gallery, and Museum. This Royal Museum contains many interesting relics of bygone Can- terbury, including a very fine collection of Roman glass, pottery, and earthenware, found in this part of Kent ; whilst there is also to be seen a large number of badges and other relics of the Canterbury pilgrims ; the maces of the once corporate town of Fordwich, the port of Canterbury, but now only a diminutive village ; Oliver Cromwell's purse ; two Runic stones ; the old Burghmote Horn ; " St. Augustine's Chair " ; and a chair that belonged to Cardinal Richelieu. Concerning the exact age of " St. Augustine's Chair," an acute controversy has raged among contemporary antiquaries. It was formerly preserved in the chancel of a Herefordshire church (Stanton Bishop), and it is claimed by its supporters to have been that very chair whereon St. Augustine actually sat during his memorable conference in 602 with the bishops of Wales. This wooden seat, of course, must not
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be confused with the " Patriarchial," or " St. Augustine's Chair" preserved in Canterbury Cathedral, formed of slabs of Purbeck marble, whereon the Primates of England are enthroned. The chances are, however, that neither this chair, nor that in the Royal Museum, is authentic, for both, surely, must be ascribed to periods dating several centuries subsequent to the death of St. Augustine ; and probably that in the Cathedral goes no further back than the thirteenth century. The tradition, in fact, that either of these chairs was used by St. Augustine is as unconvincing as that faithfully handed down concerning the achievements suspended over the tomb of the " Black Prince," which, according to the old legends, were worn by him at Cressy or Poitiers. As a matter of fact, these arms and armour are of a kind that could never have been employed in battle, but are probably replicas of those used by him in warfare, con- structed either for the purpose of being carried at his funeral, or possibly for his occasional use at court functions.
Mention of the obsolete Fordwich maces, preserved in the Royal Museum, calls to mind some of the various noteworthy relics of that decayed port kept in its " Town- hall." In Saxon days, when the river Wantsum divided Thanet from the mainland, the sea covered the valley of the Stour at high tide, and trading ships were enabled to come up the river as far as Fordwich, which became the port of Canterbury for many centuries. It was, too, a " limb " of the Cinque Ports. A very ancient borough, it used in its palmy days to have a Mayor and Corporation of its own, of whose existence the " Town-hall," or " Court- hall," bears ample evidence to-day. This is a one-storied building, the ground floor walls being of unwrought stone, and the first floor of timber and plaster. The " Council Chamber" measures thirty-one feet by twenty-three feet. Here are kept a Tudor table ; a bridle for scolding
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women ; a most formidable-looking ducking-stool, also used for scolding women; and several Corporation charters granted to Fordwich by the first three Edwards, and by the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth Henrys ; veracious records, indeed, of the pristine import- ance of this now small village, which is only famous in the twentieth century for its excellent trout, frequently caught in the river Stour. Sir John Finch (1584-1660), the celebrated Speaker of the House of Commons, who was forcibly held down in his chair by some of the members to prevent his adjourning the house on a certain historic occasion in the reign of King Charles L, was raised to the peerage, in 1640, by the title of Baron Finch, of Fordwich, in the county of Kent. He died without issue, and the title thus expired with him. There is a monument to him in St. Martin's Church, Canterbury. In Norman times, Fordwich possessed no less than ten mills.
The quaint little " Court-hall " of Fordwich presents a striking contrast to the more modern, but much larger, Guild-hall of Canterbury, worthy of a visit, notwith- standing its hideous exterior, if only on account of the interesting portraits hanging therein of Canterbury celebrities, such as John Cogan, by Cornelius Jansen ; Leonard Cotton, 1605 ; John Whitfield, 1691 ; Sir John Boyes ; and Elizabeth Love joy, 1694. The collection of pictures here, nevertheless, is not to be compared with that known as the " De Zoete " Bequest, in the Royal Museum, where are pictures by Burne-Jones, Sidney Cooper, Marc Gheeraedts, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Van der Neer. The striking portrait of the Queen of Bohemia (daughter of James I.), by Marc Gheeraedts, on loan to the collection by Mr. Bennett-Goldney, F.S.A., is a very good, full-length portrait, and deserves hanging in a better light and position.
Like those of Fordwich, some of the Corporation Charters of Canterbury are of an ancient date, and are
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in some cases finely illuminated and inscribed. These highly valuable documents were, until the spring of 1906, rolled up tightly and hidden away in a tin box, to the greatest detriment, it need hardly be said, of the state of their parchment and illuminations, as the present witness can testify, owing to his having been one of those present to see them on their being extracted from their box at the occasion of their being taken out therefrom to be properly pressed, cleaned, and hung up, at last, in a sensible and civilized manner, after having suffered during so many centuries from maltreatment, confinement, and disuse. Among these charters are particularly well- designed ones granted to the city by Henry IV., Edward IV., and Charles II.
If Canterbury was, in pre-Reformation times, famous as a city of monasteries, it was also famous, beyond doubt, as a city of hospitals. Of these benevolent institutions, many of their buildings remain in a state of good preser- vation, such as those of St. John's Hospital, Eastbridge Hospital, the Poor Priests' Hospital, Maynard's Hospital, the Jesus Hospital, and the Hospital of St. Nicholas (already mentioned), outside the boundaries of the city, on the healthier Harbledown. Of these, Eastbridge Hospital lies in a central position in St. Peter's Street, opposite the " Canterbury Weavers," and surrounded on either side by ugly, modern houses, touching its gray walls. Originally founded in the reign of King Henry L, it was enlarged and rebuilt by Archbishop Stratford in 1343, and had its constitutions reformed by Cardinal Pole. The hall of this hospital remains intact, and was founded about the period of Archbishop Becket's murder. On the walls are some faded frescoes representing our Lord in Glory, the Last Supper, and the murder of Becket.
But by far the most interesting, important, and extensive of all the older hospitals in Canterbury is that of St. John (the Baptist), in Northgate Street,
K
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founded by Archbishop Lanfranc about the same time as that at Harbledown. Its grounds are entered from North- gate Street by a timbered gateway of early sixteenth century date, with a spacious chamber above it. The capacious courtyard within reveals several glimpses of Norman windows and arches. Prior to the Reformation, this useful hospital was placed under the governance of a Prior, and its inmates were chiefly infirm, blind, or aged men and women. Of the other remaining hospitals that of the Poor Priests was founded by Archdeacon Simon Lang- ton, brother of Stephen Langton, Cardinal -Archbishop of Canterbury in the reign of King Henry III. ; Maynard's Hospital by John Maynard, in the twelfth year of the reign of King Edward II. (it was rebuilt in 1788); and the Jesus Hospital by Sir John Boys, in 1 595. One of the stringent rules of its foundation decrees that " No Brother or Sister shall keep any domestic animal, save and except the Cat!"
Without the addition of some account of one more relic of ancient Canterbury, no sketch, however slight, of the chief antiquities located outside the precincts of the Cathedral, could reasonably be concluded without mention of the narrow passage leading direct towards the south- west entrance of the Cathedral, called Mercery Lane, the old head-quarters of the local silk mercers, and one, surely, of the most retired, charming, and picturesque nooks to be found anywhere within the confines of any old-world city in England. The vista of this narrow lane, only just wide enough to admit of the progress of one vehicle at a time, with Prior Goldstone's Christ Church gate — a poem in stone — at the end, and the towers of the Cathedral rising above that gate beyond, affords a glimpse of the " Old England," now so fast dying away, that no other of our cathedral cities is able to present. The house at the left-hand corner of the lane formed part of the " Chequers of the Hope Inn," where so many of the
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Canterbury pilgrims used to stay during the eventful period of their visit to Becket's Shrine : —
They took their inn and lodged them at mid-morrow, I trow, At the Chequer of the Hope, that many a man doth know.
The vaulted cellars of the former inn still exist. The inn itself occupied originally a large area, and extended round the corner some distance down the High Street, on the one side, and down Mercery Lane on the other. It was built in quadrilateral form, having a big courtyard in the middle, and a huge dormitory on the upmost floor, used chiefly by those of the pilgrims who either could not, or did not want to, secure lodgings in the monastic guesten-halls.
When the bells are ringing for divine service in the Cathedral, and the slanting rays of the afternoon sun are fitfully illuminating the dark entry of Mercery Lane, lighting up the frontage of the Christ Church Gate, and the tops of the majestic towers beyond, then is the time for the modern pilgrim first to visit this quaint quarter of mediaeval Canterbury :
In the sky
Ye can hear the Yule bells, pealing from the belfry, low and high : Bells of promise, pealing, pealing of an England free and One In the league of all the Englands ere the pilgrimage be done. Peace and Freedom ! Peace and Freedom ! This the tale our token
tells ; And the World looks up to listen to the Canterbury bells.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS BY GEORGE CLINCH, F.G.S.
NE of the well-marked features of the history of Kent, from the political point of view, is unquestionably the important part which the people of that county, the Men of Kent and the Kentish Men, have always taken in efforts to secure personal, religious, and political freedom. It may be affirmed, indeed, without fear of contradiction, that a large proportion of the great movements having for their object popular liberty have had their origin in Kent. Caesar, Shakespeare, and many other authors, refer to the bravery, the early civilisation, and the love of liberty displayed by the inhabitants of this county.
Kent, in the commentaries Caesar writ, Is termed the civil'st place of all this isle.
— Henry VI., 2nd pt., Act iv., Sc. ^.
One of the first Kentish insurrections on record was the revolt against the authority of Odo as regent of William in 1067.
Lambarde, in his Perambulation of Kent (1576), gives a delightful story, copied from the writings of " Thomas Spot, sometimes a Moncke and Chronicler of Saint Augus- tine's at Canterbury," of the means by which the Kentish men obtained from William the Conqueror a confirmation of their ancient privileges and customs. The story is not fully credited generally by modern historians, but it can hardly be doubted that it had some foundation in fact.
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The following is the account as printed by Lambarde : —
After such tyme (saith he) as Duke William the Conquerour had overthrowne King Harold in the field, at Battle in Sussex, and had received the Londoners to mercy, he marched with his army toward the Castle of Dover, thinking thereby to have brought in subjection this country of Kent also. But Stigande, the Archebishop of Canterbury, and Egelsine, the Abbot of saint Augustine's, perceaving the danger, assembled the countrie men together, and laide before them the intoller- able pride of the Normanes that invaded them, and their own miserable condition, if they should yelde unto them. By whiche meanes they so enraged the comon people, that they ran forthwith to weapon, and meeting at Swanscombe, elected the Archbishop and Abbot for their captaines. This done, each man gotte him a greene boughe in his hand, and bare it over his head in suche sort as when the Duke ap- proached he was muche amased therewith, thinking at the first that it had been some miraculous wood that moved towards him. But they, as soone as he came within hearing, caste away their boughes from them, and at the sounde of a trumpet bewraied their weapons, and withal dispatched towards him a messenger, which spake unto him in this manner. The commons of Kent (most noble Duke) are readie to offer thee eyther peace or warre, at thine own choyse and election : peace with their faithful obedience, if thou wilt permit them to enjoy their ancient liberties : warre, and that most deadly, if thou deny it to them.
Now when the Duke heard this, and considered that the danger of denial was great, and that the thing desired was but smal, he forthwith, more wisely than willingly, yealded to their request. And by this meane both he received Dover Castle and the Countrie to obedience, and they only of all England (as shall hereafter appear) obtained for ever theyr accustomed priviledges."
It was in reference to this interesting event that the late Mr. John Brent, F.S.A., wrote the following charming lyric, entitled
THE OAK BOUGH
The lordly oak that crowns each wood
For Kentish heart a charm maintains, And speaks of times when Kent withstood
The proud invader of her plains.
The oak boughs ! the oak boughs ! Wreathed around their swords and brows,
O, nobly went the men of Kent, To conquer 'neath their oak boughs !
134 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
The Norman banner shone afar, And " Chains for Kent ! " the mandate ran ;
Each vale, each forest, armed for war, And every oak produced its man. The oak boughs ! etc.
Our sires were brave — each dark grey hill That sheltered them yet girds us round,
The same broad sea and woods — O, still Be Kentish hearts unconquered found ! The oak boughs ! etc.
When duty calls we will obey —
For home and altars ! themes like these
Shall aye our hearts in steel array, And spread our banners to the breeze. The oak boughs ! etc.
The old White Horse still keeps our ground, No foe hath dared to curb him yet ;
And were so bold a rider found,
He'd crush the slave beneath his feet. The oak boughs ! etc.
Our vales are deep, our woods are wide — We love not foreign laws nor lords ;
'Twere well they rouse not Kentish pride, Or oak again shall mask our swords.
The oak bough ! the oak bough ! Wreathed around his sword and brow,
The Kentish man claims battle's van And fights beneath the oak bough.
THE GREAT REBELLION OF 1381
The various insurrections in Kent, rightly considered, must be pronounced, not acts of lawlessness, but efforts in the direction of freedom — freedom of conscience, free- dom in religion, political freedom, and the entire casting off of the bonds of feudal tyranny. It is this special character of the Kentish insurrections that gives them so much interest, and clearly differentiates them from those minor risings of the people which were inspired by sordid or less worthy motives.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 135
The Great Rebellion of 1381, usually associated with the name of Wat Tyler, was one of these great popular upheavals. The outrage by the Dartford tax-gatherer was an incident irritating enough, of course, to an intelligent and oppressed people, but it merely brought to open activity the fire which had been smouldering for a long period.
The truth is, that for years the people had been endeavouring to obtain relief from burdensome feudal customs — customs which made them in fact, if not in name, mere bondsmen. The villeins formed frequent confederacies against their lords, and one of the very first and most natural demands of the insurgents was that "no tenant should do service or custom to the lords as they had aforetime done."
One of the first acts of open rebellion was to proceed to the house of William Medmenham, who was probably a steward of various manors and the custodian of the Court Rolls, where the insurgents burnt all the rolls and books. Later on, "John Rakestraw" and "Watte Tegheler of Essex" seized William de Septvanz, the Sheriff, whose books and rolls "touching the King's Crown " they destroyed by fire. They then released the prisoners incarcerated in Canterbury Castle, and proceeded to take vengeance on numerous obnoxious persons.
Mr. W. E. Flaherty, in an interesting account of the rebellion, writes : 1
Some were murdered, others put to ransom ; the hateful roll of the subsidy of three groats was burnt, as were likewise the equally odious green-wax escheats from the Exchequer ; and the houses of Sir Thomas Fog and other persons named were plundered of goods, chattels, and muniments, valued at one thousand pounds. They would appear, indeed, to have had something like military possession of the city till the end of June, and on the 1st of July we find them attempting to make an orderly levy, by means of the bailiffs, to resist the approaching royal com- missioners. These facts are a very sufficient proof that the commotions
1 " The Great Rebellion in Kent of 1381, illustrated from the Public Records" (Archaologia Cantiana, vol. iii., pp. 65-69).
136 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
did not subside with the death of Wat Tyler, though, no doubt, the insurgents who had reached London began to return home on the death of their leader.
The muster on Blackheath took place on June I2th, the murder of Archbishop Sudbury on June I4th, and the death of Wat Tyler on June I5th. These events are matters of common knowledge, and there is no need to dwell upon them here. Soon after the death of Tyler the insurgents began to return to their native places, and, as far as London was concerned, the riots were practically over. But in Kent the case was different. There violence lasted from April to August. In the Canterbury district there was a particularly active and destructive band of insurgents, under the leadership of one Henry Aleyn.
On the very day when Wat Tyler was killed the King gave directions to Sir Robert Belknap, or Bealknap, and other judges, to adjourn the sitting of the courts till the Michaelmas term, probably in order that he might be at full liberty to deal with the insurgents, who, it was anticipated, would soon be in custody. Sir Robert Belknap was a man of considerable influence, and closely connected with Kent. In 1366 he was appointed King's Sergeant. In 1375 he gave lands near Chatham to the Prior and Convent of Rochester. He served on Commissions to survey the coast of Thanet and take measures to secure lands and houses in the district against the encroachments of the sea ; also on a Commis- sion entrusted with the defence of the coast of Kent against invaders. He is believed to have been buried in Keston Church, where a stone coffin-lid or grave-slab, adorned with a floriated cross, on the floor of the nave, probably marks his resting-place.1
The Commission appointed to deal with the disturb- ances caused by the great rebellion contained the following influential names, some of them members of well-known Kentish families : —
1 Gentleman's Magazine, November, 1830.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 137
Thomas de Holland, Earl of Kent ;
Robert de Asshton, Constable of Dover ;
John de Clynton,
Thomas Tryvet,
Robert de Bosco,
Stephen de Valeyns,
Thomas Colepeper,
William Septvanz, the Sheriff;
John de Frenyngham (Farningham),
James de Pelham,
William de Halden,
Nicholas Atte Crouche, and
William Pikytt.
On a Commission issued from St. Albans the following further names appear: —
Robert Tresylian, William Home, and John Peche.
The identity of Wat Tyler is a matter of some uncertainty. A recent writer l on the subject contends that the two names represent one and the same person. Doubtless there were reasons why it might be politic for a great popular leader of this type to keep secret his actual name and origin.
One of the striking features of the great rebellion in Kent was that the whole of the county took an active share in the rising, the Weald and Romney Marsh joining as well as the more accessible parts lying near the principal rivers and the sea.
The preaching of social equality by John Ball, a priest, did much throughout the land to bring the great rebellion to a head. When the insurrection actually broke out Ball was a prisoner lodged in the Archbishop's prison at Maidstone. When committed to prison he had
IF. W. D. Brie, on "Wat Tyler and Jack Straw" (The English Historical Review, January, 1906).
138 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
declared that he would be liberated by twenty thousand friends. The prophecy came true. One of the first acts of the insurgents was to release the priest, and they carried him in triumph to Canterbury. Ball now took a very active part in fomenting the insurrection. At Black- heath he preached from the famous lines :
When Adam dalf, and Eve span, Wo was thanne a gentilman?
He accompanied the rebels to Smithfield, and was probably present when Wat Tyler was slain by Sir William Walworth.
It is, perhaps, impossible at this distance of time to estimate with any precision the benefits which arose from this great rising ; but it is safe to say that they were considerable, real, and far-reaching.
JACK CADE'S REBELLION, 1450
The main facts about this important insurrection are matters of history, and need not be given very fully now. The leader, known as Jack Cade, or " Mortimer," is believed to have been an Irishman by birth. The rising was not of a democratic character, but was general among the commons in Kent. It was directed against the extortions practised by the King's officers. The rebellion first broke out about Whitsuntide, in the latter part of May, 1450. On June 1st the rebels encamped on Blackheath.
One of the incidents of the camp on Blackheath immortalised by Shakespeare (Henry VI., 2nd part, Act iv., Sc. 2) is the examination of the unfortunate Clerk of Chatham :
Enter some, bringing forward the Clerk of Chatham. Smith : The Clerk of Chatham : he can write and read, and cast accompt.
Cade : O monstrous !
Smith : We took him setting of boys copies.
Cade: Here's a villain!
Smith : 'Has a book in his pocket, with red letters in't
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 139
Cade : Nay then, he is a conjurer.
Dick : Nay, he can make obligations, and write court-hand.
Cade : I am sorry for't ; the man is a proper man, of mine honour ; unless I find him guilty, he shall not die. — Come hither, sirrah, I must examine thee : what is thy name?
Clerk : Emmanuel.
Dick : They use to write it on the top of letters. — 'Twill go hard with you.
Cade ; Let me alone. — Dost thou use to write thy name ? or hast thou a mark to thyself, like an honest plain-dealing man?
Clerk : Sir, I thank God, I have been so well brought up, that I can write my name.
All : He hath confessed : away with him ! He's a villain, and a traitor !
Cade ; Away with him, I say ! hang him with his pen and ink-horn about his neck.
During the few days when Jack Cade held London in terror he had his headquarters at the White Hart Inn, at Southwark, one of the large and commodious old- fashioned hostelries for which the south side of the Thames was once famous. It was destroyed in the great Southwark fire of 1676.
Jack Cade's insurrection was very widely supported by men of position in Kent. Yeomen1 were amongst the most numerous of Cade's supporters, and several of the names mentioned in the pardons belong to families which have since risen to the rank of gentry. One knight, eighteen esquires, and seventy-four gentlemen of the county were implicated in the rebellion, whilst five ecclesiastics supported the movement — viz. : John Clerke, parson of the church of Halgeste, in the Hundred of Hoo (Query, the "Clerk of Chatham" of Shakespeare?); Thomas Changle, of Yalding ; Henry Spencer, Chaplain of Cowling ; John Boteler, of Boughton Malherbe ; and William Penyngton, Chaplain of Ospringe. There were also two in minor orders, described as " Holy Water Clerkes," doubtless parish clerks.
1 A certain Thomas Clench, of Borden, with whom the present writer claims kinship, received the royal pardon for participation in Jack Cade's rebellion.
140 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
In several of the hundreds of Kent the regular constables summoned the men to take their part in the insurrection. Marden, Penshurst, Hawkhurst, Northfleet, Boughton Malherbe, Smarden, and Pluckley responded vigorously, and it has been stated that they furnished as many men as could be found in the latter half of the last century fit for arms.
Amongst the archives of the Corporation of New Romney is preserved the Proclamation of Pardon, issued by royal authority on July /th, 1450, in favour of Jack Cade, the rebel, under his assumed name of Mortimer.
The question of the identity of Jack Cade is one of great interest It will be remembered that at the rebel camp at Blackheath, according to Shakespeare's play, Henry VI. (2nd part, Act iv., Sc. 2), Cade declared that his father was a Mortimer and his mother a Plantagenet. In a subsequent scene, in Cannon Street, London, Cade, striking his staff on London-stone, cries : " Now is Mortimer lord of this city. . . . Henceforth it shall be treason for any that calls me other than lord Mortimer" (Act iv., Sc. 6). According to Fabyan, the chronicler, the people who chose Cade for a leader professed to consider him to be the cousin of the Duke of York. There is further evidence to show that Cade, whatever his right name may have been, was not a low- born person. The act of attainder refers to Cade as " that false traitor, John Cade, naming himself John Mortimer, late Captain of Kent." It ordered that he should be attainted, and should forfeit to the King his " goods, lands, and tenements, rents, and possessions, which he held on the 8th July or after," and his blood was declared corrupt. Obviously such a sentence would have no meaning for a low-bred person without property or position.
Jack Cade, deserted by his followers, with a reward of a thousand marks on his head, fled into the woody country — near Lewes, in Sussex. On July I2th he was discovered by Alexander Iden, at that time, or soon after-
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 141
wards, Sheriff of Kent, who took him prisoner. During the struggle, however, Cade received a mortal wound. He was put in a cart, but died on the road to London. At Cade Street, about half a mile to the north-east of the village of Heathneld, Sussex, there is a monument recording the fact that Jack Cade, the rebel, there received his death-wound in his struggle for freedom.
The chief source of information as to this remarkable Kentish insurrection is to be found in the Patent Rolls of 28 Henry VI. in the Public Record Office. These documents contain the names of many hundreds of Cade's followers who were pardoned.
THE WYATT REBELLION, 1554
The Wyatt Rebellion of 1554 aimed at preventing the marriage of Queen Mary and Philip of Spain. It was led by Sir Thomas Wyatt the younger (eldest son of Sir Thomas Wyatt, the poet). At the age of sixteen he married, and in 1542, on the death of his father, he succeeded to Allington Castle and Boxley Abbey. It was to Allington Castle that Wyatt called his friends to discuss ways and means of resistance to the Spanish marriage. Wyatt fixed his headquarters at Rochester Castle, whither ammunition and guns had been secretly conveyed. Cowling Castle was assaulted and captured by Wyatt and his followers.
A charming little picture of the home of the Wyatts at Allington is painted by Lord Tennyson in the following lines, which are supposed to have been spoken by Sir Thomas Wyatt just before setting out for London:—
Ah, gray old castle of Alington, green field Beside the brimming Medway, it may chance That I shall never look upon you more.
Queen Mary, Act ii., Scene I.
At the head of four thousand men Wyatt set out for London without opposition. The road was open. Through Gravesend and Dartford he marched to Black-
142 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
heath, where he encamped. On February 3rd he entered Southwark, and on the same day a large reward was offered by the Government to anyone who should capture the rebel. But already his followers, alarmed by the batteries in the Tower of London, began to desert. Wyatt next went towards Kingston, where he crossed the Thames. Proceeding eastwards he proceeded to Kensington, Hyde Park, Charing Cross, the Strand, and Fleet Street, to Ludgate. Here he found his progress stopped. The gate was shut, and he retreated up Fleet Street towards Temple Bar. There he was encountered by Norroy, King of Arms, and finding his cause hopeless, he made voluntary surrender.
Whitehall and the Tower of London were successive prisons, and on April nth he paid for his folly by suffering on Tower Hill. His body was gibbeted at Hay Hill, near Hyde Park, and subsequently his limbs were distributed among gibbets in different parts of London.
THE ROYALIST RISING IN 1648
The Royalist Rising of 1648, although not, perhaps, of the highest historical importance, was an event of great interest locally. Like so many of the popular upheavals in Kent, this movement was an attempt to secure liberty — liberty of conscience, liberty of religious privileges
The ordinances of Parliament prohibited all observ- ance of the great Christian festival of Christmas and other feasts and fasts. On Christmas Day, 1647, the good people of Canterbury attempted the celebration of the Divine Service. At St. Andrew's Church the usual Christmas Service was performed by the Rector, the Rev. Mr. Allday. The Committee of Kent, representing the Parliamentary authority, opposed it, and endeavoured to compel the people to open their shops. A riot ensued. The defences of the city were seized by an anti-Parliament mob, whcTraised the cry, " For God, King Charles, and Kent"
SIR THOMAS WYATT.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 143
In A Perfect Diurnal of some Passages in Parliament and Daily Proceedings of the Army under His Excellency Sir T. Fairfax, under the date December 3Oth, 1647, we find the following : —
A letter this day out of Kent from some of the committee of the said county, acquainting the House with the great riot that was at Canterbury on Saturday last. The House hereupon ordered that the order for examining and committing of churchwardens that countenance malignant ministers to preach be forthwith printed. They further ordered that the business of the riot at Canterbury be referred to the examination and consideration of a committee.
Under the date of January 7th following we find it recorded that the insurrection and tumult at Canterbury was quieted and the chief insurgents in custody.
The next step was an official visit of the committee with an immense armed force. They tore down the gates and made a breach fifty yards in length in the walls of the city somewhat to the south of the West Gate. An inquiry was made into the matter, and, with that perspicuity and acumen not unusually found in tribunals of this class, the very gentlemen1 who had endeavoured to calm the insurgents were sent off to Leeds Castle, where they were confined as prisoners.
Parliament evidently became alarmed, and sent a special Commission down to Canterbury to try the delinquents. A special assize was held on May I ith, and several of the Committee were on the Bench, but the Grand Jury ignored the bill, and when pressed again brought in a second ignoramus. Colonel Colomb, F.S.A., in an able review of this subject, writes : 2
The grand jury, emboldened by this victory, composed, upon the spot, a petition to Parliament which, to my mind, was worthy of " unconquered Kent," and of a people whose ancestors always claimed the right to march in the van of the English army.
1 These comprised Sir William Mann, Francis Lovelace, Alderman Sabine, Dudley Wiles, and other good Kentish names.
2 Arthceologia Cantiana, vol. xi., pp. 31-49.
144 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
The following is the text of the document : — THE PETITION OF KENT, 1648
The Humble Petition of the Knights, Gentry, Clergy, and Common- alty of the County of Kent, subscribed by the Grand Jury, on Thursday, nth May, 1648, at a Sessions of the Judges upon a Special Commis- sion of Oyer and Terminer, held at the Castle of Canterbury, in the said County :
Sheweth— •
That the deep sense of our own miseries, and a fellow feeling of the discontents of other counties exposed to the like sufferings, prevaileth with us thus humbly to present to your honours these our ardent desires :
(1) That our most gracious Sovereign Lord King Charles may, with all speed, be admitted in safety and honour, to treat with his two Houses of Parliament for the perfect settling of the peace, both of Church and Commonwealth, as also of his own just rights, together with those of the Parliament.
(2) That for prevention and removal of the manifold inconveniences occasioned by the continuance of the present army, under the command of Lord Fairfax, their arrears may be forthwith audited, and they dis- banded.
(3) That according to the fundamental Constitution of this Common- wealth we may, for the future, be governed and judged by the English subjects' undoubted birth-right, the known and established laws of the kingdom, and not otherwise.
(4) That, according to the petition of rights, our property may not be invaded by any taxes or impositions whatsoever; and particularly the heavy burdens of the Excise men no longer be continued, or here- after imposed upon us.
All which our earnest desires we humbly recommend to your most serious considerations, not doubting of that speedy satisfaction therein which the case requires, and we humbly expect. Whereby we may hope to see (what otherwise we cannot but despair of) a speedy and happy end to those pressures and distempers, whose continuance will inevitably ruin both ourselves and posterities. Your timely prevention where by a mutual agreement of what we here propose in order thereunto, will oblige us ever to pray.
Among the leaders of this movement were the following gentlemen bearing well-known names : —
Sir Gamaliel Dudley.
Sir George Lisle.
Sir William Compton.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 145
Sir Robert Tracy.
Colonel Leigh.
Sir John Many.
Sir James Hales.
Sir William Many.
Sir Richard Hardres.
Colonel Washington.
Colonel L'Estrange.
Colonel Hacker.
Sir Anthony Aucher, of Bishopsbourne.
Sir William Brockman, of Beechborough.
Sir T. Colepeper, of St. Stephen's.
— Darrell, of Scotney Castle.
Sir Thomas Godfrey, of Heppington.
Edward Hales, of Tunstal.
Anthony Hammond, of St. Alban's Court.
Francis Hammond, of St. Alban's Court
Francis Lovelace.
Sir Henry Palmer, of Beaksbourne.
Sir Thomas Palmer, of Beaksbourne.
Sir Thomas Peyton, of Knowlton.
James Dorrell.
George Newman, etc.
Two hundred gentlemen of Kent signed the famous petition, and in a few days the number of signatures had increased to twenty thousand. It was resolved that the petitioners should assemble at Rochester on May 2Qth and proceed to Blackheath, but the Committee of Kent condemned the petition by proclamation. Every con- ceivable obstacle was raised, and it was even brutally proposed that two of the petitioners should be hung up in each parish. Nothing daunted, however, the Kentish men determined to march to Westminster with the petition in one hand and the sword in the other.
An unfortunate step was taken by the Royalists in L
146 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
placing Edward Hales, then about twenty-four years old, at their head. • There was a rumour that the fleet stationed in the Downs was prepared to declare for the King. The ships were visited, and the report was confirmed. It was at this point that Mr. Hales was approached and advised to assume the leadership. He was flattered, and consented in spite of his youth and the fact that Sir Edward Hales (his grandfather) was still alive. Many of the inhabitants, particularly in the districts of Ashford, Wye, Rochester, Gravesend, and the Weald, joined the Royalist forces. They seized all the arms deposited at Scott's Hall, Ashford, Faversham, etc. Colonel Robert Hammond was commissioned to raise a regiment of infantry, and Colonel Hatton a regiment of horse. About three hundred well-armed men and sixty horse were soon collected. The East Kent Royalists encamped on Barham Downs, and Sir Richard Hardres, of Hardres Court, and Sir Anthony Aucher, of Bourne Place, Bishopsbourne, were dispatched with one hundred and forty trained men to Sandwich, where they found the gates shut and the town guarded. Hearing who demanded admission, the inhabitants opened the gates, but as they showed little enthusiasm in the King's cause, and pleaded poverty, they were deprived of their com- missions, and their arms and ammunition were seized by the Royalist forces and conveyed in a waggon to Dover Castle.
At Dover they found Hammond with more than five hundred infantry, and Hatton with two hundred cavalry, drawn up before the Castle, which was held by the Parliamentary forces. At the castles of Deal, Sandown, and Walmer the Royalists were more successful, finding little if any difficulty in taking possession of those important fortresses. On a second visit to Sandwich the inhabitants of that sleepy old town were found to be somewhat less apathetic. Influenced, doubtless, by the direction events were taking in the district, the Mayor
SIR EDWARD HALES.
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 147
and Corporation regarded the Royalist programme with more favour, and presented the sum of two hundred pounds to their funds.
Successes in Kent brought assistance from Surrey and Essex, but there was no really good discipline in the Royalist troops and no conspicuous capacity in the Royalist generals. In a straggling, undisciplined manner they reached Deptford and Greenwich. Fairfax, at Blackheath, advised them to lay down their arms and disperse, and assured them of mercy if they did so ; but the suggestion was firmly declined.
Fairfax next sent Major Gibbon and a party of horse round by the Weald of Kent to relieve Dover Castle, forcing Sir Richard Hardres to retreat to Canterbury.
Matters had now gone so far that the Royalists were compelled either to fight or lay down their arms. They chose the former, and the storming of Maidstone, on June ist, 1648, followed. The result was disastrous. The town fell into the hands of the Parliamentary forces.
The morning after the engagement the Royalist army at Rochester mustered in Frindsbury Fields, where a council was held ; and in the hope of either relieving Maidstone (for its fall was not then known) or meeting Fairfax they marched through Rochester, but had not proceeded above two miles towards Maidstone when intelligence reached them of the fall of that town, so they returned ; and in the hope of securing Canterbury and tht towns in East Kent, Colonel Hatton was ordered to return with his horse, and, meeting Major Osborne's troop proceeding from Ashford to Sittingbourne, he charged them, when Major Sumner was killed and one or two other officers were wounded.
The tide had turned, however, against the Royalist rising. The Kentish men were no match for the skill and energy of Fairfax. The march to Colchester and the siege which followed are well-known events, and mark
148 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
what was practically the end of the Kentish rising in favour of the Royalist cause.
The following curious verses relating to the fore- going events were published in a small quarto newspaper called Mercurius Crito-Pragmaticus : —
Verses by Mr. Egerton on certain men of Canterbury, declaring themselves for God, King Charles, and Kent, January, 1648 :
The roast-meat men of Canterbury,
Counting it no small injury
To lose their spiced broth, and their pies,
Their wassails and their fooleries,
Resolved ere Christmas went away
They would some uncouth gambol play ;
For now debar'd of their good cheer,
They took the double size in beer ;
And now so long they sit and fuddle,
'Till each agreed to broach his noddle,
Then one saith this, another that,
And the third he talks he knows not what.
'Till one upstart, whose nose to handle,
Had often saved them fire and candle,
And he in broken sense relates
The wrong to be debar'd their cates ;
And tells them if they do not rise
To right plum-pottage, and mince-pies,
Hereafter may things never whittle,
And the plum-pottage burn the kettle,
And may each bak'd-meat (heaven forbid)
Lose both the bottom and the lid.
At this each swain lift up his snout
And wrath incensed all the rout :
And now away the clowns do reel,
And out of doors each one doth wheel ;
He gets a mattock or a rake,
A third will need his coulter take,
And all with an inspired rage,
Set forth in martial equipage.
Fear now upon the townsmen falls,
To see these frantic bachannals ;
They lock their doors, but to no end,
The madmen do them open rend,
And he that hath not broth or pie,
Within his lard or buttery,
KENTISH INSURRECTIONS 149
Was surely banged, back and head,
And all his chattels forfeited.
But to prohibit this wild course
Out comes the Mayor on his horse ;
But they of him stand in no awe,
His crown is crack't, he doth withdraw ;
And thus, elated with success,
They needs will further yet transgress.
For God, and for King Charles, they cry ;
Plum-pottage and sweet Christmas pie ;
But out, alas ! this did no good.
Their language was not understood.
And now these birds in cages sing,
Wee'l no more Christmas revelling.
MINOR INSURRECTIONS
There have been several minor insurrections and disturbances at various times, of which, in conclusion, it will suffice to give a very few brief details :
The Holy Maid of Kent (Elizabeth Barton). — She was a domestic servant at Aldington, Kent, in the household of Thomas Cobb, steward to Archbishop Warham. She professed to see visions and to be in direct communication with the Blessed Virgin Mary. Executed at Tyburn April 2Oth, 1534.
O'Connor Riots at Maidstone, May 22nd, 1/98.
Riots at Boughton-under-the-Blean, 1838. — These were occasioned by an insane Cornish publican named John Nichols Tom, or Thorn. He was an impostor and madman, who assumed the name of Sir William Percy Honeywood Courtenay. He preached Communistic doctrines and professed to be the Messiah. He was, together with eight other rioters, shot by soldiers sent to arrest him in the Blean Woods in 1838, and was buried in the church- yard of Hernehill.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES
BY HAROLD SANDS, F.S.A., M.I.MECH.ENG.
fROBABLY but few people are aware that in the number and variety of its castles the County of Kent surpasses any other in the South of England ; while its total is exceeded by but four counties, namely, those of Northumberland, Cumberland, Yorkshire, and Herefordshire, according to an elaborate table compiled by the late Sir James Mackenzie, for his work upon the Castles of England, published in 1897. In order to facilitate comparisons that part of it which refers to the five counties above- named is here reproduced.
other
|
COUNTY |
CHIEF CASTLE |
MINOR CASTLE |
NON- EXISTENT |
TOTAL |
|
Kent .... |
7 |
18 |
5 |
30 |
|
Hereford .... |
3 |
8 |
24 |
35 |
|
Cumberland |
5 |
20 |
8 |
33 |
|
Yorkshire |
12 |
2O |
21 |
53 |
|
Northumberland |
9 |
46 |
8 |
63 |
Although in the main correct, yet in the case of Kent some additions and subtractions are now necessary in the light of more recent information as to the number of castles the county really contained.
To give anything like a detailed account of the various castles and their history, is, of course, impossible
150
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 151
within the limits of this paper. I shall, therefore, restrict myself to a brief notice of the more important, with a glance at their prominent features, together with any incidents of interest in their history ; but, before doing so, it may be as well to glance briefly at the early military history of the county. Of the Roman stations, the sites of three — Reculver, Richborough, and Lympne — were not occupied by any later works, and from the alteration of the geographical conditions of their surroundings they fell gradually to decay. The three towns having Roman walls — Dover, Canterbury, and Rochester — never lost their importance, and at a later period had chief castles attached to them. Then come the post-Roman earth- works, thrown up by the invading Danes in order to pro- tect their ships, women, children, horses, and cattle, when they settled down in any place in order to spend the winter there and to facilitate a prolonged raiding of the country round. These are usually known as " geweorcs," and were thrown up for the most part by the Danish invaders, or as the Saxon Chronicle1 terms them, the " heathen men," during the latter part of the ninth cen- tury. The first mention of such a " geweorc " in Kent occurs in the Saxon Chronicle of 893, when it speaks of one being wrought at Appledore, which, now an inland village, was at that time situated on the estuary of the Rother.2 There are some slight remains of one at Ken- nardington, now also an inland village, but at that time situated on a creek running inland from the Rother estuary, and probably the one spoken of as being at Appledore, from which it is about three miles distant. Another " geweorc " is Castle Rough on Milton3 Creek, which runs in from the Swale, between the Isle of Sheppy and the mainland. Immediately opposite to it is another
1 Saxon Chronicle, vol. i., p. 56.
2 Archceoloxia, vol. xl. " The Position of the Portus Lemanis," by T. Lewin, F.S.A., pp. 361, 374.
3 Saxon Chronicle, vol. i. , p. 164.
i $2 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
work known as Bayford (subsequently converted into a Norman castle), which dates back to 893, when it was erected by the order of King Alfred to keep watch upon and repel the incursions of the Danish invaders. Similar " geweorcs " are found at Willington Camp, and Temps- ford-on-the-Ouse, in Bedfordshire.1
During the first quarter of the tenth century we find the English building " burhs " or " burgs," as offensive and defensive works against the Danes. These were mostly designed to defend the passages of all the chief rivers, and to keep out the Danes, by barring the water- ways up by which they gained access to the interior of the country. They were at first surrounded with a wall of earth, replaced later by timber and stone. The Saxon Chronicle lays particular stress on the " burg " of Towcester being surrounded by a stone wall by the men of King Edward, in 921. Owing probably to the Danish settlement being chiefly in East Anglia and Mercia, there is no record of any new "burg" on a new site having been founded during the Saxon period in Kent, and they seem to have contented themselves with occupying the towns on the old Roman foundations at Dover, Canter- bury, and Rochester, with smaller settlements along the line of the great Roman road that runs from the coast by Canterbury to London.
The first mention of a castle occurs in the Saxon Chronicle of the year 1048, where it says that " The Welisce men wroht aenne Castel on Herefordscire." That is to say the Norman followers of some of the King's Norman favourites had built this castle in Here- fordshire, among the men of Earl Sweyn Godwinsson, and there did every harm, and insult alike to them, and to the King's men, that they could.3 Prior to the Norman Conquest, there were but three castles in all England:
1 Saga Book of the Viking Club, vol. iii., part 3. "The Danish Camp on the Ouse near Bedford," by A. R. Goddard, pp. 326, 337.
2 Saxon Chronicle, vol. i., p. 195.
3 Ibid., p. 315.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 153
that of Osbern Pentecost at Ewias Harold (probably the Herefordshire Castle previously mentioned), Richard's Castle (also in Herefordshire), and Robert's Castle at Clavering, in Essex.1 Orderic,2 in his account of the rebellion of the English in 1068, says : —
In the English provinces there were very few of those fortresses which the Normans call " castles," so that though the English were warlike and brave, they were little able to offer a determined or prolonged resistance, and in consequence the King carefully surveyed the country, and, selecting suitable sites, caused them to be fortified with " castles " against the incursions of enemies.
Of the thirty castles in the list seven are classed as " chief castles " ; that is, they were either Royal Castles held for the King by a garrison, or were held directly from the Crown by one of the great barons. They are as follows : Allington, Canterbury, Dover, Leeds, Rochester, Saltwood, and Tonbridge. One, the Tower of St. Leonard, at West Mailing, is not a castle at all, or any part of one. It is the tower of a destroyed church of St. Leonard, granted as a cell to the Abbey by Bishop Gundulf. Similar towers are attached to the Cathedral Church of Rochester and the parish Church at Dartford, and in all probability all three were the work of Bishop Gundulf.3 The documentary evidence of the existence of this church may be found in the Registrum Roffense, a collection of ancient records relating to the Diocese of Rochester.
One, Bayford, near Sittingbourne, was originally a pre-Conquest earthwork, dating back to the time of Alfred, subsequently converted into a Norman Castle.4
Four are blockhouses, expressly designed for the defence of the coast by fire artillery, and are as recent as the reign of Henry VIII., having been built by his orders
1 Saxon Chronicle, vol. i., p. 321.
2 Ordtricus Vitalis, Book iv., chapter 4.
3 " English Fortresses and Castles of the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries," W. H. St. John Hope, Archaeological Journal, vol. lx., p. 90.
* Hasted, History of Kent, vol. vi., p. 154.
154 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
about 1539; their names are — Deal, Sandown, Sandgate, and Walmer.
One, Upnor Castle, on the Medway, is a similar block- house, built about 1561, in the time of Queen Elizabeth.
One, Gillingham, is not a castle at all, but a modern fort, built in the time of Charles L, for the defence of the dockyard at Chatham.
Fifteen are termed minor castles, forming heads of lesser fiefs, held by the process of sub-infeudation from the greater barons, who held directly from the Crown. They are as follows : — Chilham, Colebridge, Cooling, Eynesford, Hever, Leybourne, Lympne, Queenborough, Sandwich, Shurland, Sissinghurst, Sutton-Valence, Thurn- ham, Tong, and Westenhanger. Thus completing the tale of the thirty castles included in the list given by Sir James Mackenzie.1
There are, however, eleven others not included by him, which, if the tower of the now non-existent church at West Mailing, the four blockhouses of Henry VIII, and the forts of Elizabeth and Charles are deducted, will raise the total to thirty-four castles! They are as follows: — Kennardington2 and Castle Rough (probably Saxon or Danish earthworks), Brenchley, Binbury, Stockbury, Castle Toll, near Newenden, and Caesar's Camp,3 near Folkestone, early castles of the " mount and bailey " type in earthwork, probably dating from the Norman period.
Folkestone, Deptford, Lullingstone, and Simpson's Moat at Bromley, are later works in masonry, but of these only the gateway at Lullingstone remains. The five castles not now in existence are Bayford, Queenborough, Sandown, Sandwich, and Shurland, only their sites are known.
1 The Castles of England, vol. i.j xxiii. and pp. 1-59.
2 This is stated by G. T. Clark in his Mediaval Military Architecture, vol. i., p. 146, to have had a shell keep, but his authority for such a state- ment, or that there was ever a castle there at all, remains unknown.
ZArchaologia, vol. xlvii., " Excavations at Caesar's Camp, Folkestone," Major-General Pitt-Rivers, pp. 429-465.
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The earliest type of castle of which we have any reliable information is that introduced into England by the Normans, three of which are known to have been erected by the Norman favourites of Edward the Con- fessor, as already mentioned. Prior to the Conquest there was no need for such erections in England, then at peace under the rule of a supreme King, save upon the marches of Wales to check the inroads of the wild Welsh. Many of the new Saxon " burgs," already referred to, had increased in size and importance, and had become popu- lous towns from occupying positions on roads and rivers ; after the Norman Conquest, whether the inhabitants of the new " burgs " and the old towns were Danish or Saxon, both were bitterly hostile to King William, and it became a part of his policy to dominate every conquered town by building a castle in it, for the double purpose of intimidating the unfriendly townspeople and command- ing the passage by road or river, or protecting a harbour. While the King was pursuing his gradual conquest of England, he was also parcelling out its lands by grants to his Norman followers, who in many instances displaced the former Saxon holders. The new landowners1 found themselves occupying isolated positions in the midst of a hostile population, by whom they were liable to be attacked, and cut off in detail ; for their own defence they were compelled to fortify their dwellings, and accordingly we find them (like their King) building just such castles as they were familiar with in their native Normandy. The two most notable features of all these castles are their extreme novelty to the conquered Saxons and the
1 At the time of the Domesday Survey twelve tenant 's-in-chief held the whole of Kent, except that portion retained by the King, which included the towns of Canterbury, Dover, Dartford, Faversham, and Aylesford, with Milton and Tottington. First came Odo, Bishop of Baieux, who held no less than one hundred and eighty-four manors ! The other land- holders were chiefly ecclesiastical — the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Rochester; the Abbots of Battle and St. Augustine's at Canterbury ; the Canons of St. Martin's at Dover ; the Abbey of Gand and Albert the Chaplain. The laymen were Hamo the Sheriff, Earl Eustace, Richard de Tonbridge, and Hugh de Montfort.
156 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
importance of the strategical positions they occupy ; those thrown up in the towns were generally placed in an angle of the line of defences so as to dominate the place and permit the introduction of reinforcements and supplies from the open country should the townsfolk attack the castle. Where the town is situated upon a navigable river, the castle was so placed as to command the water- way, as at Canterbury, Rochester, and Tonbridge ; and in the case of private castles erected by the great land- owners upon their fiefs, those of Allington and Eynesford. Save for slight modifications introduced by variations in the geographical features of the sites selected, all these Norman castles are of one uniform type. They consisted of a lofty, conical mound of earth, surrounded by a deep ditch, and partly encircled at its base by one or more crescent-shaped enclosures (also surrounded by deep ditches) called baileys. One detail of their construction has been ignored by nearly all writers of history, that is the universal prevalence of the use of timber for their first defences. Not only were the earthen banks surround- ing the baileys crowned by lines of stout wooden palisades, but the great mound was also encircled at the summit by a similar wooden stockade, which enclosed a lofty wooden tower dwelling, and the palisades of the baileys were carried across the ditches, up the side of the mound to join the stockade at the top, so as to form one continuous line of defence ; access to the mound was gained by a bridge across the ditch, and a steep flight of steps running up the side of the mound. In the baileys below were erected wooden shed dwellings for the Norman followers of the lord, together with very extensive ranges of stables and barns, to accommodate the numerous horses needed for the new Norman method of fighting on horseback, instead of on foot in the obsolete Saxon way. There were two reasons for this extensive use of earth and timber castles of what is now known as the " mount and bailey " type — the castles were needed at
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 157
once ; there was no time to execute elaborate works in stone, even had the technical skill of the period been equal to the task involved. The materials were available on the spot, timber being at that time abundant every- where, and labour was plentiful, for the Chronicle tells us how " in 1067 William went over to Normandy, and his regents, Bishops Odo and Earl William, remaining in England, wrought castles widely throughout the realm, and oppressed the poor folk, and ever thereafter greatly grew this evil."1 No skilled labour was required, and the building of a castle was the work of a few days only, for Orderic tells us that in io682 William tarried eight days at York after the suppression of the Northern rebellion, rebuilt the castle which had been burned by the rebels, and threw up a second castle on the opposite bank of the Ouse, and it is obvious that so short a stay could only suffice for the erection of just such castles of earth and timber. Moreover, the mounds of both these castles remain at the present time.3 As a defensive work the moated mount is admirably adapted to allow small bodies of men planted in the midst of a hostile population to maintain their position even against heavy odds, as is shown in the history of most of the early sieges, where for a time the means of defence were superior to those employed in attack. The second reason for the employ- ment of timber was that the earth of a newly-raised mound or bank required time to settle before it could bear the weight of solid stone walls. Where the site was naturally rocky, as at Deganwy in North Wales (the Castel Gannoc of the Chronicles], and stockades could not be driven into the ground, stone was employed for walls, but as a rule in the time of the Conqueror its use is confined to gatehouses (as may be seen at Exeter, and perhaps Tickhill), which were built on the natural or
1 Saxon Chronicle, vol. i., p. 342.
2 Orderic, book iv., chap. 5.
3 York : The Story of its Walls and Castles, T. P. Cooper, pp. 215, 238.
158 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
unmade ground in a gap purposely left in the line of the earthen banks. When the timber ring wall at the summit was replaced by one of stone, which we find to be the case in about ten years after the Norman Conquest, it is called a " shell " keep, and of these there are several excellent examples in Kent. The first castle at Allington was of this type, as are Leeds, Tonbridge, Saltwood, Tong, and Thurnham Castles. Mr. G. T. Clark, in his list of shell keeps in Kent, mentions three which cannot be satisfactorily identified, " Haydon Mount, Newington, and Kennardington."1 There are no less than four Haydons in Kent : one at West Wickham, where there is a small entrenchment thrown up in the days of Queen Elizabeth by Sir Christopher Haydon ; Haydon (alias Cossington) is a manor in Horsemonden ; Haydon Manor (called the Mount) in Cobham parish ; but there is no record of any castle having existed at either of the above places.
There is a Haydon Sewer2 in the parish of New- enden,3 which (passing close by Castle Toll) falls into the river Rother. In 1693 there was a lofty mound and banks here, but it has been greatly lowered since by ploughing ; it is, however, still traceable, and is distinctly of the " mount and bailey " type, so that it is probably the place referred to by Mr. Clark. Newington is probably a misspelling of Newenden, or it may be meant for Tong, which is not far from Newington next Sittingbourne, from which it is distant about 4! miles.
Of Kennardington, while this may have been one of the adulterine castles erected in the reign of Stephen, and destroyed by Henry II., it seems probable that Mr. Clark derived his information from Hasted as to this.4 The
1 Mediaeval Military Architecture, Clark, vol. i., p. 146.
2 " Sewer," a Kentish word for an open dyke to carry off land drainage water.
3 Archaologia Cantiana, vol. xiii., p. 16; and Hasted's History of Kent, vol. vii., p. 166.
4 Hasted's History of Kent (second edition), vol. vii., p. 245.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 159
Kentish historian gives a description of some ancient fortifications, having a small circular mount, below the hill on which the church stands, and adjoining it to the south-east. Possibly some such works may have existed in his day, and as already stated they were probably remains of a Danish Camp. His history was published between 1778 and 1799. At the present time the church of Kennardington stands on a knoll or spit of land pro- jecting into the marsh below ; no trace of any such works as described now remains. The Ordnance Survey Map shows a roughly-defined rectangular work situated on the north and east of the church, on the slope of the hill towards the marsh — a very likely place for an entrench- ment thrown up to defend a fleet of light draught ships hauled up on the beach. This land is now laid down in grass, the adjoining field south-east of the church is now arable land, but there is no trace of any mount there, nor could an old inhabitant of the parish recollect the removal of anything of the kind when the Royal Military Canal was made in 1807, which runs just below the hill. The Manor of Home (alias Kennardington) was held of the constable of Dover Castle by castle guard tenure in capite, which may, as in the instances of Borne and Ferle in the adjoining county of Sussex,1 have given rise to the mistaken idea that there was formerly a castle here, but as the place is not mentioned in Domesday this is uncertain.
Having surveyed the earlier military remains, we will now deal with some of the later castles in the order of their importance. Of these, Dover is easily " Primus inter pares."
DOVER CASTLE
There is a widespread, and I think erroneous, idea, that a castle existed at Dover, built by the Saxons, before 1066. There is no evidence of the existence of any
1 Sussex Domesday Book x., line 31 ; xi. line 17.
i6o MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
such castle prior to the advent of William the Conqueror, and the expression used by the Chronicler William of Poitiers is actually destructive of this idea. Although Domesday Book commences with an account of the town of Dover, which is written in capitals, and rubricated to show that it was the name of the place, there is no men- tion of any castle existing there, or in close proximity to the town, at the time of the survey in 1085, and for this there is an excellent reason. Dover was originally of Roman foundation, and as such was surrounded by a wall with towers at frequent intervals1 ; the harbour was on the east side of the town, and extended from where the Imperial Hotel now stands to new St. James' Church. It was this walled town, with its well-protected harbour, that formed what, according to the Chronicler William of Poitiers, Duke William demanded that Earl Harold should give up to him at the death of Edward the Confessor, for the words used are " Castrum Doveram." It has been clearly shown by Mr. Round2 that the expression " Cast- rum Harundel " in that portion of the Domesday Book which relates to Sussex does not refer to a pre-Conquest castle existing there, but to the entire town and port of Arundel ; a like inference may be legitimately drawn from the expression " Castrum Doveram," that what was pre- sent to the mind of Duke William was the advantage to be derived in prosecuting his claim to the English Crown by the delivery to him of the strong walled town of Dover, with its snug harbour, as affording a safe and ready means of communication with the Continent, and in particular with his Duchy of Normandy. The expres- sion " Castrum " has been carelessly translated as " Castle," where what the Chronicler really meant was a fortified town. While there may have been small earth- works on the heights of Dover, erected to guard the light-
1 ArchcRologia Cantiana, vol. xx., pp. 128, 136.
2 A re hceolog ia, vol. Iviii., "The Castles of the Conquest," J. H. Round, pp. 331-333.
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houses in late Roman times, it is pretty clear that at the time of the Norman Conquest there was no castle (or what the Normans would have understood by the term) on the eastern heights above the town. It is difficult, indeed, to see what purpose could be served by any such work, too far distant for the defence of the town (already protected by its Roman walls of stone) or the harbour ; certainly not the seat of a new landowner surrounded by a hostile population, it is most improbable that there was any castle of the regular " mount and bailey " type, or any need for such prior to the Norman Conquest. The Norman system of warfare consisted in the employment of large bodies of horsemen, therefore the baileys of their castles are of large size, capable of containing vast ranges of stables, barns for the horse provender, and shed dwellings for the accommodation of the garrison. It is probable that a simple entrenched camp with earthen banks, enclosed by a shallow ditch, may have taken the place of the earlier Roman work, of which the church and pharos formed the centre ; but the existence of a large Norman " mount and bailey " type castle upon the eastern heights prior to the Conquest may be dismissed as an idle fable ; indeed, the whole testimony of the Saxon Chronicles shows that such a work was alike alien to the national feeling and opposed to their system of warfare.1 The Norman favourite of Edward the Confessor (by whom alone such a castle could have been built) had no con- nection with Dover, which, like the rest of Kent, was almost entirely held by various members of the house of Godwin. The Chronicle informs us that William remained eight days at Dover, during which time he extended and added to the fortifications upon the eastern heights.2 Within them stood an irregular hillock (then, as now, the
1 See ante, p. 156.
2 As already noticed on p. 157, this space of time two years later sufficed for the erection of a complete mount and bailey castle of earth with timber defences by the army of William I. when at York, showing the rapidity with which such works could be thrown up.
M
162 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
highest point of the hill), having on its summit the church and the Roman pharos. This was probably levelled, the sides steeply scarped, and increased in size with material from new and deeper ditches surrounding it, and a fan- shaped bailey was added, extending northwards from its base towards what is now the Inner Ward.1 It is certain that no elaborate works on an extended scale were executed at this time, for Orderic tells us that the army was enfeebled by a severe epidemic of dysentery2 during its stay at Dover, due probably to its defective com- missariat arrangements and the drinking of bad water in the great marsh, across which the army had marched from Senlac, to attack and punish the men of Romney for the slaughter of some of their comrades. Owing, how- ever, to the numerous and frequent additions, alterations, and removals executed by the military authorities, it is now well-nigh impossible to trace out the lines of the earthworks with any degree of accuracy. Moreover, the regulations prohibit all sketching or photographing in the vicinity even of the castle, and the maps of the Ordnance Survey of Dover are carefully left blank in the area, which, unfortunately, contains not merely the modern fortifications, but the whole of the ancient castle. No information as to the levels of the various portions of the fortress is obtainable, consequently an accurate description of even that which remains of the earlier works in earth or masonry is an impossibility. The great keep has been converted into water tanks and store rooms, and the public is little by little, and slowly but surely, being gradually excluded by the authorities from access to what, until a few years ago, was freely open to inspection. New barracks, batteries, and magazines have been erected, and the ancient works have been so altered by additions, extensions, removals, retrenchings,
1 The Antiquary ', vol. xxxviii., " Moated Mounds," by J. A. Rutter, Part I., p. 239, paragraph 6; and p. 242, paragraph 10.
2 Orderic. Vital., Book III., chap, xiv., p. 488. (Edn. Bohn.)
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tunnellings, and filling up of ditches, to adapt the mediaeval castle to modern military purposes, that many of the original features have in the process been obliterated, or erased beyond the power of recall.
We may assume that the castle as left by Duke William was of the usual "mount and bailey" type, with earthen defences, probably surmounted (as at Hastings)1 by a wooden stockade and tower, and deep ditches cut in the chalk rock (here so solid as to stand like a wall), the Roman pharos and the church being within the palisade that surrounded the top of the great mound on which they stood. By about the time of Henry I. masonry seems to have been gradually substituted for these defensive works, and an additional enclosure was made, surrounded by a stone wall having numerous towers, constituting an enlarged or a second bailey, extending round the east, north, and west fronts. All these towers (except the Constable's tower, re-built between 1278 and 1299), from that of Peverel on the west to Godwin on the east front, are of Norman work, or rest on Norman foundations. These works sustained one siege in 1137, during the reign of Stephen, and this may have revealed the weakness of their design, for during the reign of Henry II. numerous entries (beginning in 1168) upon the great Roll of the Pipe testify to extensive preparations then in progress for works so vast that commencing in 1182, they were not completed until 1188. During this period, the exterior defences were remodelled and improved, a new citadel, or cingulum, with a ring of towers, was built, occupying a site in the outer or second bailey, but impinging on the first or inner bailey to such an extent that portions of its defences were removed to make room for the new work ; within the citadel was built the great Keep, measuring
1 Freeman, Norman Conquest, vol. iii., p. 273; Saxon Chronicle, "Hi Worhton Castel act Hastinga Port, 1066," p. 338; The Bayeux Tapestry, Fowke, pp. 108, no, and plates Iii., liii.
1 64 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
98 feet by 96 feet (exclusive of its forebuilding), and the third largest of its kind in England. The cost of these immense works (including the preliminary preparations, transport of stone, and other building materials) amounted to the enormous sum of £4,763 173. 8d. During the second constableship of Hubert de Burgh, the castle underwent its famous siege by the Dauphin Louis of France and the insurgent English barons which is so graphically described in the Chronicle by Roger of Wend- over, from whom we learn that the siege began on June 24th, 1216, the attacks being made by projectile engines, aided by battering rams, and mining, chiefly directed against the north-west angle of the defences, the sole point affording sufficient level ground without the walls for the erection of siege towers and the working of the various engines. The siege proved abortive, and was raised shortly after the demise of King John, having lasted a little over four months. Matthew Paris, another chroni- cler, called Dover " the very front door of England," and King Philip Augustus seems to have also regarded it in this light, for having enquired if his son Louis had taken Dover Castle, and being answered " Not yet " — " Then," said he, " my son holds nothing in England." The lesson taught by the siege appears to have disclosed the need of an additional defensive work to command the plateau on the north, and a great redoubt was constructed, projecting like a vast spur from the north front, enclosed by a high wall, strengthened with numerous towers, having in the centre of its rear face a tower (of which the basement storey still remains partly buried in a modern bastion that occupies the site of the ancient spur work), known as St. John's, that communicated by a bridge with the Magminot tower of the outer ward, and by a subterranean passage (which still exists) excavated in the solid chalk, with the citadel surrounding the keep. These extensions were carried out under the supervision of Hubert de
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 165
Burgh, between 1220 and 1239, at a great expense, partly defrayed by the Scutage of Kent and other onerous exactions and taxes. At the same time the eastern and western flanks of the castle were secured by walls, having towers at frequent intervals, extending from the Peverel and Godwin towers, respectively, to the edge of the cliff. In 13/1, extensive repairs were effected, and during the reign of Edward IV. the Clopton tower was re-built, and, according to Lambarde,1 a sum of £10,000 was expended in placing the castle in a thorough state of repair throughout. The works executed by Henry VIII. and his successors being designed for modern fire artillery do not fall within the limits of this description. The rapid advance of Duke William upon Dover immediately after Senlac, instead of London, shows the value he attached to its possession, which does not appear to have diminished, his successors having, in the feeling words of the old chronicler, " ever regarded it as the ' Clavis et repagulum Angliae.' "
CANTERBURY CASTLE (Chief)
As at Rochester, there were at Canterbury two suc- cessive castles, entirely different in type. The first one was the work of Duke William, and of the usual " mount and bailey " pattern. It was raised on a site almost entirely without the line of the present wall and ditch, which are of much later date, and opposite to the sham mound known as the Dane John (erroneously supposed by some authorities to have been its keep). In 1789 this mound was a low hillock, not rising to the height of the rampart walk (exactly as it is depicted in the earliest known plan of Canterbury,2 by Hoefnagel, in I562).3 When the waste place, now the Dane John gardens, was
1 Perambulation of Kent, William Lambarde, p. 142 in the 1826 reprint of the original book of 1570.
2 Archaologia Cantiana, vol. xxv., pp. 250, 254. 8 See pp. 212-214.
i66 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
levelled, and laid out as a pleasure ground, this hillock, by paring its shapeless sides, and heaping up the material so gained, was erected into its present absurd shape ; at no period was it large or lofty enough to have formed the mount of the castle. Although William, after his coronation, subsequently planted a castle within the walls of almost every city of importance, as at York and Win- chester, there was in the present instance an excellent reason why this castle — the first of his works actually abutting upon a town — should yet be erected without the city limits, so that opposition should not be unduly excited by its novelty. During his stay at or near Canter- bury for about a month, Duke William was merely a successful invader ; the prestige which subsequently attached to him as a crowned King was still to be attained, and it was no part of his shrewd policy to arouse unneces- sary opposition to his schemes. Another reason which renders it impossible that his castle should have been within the lines of the present city walls is, that from the Roman period down to that under discussion, this portion of the present city, extending from Wincheap to Riding Gate, was then a morass, into which all the refuse of the city was cast, traversed by a channel, which, in the early mediaeval period, was known as the Black Dyke. During excavations in connection with the drainage works, in I868,1 the ancient Roman road was discovered some three feet below the surface near Riding Gate, and along its south-western side, at a depth of 14 feet, was much black vegetable mould, oyster shells, charcoal, ashes, and much broken pottery ; the bottom of this deposit was not reached, showing that it extends to a far greater depth. Where (as in the present instance) such deposits are found along a continuous line, it is a proof of the exist- ence of an early ditch outside a wall, from the practice common in mediaeval times of throwing broken pottery and rubbish over the wall into the ditch, as the readiest
1 Archceologia, vol. xliii., p. 151.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 167
way to dispose of it. The present walls have nothing to do with those enclosing Roman Canterbury, which was of much less extent than the later Saxon city, as that was in its turn than the later mediaeval one. The Roman city wall extended from a point on the river bank a little to the South of Beer Cart Lane (the old Watling Street), in an easterly direction till turning northwards, and passing near the south-west angle of the present cathedral, it returned to the river bank at a point a little to the south of St. Alphege's Lane. The river was its defence all along the western side, and the great island between the two branches of the Stour was then a wide pool, forming a harbour accessible to the light draught shipping of the period. The Roman walls were found at various points during the excavations of 1868, and in many places within the present mediaeval wall, but outside the Roman one, cinerary urns have been found from time to time, and as by the law of the twelve tables a dead body may not be burned or buried within the limits of the city, we are thus enabled to define with sufficient exactitude those of Roman Canterbury. The first Castle of Canterbury is indirectly mentioned in Domesday, in connection with an exchange of land. Eleven houses having been destroyed in making the castle ditch, the King gave the Archbishop seven, and the Abbot of St. Augustine's fourteen houses, for land re- quired and taken as a site for the castle. Somner, writing in 1640, tells us that this castle, with an extent of about three acres, was outside the earthen bank, which, in the pre-Conquest period, defended the city ; only when the present walls and ditch were made was a small por- tion of its bailey cut through, and left within them as a low hillock. Upon the building of the new castle, and the alteration of the line of the city defences upon this side by Henry II., between H66-H74,1 the great
1 Leland, writing in the time of Henry VIII., speaks of the great mound of Bourne Castle in Lincolnshire as " The Dungeon Hill."
1 68 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
mound1 was reduced in height and the ditch filled up (as at Allington), it and the rest of the castle bailey became the property of a family named Chiche, and was known as the Manor of the Dungeon2 from the reign of Henry II. down to that of Edward IV.; the partially slighted earthworks remaining almost unaltered until, in 1860, they were swept away by the alterations that took place on the construction of the L.C.D.R. in order to form a site for the new station. The Pipe Roll of 1168 contains an entry of a payment to Adeliza Fitz Simon, which continues in the following years, of five shillings for the exchange of her land, which is in the Castle of Canter- bury. This refers to land taken for the erection of the new castle by Henry II. on a new site, rendered necessary by an addition already made to the defences of the city, which had impaired the strength and utility of the old "mount and bailey" castle. Between 1166 and 1173, a series of payments appear upon the Pipe Rolls, amounting to about £30, for making a gate and enclosing the city of Canterbury ; this probably refers to the incorporation with the earlier works of a triangular-shaped area, extending from about Wincheap Gap to Riding Gate, the salient angle being at the point where the present conical mound (to which the name of the Dane John has been transferred) now stands. A wide ditch, and a bank with a timber palisade, and probably a wooden gate, served to enclose the additional area. Much needless confusion has been caused by various modern writers upon Canterbury from their not having seen the site of the earlier castle prior to the making of the railway, and from a want of knowledge of the early maps and plans of the city, they have been so far led astray by the pre- sent sham mound, yclept the Dane John, as to have
1 This is always spoken of by all the early writers on Canterbury as " The Dungeon Hill " long before the present Dane John Hill was in existence.
2 Leland, writing in the time of Henry VIII., speaks of it as "wrier now by the Castell the eminent Dungeon hill riseth."
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 169
seriously taken it for the mount of the earlier castle, utterly regardless of the fact that it had no existence before 1790, prior to which there was nothing at that point save a low hillock (formerly a portion of the earthen bailey), which did not overtop the later stone wall erected between 1215-1225. How greatly the level of the ground has changed along the southern and east- ern face of the wall is shown by the fact that as late as 1562 the water from the Stour was admitted by a narrow channel (part of which is still in existence near St. Mildred's Church) into the city ditch, and, flowing by the postern, Worth, or Wincheap, Riding, Newing, Bur, Quenin, and North gates, discharged into the river again at the point where the Abbot's Mill stood, then known as " the Water Lock." The great keep of Henry II. was, as usual, built upon an entirely different site some distance \.t> the west of the former castle, and close to the river. Although the entries in the Pipe Roll are by no means so extensive as those relating to Dover, they suffice to enable us to say that it was finished before 1174. It is only exceeded in size by the keeps of Colchester, London, Dover, Norwich, Bristol, and Duffield, of which the last two are no longer in existence. The upper storey was pulled down in 1817, when the rest of it had a narrow escape of sharing the same fate ; externally it measures 88 feet by 80 feet, and is now reduced to about 45 feet in height ; it was enclosed by a ditch and a wall with several towers, and had its own gate to the city, and a barbican on its eastern side. The area enclosed in its bailey extended from a point near St. Mildred's Church to Wincheap Gap, and on the city side the gate stood about the spot where in the modern Castle Street is the entrance to the gasworks. Much nonsense has been written about the so-called " Roman " Worthgate, and it has been confused by several writers with the Wincheap gate, but although it is possible that some Roman build- ing, of which the arch was a part, once stood at this
1 70 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
point, it was far beyond the limits of the Roman city boundary, and the wall in which it was embodied was not erected, from the evidence of the Close Rolls, until 1215-1225, consequently the theories of the writers in question do not rest on a stable foundation of fact. The plans of the keep (fortunately preserved)1 show that it resembled several of the other rectangular keeps belong- ing to the same period. Originally it was of four storeys, and was internally sub-divided by two cross walls, in one of which (as at Rochester) was the well-pipe ascending to the now destroyed top storey ; the great hall was on the third storey, and was lighted by large windows, the others below having only narrow loops. The walls are about 1 1 feet in thickness, and are of rough flint and rubble masonry, with dressed Caen stone strings and quoins ; at each angle were broad pilaster buttresses with lesser ones between, two on the wider and one on the narrower front ; the battering plinth is now nearly buried by the raising of the ground level, and the forebuilding (which was on the north-west side) is completely destroyed. The history of the new castle after its com- pletion appears to have been of the most uneventful nature, although from its situation on the great road running from the coast to London it retained some measure of importance for a considerable period. In 1216, both city and castle were surrendered without any siege to the Dauphin Louis of France, and during the reign of Henry III., Hubert de Burgh had it in his keep- ing. In 21 Edward I., 1293, some portion of it was used as a prison, and at a later date served as the principal gaol of the county, until, in 1577, this was removed to the West gate. The castle being a royal one, was doubt- less, like the Tower of London, used as a place of safe keeping for the King's prisoners.2 There is a curious
1 Archceologia, vol. iv., pp. 390, 392; vol. vi., pp. 298, 310.
2 In 5 Edward II., 1312, William de la More, Master of the Knights Templars in England, was (according to Rymer's Fcedera, vol. iii., p. 83) imprisoned in the Castle of Canterbury under the jurisdiction of the Sheriff of Kent upon the suppression of that Order.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 171
entry on the Crown Roll of Edward II, concerning the escape from custody of Walter de Wedering, and Martin- at-Gate de Lamberhurst.1 " These prisoners of our Lord the King sat bound in a certain place called the Barbican, nigh to the said castle, to beg their bread, and, on Shrove Tuesday, they escaped and broke their bonds, and Walter took sanctuary in the church of St. Mary de Castro, hard by. He afterwards abjured the realm, but his comrade, of his own accord, returned to his prison." In 4 Richard II., 1381, the city and castle of Canterbury were taken and plundered by a party of rebels, led by one John Salos, of Mailing, on their way to join in Wat Tyler's insurrection, goods to the value of £1,000 (more than twenty times the value at the present day) being carried off. They broke into the castle and liberated John Burgh, an approver, Richard Derby, a convicted clerk, Agnes Jehyn, and Joan Hancock, prisoners, whom they found fettered and manacled within the said castle. They also imprisoned William de Septvans, sheriff of Kent, and compelled him to swear that he would deliver up all the rolls and writs that were in his custody. The castle seems to have been allowed to get into a dilapidated condition, for the Inquisi- tion of 9 Edward III., 1336, discloses numerous defects requiring to be made good ; it continued to be used as a prison down to the time of Elizabeth, when the gaol was removed to the West gate. The castle was in the hands of the Crown until in the latter part of the reign of James I. it was granted to a Mr. Watson, by whose descen- dants it was sold, and has since passed through the hands of divers owners. From 1577 it was neglected and allowed to go to decay ; the outer walls were in a ruinous state, much of them being pulled down about 1 770, and in 1 792 the remainder was demolished. The ditch was filled up, and houses were built on the site ; part of it was discovered during the erection of the present gas works. The castle has had a chequered career, commencing as a
Somner's Antiquities of Canterbury, p. 35.
1 72 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
royal residence, then a prison, next a ruin, then the pump- ing station of a waterworks, at which time the interior of the keep was gutted and the ornamental stonework torn out, leaving nothing but the rubble walls, and finally, to the everlasting disgrace of the city of Canterbury, it has suffered the further degradation of serving as the coal store-shed of the adjacent gas company. In 1817 an attempt was made to pull it down altogether, but was dis- continued after the battlements and the top storey of the four had been removed. When the coal in store is at a low ebb, the remains of the staircases, well-pipe, and the commencement of the cross walls are still distinguishable.
ROCHESTER CASTLE (Chief)
Here, as at Canterbury, there were two castles of different dates, on sites not very far apart While Domesday Book does not record any extensive destruc- tion of houses in order to clear a site for the new castle, such as are mentioned elsewhere, it states that the Bishop of Rochester received as much land at Aylesford as was worth 1 75. 4d., " in exchange for the land in which sits the castle of Rochester." When marching upon London, Duke William does not appear to have made a prolonged halt at Rochester, as at Dover and Canterbury, but the advantages of the site could not have escaped his keen eye, and there is little doubt that the erection of the castle may be dated from soon after his coronation. Advantage was taken of a small natural hill, situated near the south- west angle of the Roman castrum, and at some little distance outside its walls. This, with the aid of the deblai excavated from the ditches surrounding the new castle, was so increased in size as to serve for its mound, which, though shorn of some portion of its height and size, still survives, crowned by a modern summer-house in the grounds attached to Satis House ; its mediaeval name of " Boley " hill may be a corruption of Bailey hill. There
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 173
is no room for doubt that on this site was erected the " mount and bailey " castle of the Conqueror. Its nature, position, and size agree in all respects with what has been already observed as characteristic of the first castles of the Conquest. We learn from the Textus Roffensis1 that between the years 1097 and 1089, Gundulf, Bishop of Rochester, built a new stone2 castle for William Rufus, in the better part of the city of Rochester, and this was erected upon a different site within the Roman city wall, and (with the exception of its rectangular keep, built in the next reign) was substantially the castle bounded by the outer walls that still remain. The old Castle con- taining the Boley Hill was included (as an outer bailey) in Gundulf's plan, for the new castle ditch was cut through the Roman wall, near the south gate of the city, in such a way as to combine with that of the earlier castle. On the demise of the Conqueror in 1087, Bishop Odo seized upon the old castle, and held it for Duke Robert, William Rufus (who whatever his faults were, was almost as great a captain as his father) promptly blockaded both city and castle until, under the pressure of famine and pestilence, both were surrendered, and Odo was finally banished from the realm. This — the first of the sieges of Rochester — formed a conspicuous incident in a period of great mili- tary activity, and is worthy of more notice than has been given it by the contemporary chroniclers. Upon its termination, Gundulf seems to have commenced to build the new castle, an irregular polygon of a somewhat lozenge shape, with rounded angles, enclosed by a thick and lofty wall of the rudest rubble masonry, laid herring- bone fashion, which, as the execution of the work called for no great skill, enabled it to be rapidly completed. It was surrounded by a wide and deep ditch that separated it from the city, and, like the castle of Pevensey, advan- tage was taken of the earlier Roman works, which were
1 Textus Roffensis, p. 145, " In pulchriore parte civitatis Hrouecestre." llbid., p. 146, " Castrum sibi Hrofense lapideum de suo construeret."
174 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
utilised to form its western and southern walls. The castle, thus constructed seems to have remained in the King's hands for thirty-six years, when in 1126, Henry I. granted "to Archbishop William de Corboil, and his successors, the custody and constableship of the castle of Rochester, with permission to make such a defence, or tower, within it as he liked." The continuator of the chronicler, Florence, tells us that the Archbishop built in consequence a handsome tower, " egregiam turrim," which is the existing rectangular keep. William died in 1139, between which date and 1126 the keep was there- fore built. The new keep has from its great height an appearance of being larger than is really the case ; it measures 70 feet square exclusive of its forebuilding, and is 113 feet in height from the present ground level. The walls are 12 feet thick at the base and 10 feet at the summit, the reduction being made by a slight external batter (as at London); the great thickness of the wall is intended to allow of an unusual number of mural chambers and galleries. Rochester is by no means one of the largest of its kind, being exceeded in size by the keeps of Colchester, London, Dover, Norwich, Bristol, Duffield (in Derbyshire), Canterbury, Middleham, Kenilworth, Bowes, Lancaster, Castle Cary (in Somersetshire), and the Peel of Fouldrey, near Barrow-in-Furness. Both in design and external appearance it resembles the keep of Castle Hedingham in Essex, which belongs to the same period. There are flat pilasters at the angles, and one in the centre of each face. After the siege in 1215, the southern angle was rebuilt, and strengthened by a projecting rounded buttress. There is the usual central partition wall dividing the interior, the well pipe rising in it to the roof, with an opening on each floor for drawing water. A newel staircase in the north-east corner ascends from the basement to the battlements, serving all the floors, which were of wood throughout, the two lowest being lighted by loops only. The great hall was on the third floor, and was lighted by two tiers of large windows,
ROCHESTER CASTLE: THE KEEP.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 175
the upper ones communicating with each other by means of a gallery in the thickness of the wall (as at Newcastle- on-Tyne and Hedingham). Originally the hall was probably covered by a hipped roof sunk below the battle- ments ; at a later period the central wall was raised, and a flat roof covered with lead at the level of the rampart walk replaced the earlier and lower roof, thus increasing the accommodation of the keep by two large rooms. On the north side is the forebuilding, approached by an in- clined pathway, of which the outer wall is now destroyed ; it contained a pit prison, a basement, a ground floor with a bridge pit protecting the main entrance to the keep, and a chapel on its upper storey. In the east front on the first floor is a small postern, about 15 feet above the ground, and 30 feet from the wall walk, with which it was connected by a light wooden bridge. A similar one existed in the keep of Newcastle-on-Tyne. In 1215 the place was besieged for the second time by King John, who, aided by a strong train of military engines, reduced the castle after a siege of three months' duration ; and, according to Roger of Wendover, little harm was done to the keep by the pro- jectile engines. Its capture was due to the efforts of the miners who first breached the outer walls ; this resulted in the capture of the baileys, the defenders being shut up in the keep. They next undermined its south-eastern angle, which fell, and brought down a large portion of the walls; the keep then surrendered. In May, 1216 (not having been repaired), the castle was easily taken by Louis the Dauphin, but on the death of John it was surrendered to Henry III. This King, who was a great builder, ordered the castle to be thoroughly repaired. The fallen angle of the keep was rebuilt, and the line of the bailey wall was altered, the wall being so rebuilt that instead of the keep being upon the wall, it stood about 12 feet within it ; a new tower,1 about 30 feet diameter, capping
I Archaic gi a Cantiana, vol. xxi., pp. 30, 55, "Mediaeval Rochester."
176 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
the angle of the wall, was built, the drawbridge and its outwork beyond the ditch were repaired, also the gutters of the hall in the keep, and some alterations were made in the forebuilding. The bailey was divided by a cross wall (now removed, which ran close to the north side of the keep) into a small inner and a large outer ward. All these repairs and alterations were carried out between 1216 and 1227, the Close Rolls containing numerous entries relating to them. During the barons' wars, Rochester was held for the King by Roger de Leybourne with a strong garrison. Expecting an attack by Simon de Mont- ford, he had amply provisioned the castle. The barons laid siege to it just before Easter, and after a fruitless blockade of a week retreated to join their leader, when Roger with the bulk of his garrison joined the King in time to share in the defeat of Lewes, on May I3th, 1264. This was followed by the surrender of the castle to the barons, but after Evesham, Leybourne resumed his governorship. In 1367 and 1368 extensive repairs were carried out by the order of Edward III., at a cost of more than ^1,200,! but since that period the castle declined in importance, as it played no part in the national history. In 1610 the castle was granted by James I. to Sir Anthony Weldon, and fell gradually to decay, until in 1883 it was purchased by the Corporation of Rochester, when it was laid out as a public recreation ground, and in 1896-1904 the keep was thoroughly repaired under the supervision of the Society of Antiquaries.2
ALLINGTON CASTLE (Chief)1
At the time of the Domesday survey the manor of Allington formed a part of the extensive possessions of Odo, Bishop of Baieux. After his downfall it was
1 A re hezologia Cantiana, vol. ii., pp. 111-132, "The Fabric Roll of Rochester Castle."
id., vol. xxvii., pp. 177-192.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES
177
granted to William de Warenne, who was probably the builder of a normal type " mount and bailey " castle here. The position at that time must have been a strong one, and of great importance, being close to the river Medway, of which it commanded the passage and the fords, and also to overawe the town of Maidstone, which is about two miles dis- tant. This castle was
slighted in 21 Henry
II. (or 1175), when an entry in the Pipe Roll records a payment of 60 shillings to the Sheriff of Kent, " in proster- nendo castelli de Alintone," which can only refer to the overthrowing of the great mound of William de Warenne's castle. Towards the close of the reign of Henry III. the manor had passed into the hands of Sir Stephen de Penchester, Constable of Dover Castle, and Warden of the Cinque Ports, to whom, and to his wife Margaret, Edward I. in 1281 granted a licence to crenellate1 their house of Alintone in Kent. Of the castle, as then recon- structed, there remain the enceinte wall of an enclosure of an irregular parallelogram form, having four D towers,
1 As the term " licence to crenellate " is somewhat obscure, and will be of frequent occurrence, it may be as wdll to give a short explanation of it here. The ordinary manor house of the early Middle Ages was not furnished with any means of defence. Before it could be fortified, or converted into a Castle, or a new castle be erected on its site, the royal permission to do so had to be obtained, and from the ex- pression used therein it is known as a licence to crenellate, and runs generally as follows: — "Rex omnibus ballivis, et fidelibus suis ad quos, etc., salutem. Sciatis quod concessimus pro nobis et heredibus nostris dilecto nobis Laurencio de Lodelawe quod ipse mansum suum de Stok Say in comitatu Salop muro de petra, et calce, firmare et Kernellare, et illud sic '•firmatum et Kernellatum tenere possit sibi et heredibus suis
N
178 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT ' •
a gatehouse with a segmental pointed arch, and a chase for a portcullis, opening between two solid towers of a D shape,1 a part of its covering barbican, a range of lodg- ings along the west side, and on the east side some remains of the great hall, with the triple doorways in the screens leading from the buttery, kitchen, and pantry. The castle was surrounded by a ditch about 65 feet wide, fed with water from the adjacent river ; that on the west side may be all that remains of William de Warenne's castle, the great mound of which was on the south side. When it was levelled, the great ditches would be filled up, and the banks thrown into them, as the readiest way of disposing of the material. All that now remains of the great mound is a low, grassy hummock, part of which has been levelled and converted into a croquet lawn. From de Penchester the manor passed to the de Cobhams, Brents, and Wyatts, the second of whom, the celebrated Sir Thomas, who died in 1542, was the author of the famous anagram, Wyatt a Wit, a courtier, and favourite of Henry VIII. ; he was also a poet and statesman. His son, the second Sir Thomas, having headed a rebellion in 1553 against the marriage of Queen Mary with that other gloomy bigot, Philip of Spain, was, after its failure, tried and executed for high treason, and his estates were forfeited to the Crown. In 1569 Elizabeth granted them to John Astley, Master of the Jewel House, in whose family they remained until, in 1720, they were alienated
inperpetuum sine occasione nostri vel heredum nostrorum quorumcumque. Incujus, etc., Teste Rege Edwardi, apud, Hereford XIX die Octobris 1291." Such is the form of licence for the building of Stokesay Castle in Shropshire. To crenellate means to crown the summit of both walls and towers with battlements having alternate solid portions (called Merlons), having spaces or intervals between them called embrasures or crenelles. In some instances the merlons themselves have V-shaped openings, wide within, tapering to a narrow slit on the outer face, having a steep downward rake, or slope commanding the base of a wall or tower (as as Caernarvon Castle, North Wales, and elsewhere), through which archers could shoot without exposing themselves to an enemy.
1 These solid towers resemble those at Amberley Castle in Sussex, and thoes of the great gate of Knaresborough Castle, Yorks.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES
179
to the family of Marsham, the head of which, Lord Romney, is at present their owner. To Sir Henry Wyatt, or his son, the first Sir Thomas, are probably due the porch of the great hall, and several large windows inserted in various parts, which have probably replaced small and inconvenient loopholes of the earlier period. A notable feature about the thirteenth century buildings is the original1 brickwork forming part of the windows and doorways ; the bricks, which are of a light colour, having been made to fit the jambs in many places. The castle underwent further alterations towards the close of the six- teenth century, to which period may be assigned the drum tower at the outer extremity of an enclosure on the north front, between the castle and the river, of which only this tower and portions of two thin walls now remain. Allington was one of the seven chief castles of Kent.
B AY FORD CASTLE (SITE
BAYFORD CASTLE (Minor)
The site of this castle (now no longer in existence) lies in the marshes, about half a mile north-east of Sitting- bourne railway station ; nothing remains save a quad- rangular enclosure about 250 feet square, now used as an orchard, surrounded by a moat about 30 feet wide, filled with sea-water by a branch leading up from Milton Creek, which is about 315 yards distant. It does not appear to have ever been of much importance ; the quadrangular island appears to have been sub-divided into two portions by a
1 Archaological Journal, vol. xii., Second Series, p. 183.
i8o MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
cross ditch, resembling (though on a much smaller scale) the castle of Cowling, Kent, and that of Caistor, in Norfolk. The manor of Goodneston, in which the castle is situated, seems from a very early date to have formed part of the extensive possessions of the great Kentish family of de Leybourne ; it passed from them through the families of de Nottingham, Cheney, and Lovelace. By the close of the fifteenth century it had become a mere farm- house, and is now known as Bayford Court. The principal interest attaching to it is that, prior to the Norman Con- quest, King Alfred is said to have thrown up a " geweorc " here in 893, in order to repel the inroads of the Danes under Bjorn laernside,1 who had formed an encampment at a place called Milton, in Kemsley Downs, situated on the opposite side of Milton Creek, close to where it enters the Swale, about one and a half miles to the north of Bayford Castle. This camp is now known as Castle Rough, and consists of a quadrangular earthwork about 1 60 feet square, surrounded by a wet ditch; on one side, between it and the creek, is a large pool about two acres in extent (now cut off from communication with the creek by a modern embankment), which in the Saxon period afforded a safe and commodious harbour for the ships of the Danish invaders, where they might be left under the protection of the adjacent camp, while the main body was free to ravage the country round. Surrounded as it was by marshes, it must have been impregnable to any means of attack which could have been employed for its capture at that time, save a prolonged blockade.
BINBURY CASTLE (Minor)
The manor of Binbury formed a portion of the enormous holding of Odo of Baieux. After his forfeiture it was granted to Gilbert de Magminot, to hold by Knight
1 Saxon Chronicle, p. 164; and Lappenberg's Anglo-Saxon Kings, vol. ii. (Ed. Bohn), p. 91.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 181
service tenure in capite, and afterwards passed, with the adjacent manor of Thornham, to the de Northwodes, who held it down to the time of Henry V. The sole incident of note in its uneventful history occurred here during the reign of Edward III., when Lady Alice de Northwode was buried by a sudden landslip of the hill, and was stifled before she could be extricated. The site of the castle is about if miles north-east of Detling, and ij miles north of the other and more important castle of the de Northwodes at Thornham. It is on the northern slope of the great chalk range (known as the North Down), which rises here to its highest elevation of 651 feet. Owing to its retired situation, remote from main roads, the castle does not appear to have been of much importance, and probably being an excellent example of a Norman mount and bailey castle constructed in earth and timber, it was allowed to go to decay when Thornham became the chief seat of the de Northwodes. In 20 Edward III., 1347, the manor contributed the sum of sixty shillings towards the aid for the knighting of Edward the Black Prince.1 The remains of the castle are scanty, and consist of a large mound, oval in shape (having at the summit a long diameter of about 160 feet, and a short one of 95 feet), which is surrounded by a deep ditch about 60 feet wide. The mound has been somewhat reduced in height, and its material used to fill up the ditch enclosing the bailey, the site of which is now occupied by the manor house of Binbury and its farm buildings. The late G. T. Clark cites2 Binbury as being " a small but very perfect example of a moated mound," which is perfectly correct, but goes on to say " such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle calls a burn." This last is, however, an absurd and now quite exploded theory evolved by him, from his own imagination,3 and is, per se,
1 Archaologia. Cantiana, vol. x., p. 142, sub. "Bengebery."
2 Ibid., vol. xv., p. 344.
3 Arck-. Jour., vol. Ix. " English Fortresses and Castles of the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries," pp. 81 and 72-90.
182
sufficient evidence that although Binbury was a moated mound, it had nothing to do with the Saxons, and was not one of their burhs, or burgs (by which was meant an enclosed town), but an early Norman earth and timber castle of the usual mount and bailey type.
COLEBRIDGE CASTLE (Minor)
Save for some wide and deep ditches and portions of walls, now incorporated in a modern farmhouse, nothing remains to show that a castle formerly stood here. The
-o-
CASTLE
r/
\\
site is a small plateau on the southern slope of the Quarry hills which rise here to a height of about 350 feet, and in the valley of one of the numerous small streams that unite lower down the valley to form the little river Sherway, which falls into the Beult at Headcorn. In the time of Henry III. the manor of Colebridge was held by Fulco de Peyforer, who, in 1267, was acting as King's Escheator in Kent. In the following reign we find him obtaining a grant of freewarren for his lands at Colebridge, and in 7 Edward II. (or 1314) a "licence to crenellate " or fortify "mansum suum de Colwebrigge Kane." The family of Peyforer was of considerable eminence in the
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 183
county from earlier times, for we find Osbern Peyforer mentioned in Domesday Book as a tenant of Bishop Odo of Baieux,1 and the family seem to have held lands at Barham, Buckland, Boughton Malherb, Wichling, Mid- ley, Wittersham, and Lullingstone in Kent ; and also in Bedfordshire. On the resumption of Odo's fiefs by his nephew, they doubtless continued to hold their lands for some time directly from the Crown, and afterwards from the new grantee, probably one of those de Malherbs who are recorded as holding that manor in 12 John (or 1211), and from whom the parish takes its name. Shortly after the building of the castle we find it in the possession of the family of de Leybourne, and on the decease, in 1367, of Juliana de Leybourne, Countess of Huntingdon, this with other manors in Kent were conveyed to the King by the trustees of her will.2 On the accession of Richard II. it became vested in John, Duke of Lancaster, and other feoffees in trust, for the performance of certain religious bequests under the will of Edward III., and for the better observance thereof, we find Richard II., in 1398, granting this manor to the Dean and Canons of the College of St. Stephen at Westminster, in whose hands it continued down to the dissolution of the monasteries in 1545. In 2 Edward VI. it was granted to Sir Edward Wotton, from whom it passed by successive descents, intermarriages, and sales through the families of the Stanhopes, Earls of Chesterfield (by whom, in 1750, it was sold to the Manns), to the family of Cornwallis, the present holders of the manor. Philipott states3 that the manor of Boughton Malherb was, in 36 Edward III., in the possession of one Robert Corbye, and that in that year, 1363, he obtained the royal licence to crenellate the manor house he had previously built there, and as there
1 Kent Domesday Book, L. B. Larking, "Extension," p. 23, lines 15, 21.
2 For the will of this celebrated Kentish heiress see Archceologia Cantiqna, vol. i., pp. 1-8.
3 Philipott's Villare Cantianum, Second Edition, p. 90.
1 84 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
is a tradition that the hewn stone and other materials of the castle of Colebridge were made use of to build Boughton Place it seems probable that the castle of Colebridge was demolished about this date, which would account for there being no mention of it in later times. As far as can be traced the outer ward appears to have been roughly triangular in shape, having sides about 450 feet in length, surrounded by a deep ditch or moat about 60 feet wide, supplied with water by a branch of the small stream already mentioned. Save on the north-west, and a portion of the north-east sides, the ditch is now filled up. Within the outer ward was the inner one, placed not quite in the centre of the triangle, also furnished with a deep ditch 60 feet wide enclosing a rectangular parallelogram 80 by 1 70 feet ; on this stands the modern farmhouse, and the south-eastern portion of the outer ward is occupied by the farm buildings. The manor of Boughton Malherb (of which at that time Colebridge probably formed a part) appears on the forfeiture of Bishop Odo to have been granted to Eudo Dapifer, the builder of the great keep at Colchester, and, subsequently, to have passed to the de Leybournes, who held it down to the time of Edward II. The triangular shape of the outer ward is so unusual, and there being no signs of any earlier "mount and bailey" type of castle having been constructed on this site, that I am tempted to hazard a conjecture that this peculiarity may have been due to that William de Leybourne,1 "vaillans horns sans mes et sans si," who, in 1300, served under Edward I. at the siege and capture2 of Caerlaverock Castle in Dumfriesshire, Scotland. This castle is also triangular in plan, having sides of 152 feet, and a base of 171 feet long. William might, on his return home, have advised his friend and connexion, Fulk de Peyforer, to adopt this novel form of ground plan in building that
1 The Siege of Caerlaverock, Sir N. H. Nicholas, p. 44.
2 Castellated and Domestic Architecture of Scotland, Macgibbon and Ross, vol. i., pp. 127-136.
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new house which he had just obtained the royal licence to fortify.
EYNESFORD CASTLE (Minor)
The earliest mention of Eynesford is to be found in the Textus Roffensis, which contains an account of a lawsuit, about A.D. 970, between Leofsune and the monks of Christchurch, in Canterbury, as to the ownership of the place. This suit being tried before the King's judges (of whom Archbishop Dunstan appears to have been one), terminated in favour of the Monks, for this reason, at the time of the Domesday Survey the Manor of Eynesford (or as it was then called Elesford)1 was held of the Archbishop of Canterbury, by Knight Service ; it was then so held by one Ralph Fitz Unspak (or Uspak), and, judging by the valuation, the place was one of some importance. There were two mills, and what is more remarkable two churches2 (Dartford at that time having only one church). The early history of the place is then a blank until the reign of Henry II, when we find a family bearing the same name as the place seated there, one of whom, William de Eynesford, was Sheriff of London, and a Tenant-in-Chief of the Crown for other lands and manors. This William may be considered as one of the links in a chain of circumstances which terminated in the murder of Archbishop Thomas a Becket. In 1163 we find the two in high dispute about the patronage of the church of Eynesford,3 the Archbishop having excommunicated his opponent because he had unceremoniously ejected from the living of Eynesford one Laurence, a priest to whom it had been
1 Not to be confounded with Aylesford on the Medway, then also called Elesford.
2 Domesday Book of Kent, Extension, pp. 98, 1. 29, and 104, I. 3.
3 According to Hasted, vol. ii., 2nd edition, p. 536, the grandfather of William gave the church to the monks of Christchurch, Canterbury, upon his taking the cowl there. For his grant see Register of Christchurch, Canterbury, Cart., 1372.
1 86 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
given by Becket, without observing the custom by which, before inflicting spiritual censure on one of his tenants- in-chief, he was required to give due notice to the King.1 Henry angrily bade him withdraw his sentence ; Thomas indignantly refused, saying " it was not for the King to dictate who should be bound or who loosed." This answer, albeit correct, tended to still further embitter the strained relations between the Crown and the Church, which terminated in the awful tragedy of December 29th, 1 1 70. After the murder of the Archbishop, the popular feeling ran so high against all who had been his enemies that the holder of these estates was again excommuni- cated, and, according to one writer, " owing to super- stitious feeling, the castle was left untenanted, and let to fall into decay." This, however, does not appear to have been the case at Eynesford, as another of the family was in possession of the manor and castle in 12 and 13 John, 121 1,2 and they remained therein until the reign of Edward I., when they passed into the great Kentish family of Criol, and having been subject to many and frequent changes of ownership, finally descended to the family of Hart-Dyke, of Lullingstone, the present possessor of them. The exact date of the erection of this castle is not known. The outer wall was doubtless the work of one of the first Norman holders, and may be as early as William II. The rectangular keep, with its forebuilding, was probably erected (like most of its kind) between 1154 and 1189. No licence to crenellate existing, nor any allusion thereto shows that the castle was already in existence before the accession of Henry III., in whose reign these licences are first mentioned. The site selected for the castle was admirably chosen, it being low, marshy ground, abutting on the south bank of the river Darent, which was utilized to supply with water the wide moat that surrounded it, and commanding
1 R. Diceto (Stubbs), vol. i., p. 311. 2 Red Book of the Exchequer.
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that ford or passage of the river from which the place derives its name, to which ran a raised causeway, about 30 feet wide, passing close by the north side of the moat. The ruins are extensive, but lacking in detail, having suffered much damage about 1830, when the place was fitted up to accommodate a pack of hounds, and used as hunting stables. They consist of an outer wall (much broken down), having two small breaches, and a rectangular keep. The outer wall was about 30 feet high, and 5 feet 4 inches thick, and is built of flint rubble, having a slight external batter from the base of about 8 inches. The absence of any projections, or towers, may be adduced as a proof that it is of early Norman date. In shape it forms an irregular oval polygon, of twenty unequal sides, enclosing about three- quarters of an acre. The original entrance was on the north-east, about 25 feet above the moat, having stone corbels without, which served to support a wooden bridge across it. There was another entrance at the south end, and on the north an arched recess in the wall below the rampart walk which would seem to have been the window of an earlier great hall, removed when the later keep was erected ; probably the various domestic buildings formed a series of sheds, with roofs leaning to the walls, extending round the northern and western sides as least exposed to attack. The moat on the north side was about 30 feet in width, but is now, by filling up, nearly obliterated on the other sides. The keep is a rectangular building, also of flint rubble masonry, interspersed with Roman bricks, having walls varying in thickness from 5 to 7 feet 6 inches. Externally it measures 71 feet 6 inches in length by 39 feet 3 inches in breadth, and is divided into two unequal compartments by a cross wall 2 feet 10 inches thick. There was a large forebuilding which served to protect the original entrance ; this extended along the southern face of the keep for about 55 feet,
1 88 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
and varied in width from 18 feet 10 inches to 26 feet 2 inches ; only the foundations of it now remain. The walls of the keep itself, which was probably about 70 feet in height, have been destroyed, with the excep- tion of about 10 to 17 feet above the ground level. There was a newel stair 5 feet 8 inches diameter in the north- wall, extending upwards from the ground floor in the north-west angle of the larger room. In the smaller are remains of what appears to be an original fireplace in the south wall, and in the north-west angle is a door leading to a flight of steps affording access to a small garde-robe in the north wall. It does not appear that any traces of a cross wall dividing the bailey were observed (or indeed sought for) at the time of the excavations in 1835 ; if there were such, it might have been looked for between the two breaches in the east wall, where is now the modern entrance, and the west wall opposite thereto. The size of the keep is, for a minor castle, considerable, and is only exceeded (in Kent) by those of Dover, Canterbury, and Rochester, to which last, indeed, it bears some resemblance, and, like it, may have been the work of Archbishop William de Corbeuil, who died in 1139. The keep is placed in the centre of the north front ; with a view of strengthening this — the weakest face of the external defences, which is overlooked and commanded — the distance from the outer wall varies, owing to its curvature, between 9 and 23 feet. The level of the bailey was about 6 feet above that of the meadow-land without, which was formerly on the southern half of the defences little better than a wide morass, that materially added to the difficulty of attacking that front of the castle.1 There was formerly another manor in Eynesford, called " Orkesden " (now, by corruption, Austin lodge), which
l For a detailed account of the excavations at the Castle, see Archaologia, vol. xxvii., 1838, Appendix, pp. 391-397.
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in 15 Edward III., or 1342, was in the possession of Reginald de Cobham, who in that year obtained a licence to crenellate his house there, but it does not appear to have been a place of any importance, and, like its larger neighbour, passed in the eighteenth century into the possession of the family of Hart-Dyke.
NEWENDEN-CASTLE TOLL (Minor)
It has been erroneously supposed by the majority of the historians of Kent that this place was the site of the famous city of Anderida, and much distorted evidence has been adduced by them in support of their mistaken theories. These rest, however, for the most part, upon the evidence of a camp upon the supposed site, and its proxi- mity to the river Rother, then, as now, a tidal stream.1 Before proceeding to describe the remains, let us take a brief glance at the facts as they really exist. In the first place Castle Toll is not placed upon the bank of the Rother, but is more than half a mile distant therefrom, nor is there any reason to suppose that the river has, in this part of its course, ever changed its present channel, despite its various divagations at points nearer to the sea. Castle Toll is situated close to the Hexden (or Haydon) channel, which formerly supplied its moat with water. This is a small stream which, rising some nine miles away, near Flimwell, flows into the Rother about one and a half miles below Castle Toll, near a place called Maytham Wharf, about three quarters of a mile below the spot at which the remains of the ancient ship were discovered in 1823. This ancient vessel was 64 feet in length by 15 feet beam, and 9 feet depth, and when discovered was buried over 10 feet below the surface in sea sand and mud. It is supposed
1 The tide still flows to a little above Bodiam Bridge, four miles beyond Newenden, and fifteen miles from the sea at Rye Harbour.
2 Archaologia, vol. xx., O.S., p. 553.
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to have been cast away in the great storm of 1287, when Old Winchelsea was overwhelmed, and the very course of the Rother was completely changed.1 At a time when transport by road was so difficult by the miry and frequently impassable trackways leading through the forest of the Weald, the river afforded an easy and expeditious access to this part of Kent from the coast, and it must be borne in mind that from Saxon times down to the close of the Middle Ages the Rother had a channel (then much deeper, both from the scour of the tide and the greater volume of fresh water) which was navigable by vessels with an even greater draught of water and of larger size than that already indicated. In 1879 the place was visited by that eminent archaeologist, Mr. C. Roach Smith, who thus expresses his opinion : —
I deny the possibility of these earthworks having been a Roman station, and much less a permanent one, such as Anderida must have been. Excavations on the site yielded no trace of pottery, coins, or building material, nor has anything of the kind been ever found near this place. My contention is, that even if the Newenden earthworks had been of a far more important kind than they really are, they could never have sheltered Roman soldiers in winter quarters, and had they ever occupied this position for any length of time there would have been abundant vestiges of their sojourn. — Arch. Cant., vol. xiii., pp. 489, 491.
Since these lines were penned by Mr. Roach Smith, traces of Roman occupation have been found within the Weald at three points, all within a few miles distance of Castle Toll, to which it was previously supposed they had not penetrated. A quantity of Roman cinerary urns were found at a point about one and a quarter miles north of Biddenden; a Roman urn with ashes and some coins were found near Reading hill, in Tenterden ; and a fine bronze vase at the foot of Rolvenden hill, near
1 See map in History of the Weald oj Kent, by Robert Furley, F.S.A., vol. iL, parti., p. 251.
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the New Mills channel valley, at a point about two miles distant from Castle Toll. The earthworks are of two periods — a pre-Conquest one, which, while it may have been of Roman, or Romano-British origin, is, I think, more probably a defensive work thrown up by a body of Saxon or Danish invaders to protect their shipping, and possibly to form an encampment for the winter, while raiding the surrounding country in a methodical and leisurely manner. This camp, of which a portion has been destroyed, was an irregular enclosure of about 1 8£ acres, roughly triangular in shape, and surrounded by a wet ditch 65 feet in width. Its extreme length (including the destroyed portion at the apex) measures 1,450 feet, and the breadth at the base measures 670 feet. It is thus considerably larger than the late Roman Castrum at Pevensey, which measures 975 feet from East to West, and 525 feet from North to South. In the pre-Conquest period, the Hexden channel stream may have, and probably had, sufficient depth of water to float a light draught Saxon or Danish ship. Within the area of the pre-Conquest earthwork a Norman castle of the usual type has been subsequently erected, the mound of which has given the place its name of Castle Toll.1 The castle has been placed across the upper portion of the triangular enclosure, the apex of which has been destroyed to furnish material for its mound ; this at the top is now 65 feet and at the base about 125 feet in diameter, and was surrounded by its own ditch, of which traces remain. The mound stands at one corner of a rectangular bailey, having an area of about if acres with well-rounded corners, which measures 210 feet by 250 feet, and is surrounded by a ditch 70 feet in width (formerly supplied with water from the Hexden stream), having an external
IToll, being a Kentish word (now obsolescent), usually applied to a clump, or row of tall trees, and by analogy to a low hill, or mound, forming a conspicuous landmark.
1 92 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
raised bank. The situation is admirably chosen, the castle occupying a knoll of land now elevated some 14 feet above the surrounding marshes, which here are only about 1 1 feet above sea level, and in the early post-Conquest period it must have been well-nigh impregnable as it lies out in the marshes some one and a quarter miles to the north-east of Newenden church. Some years ago the owner of the manor of Lossenham had a cutting made completely through the great mound1 to its base, when it was found to consist simply of layers of earth piled one upon the other, and no traces of any remains were discovered. Dr. Plot, who visited the place in 1693,2 states that even then "the banks were very lofty," and that he was informed by an old countryman, who had often ploughed over the site, that in his own time both mound and banks were become some four feet lower than when first he knew the place. If this be taken as a measure of the rate of waste in the lifetime of one man, what, therefore, must have been the denudation when spread over a term measured, not by years, but by centuries? The marvel is that so much has survived comparatively uninjured down to our own time. At the compilation of Domesday Book " Newedene," as it was then called, was held by the Archbishop of Canterbury (to whose other manor of Saltwood it had been attached during the reign of Edward the Confessor), and his successors continued to do so until 31 Henry VIII., 1540, when it was conveyed to the Crown by Thomas Cranmer, in exchange for other estates elsewhere. The manor of Lossenham, on the hill above Newenden village (of which Castle Toll is now a part), was at the time of the Survey held by the family of FitzAucher, and in 26 Henry III., 1241, one of them founded there a Priory of Carmelites, of which nothing now survives but a portion of a moat, the last remains
l Arch. Cant., vol. xiii., p. 490. 2 Harris's History of Kent, p. 215.
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of the foundations of both church and monastic buildings having been grubbed up to mend roads with many years since! In the Hundred Roll of Kent, \ Edward L, 1272, the lord Ralph de Seyntleger is recorded to have held " the fourth part of a Knight's fee at Lossenham, in Newenden, of 'our Lord the King,' but the town of Newenden is now in the hand of the Lord Richard de Waleys, who wrongfully takes a toll of sixpence there from all boats passing, and, moreover, he claims the right of a gallows, with the assize of bread and ale there, and this by the liberty of the Archbishop."1 King Edward I. had a seat at Newenden (possibly this castle of which FitzAucher may have been the Castellan). He was there hunting in 1299, 1300, 1302 and 1304, or, if the Castle were then in the Archbishop's manor, de Waleys may have served in that capacity to His Grace. In 20 Edward III, 1347, Henry FitzAucher paid for one-fourth of a Knight's Fee in Lossenham — ten shillings to the Aid for Knighting the Black Prince. There is no recorded date for the construction of the castle, which, however, must have been built soon after the Norman Conquest, nor when it was allowed to go to ruin.
SISSINGHURST CASTLE (Minor)
Strictly speaking this was not a proper castle, but a defensible quadrangular manor house such as Old Brock- hill, Hever, and Ightham Mote — of this nothing now remains except stone foundations of its outer walls, and a portion of the moat on the eastern and southern sides. At the close of the reign of Henry VII. the manor was sold to Thomas Baker, whose grandson, Sir John Baker, was Speaker of the House of Commons, and under Queen
IBy this is meant what is known as "High," as opposed to " Middle and Low " Justice, and carries with it the power not merely to fine and imprison, but to inflict the death penalty. O
194 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Mary played a prominent part in the burning of the Kentish Martyrs at Cranbrook and Canterbury. The old house (then very ruinous) was pulled down by him, and a new half-timbered one built, with a lofty three-storey gatehouse of brick, having stair turrets at the angles ; his son, Sir Richard Baker, entertained Queen Elizabeth here in 1573, on her return from Rye. Subsequently the estate passed to the Manns of Biddenden, whose friend, Horace Walpole, visited the place in 1752, when he wrote : "The park is in ruins, and the house is in ten times greater ruins, for the back of it is but lath and plaster, hence its speedy decay." Shortly afterwards it was used as a place of detention for French prisoners of war, and more recently as a parish poor house. It is now a farm, and the site of the castle is an orchard.
STOCKBURY CASTLE (Minor)
The history of this castle closely resembles that of Binbury, for, as there, the manor was originally part of the vast Kentish possessions of Bishop Odo ; but upon their forfeiture it passed to the family of Auberville, who held it by the usual knight service tenure. William de Auberville in 4 Richard I., 1 192, founded the priory of West Langdon, near Dover. His granddaughter Joan carried the estate by marriage to Nicholas de Criol, who for his good service at the siege of Caerlaverock Castle, Scotland, was created a Knight Banneret in 28 Edward I., 1300, and it remained in his family down to 38 Henry VI., 1460. In 20 Edward III., 1347, the manor contributed an aid of seventy shillings towards the Knighting of Edward the Black Prince.1 The site of the castle is to the east of the village, which lies on the northern slope of the great chalk range of the North Downs (here 371 feet above sea level) near what was probably an
1 Arch. Cant., vol. x., p. 142, sub. " Stokebery."
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ancient Roman road1 between Maidstone and a place now called Key Street, near Sittingbourne, upon the Watling Street, from which last-named town it is about four and a quarter miles distant. Although the great mound has been improved away, and one-half of its ditch filled up, that of the crescent-shaped inner bailey is nearly perfect. Both are about 50 feet in width, the mound being probably about 220 feet in diameter at the base.2 Like Richard's Castle, in Herefordshire, and that of Earl's Barton, in Northamptonshire, it has the peculiarity of having a church3 situated close to the bailey, or in this instance in what may have been an outer bailey, part of the ditch of which is preserved in a sunk road leading to a now disused gravel pit. The mound itself (and the inner bailey) has been levelled, and the site is now occu- pied by the house and outbuildings of Church Farm. The castle was of the usual " mount and bailey " type, but owing to the Criols having their principal seat at Westenhanger, Stockbury was allowed to go to ruin, probably about the end of the reign of Henry III.
SUTTON VALENCE CASTLE (Minor)
This is a small castle situated on a spur of the Quarry Hills (so called from their rag-stone beds). It com- manded the road from Maidstone to Rye, and Old Winchelsea. By whom or when the keep was erected is a matter for conjecture, as no architectural detail remains, but like others of its kind it was probably built during the reign of Henry II. The keep of Peak Castle, in Derbyshire (which is smaller than this), was built in
1 Archaologia, vol. li., Map of the Archaeological Survey of the County of Kent.
2 About the same size as the Binbury mount.
3 The church at the present time contains much good Early English work, but no traces of Norman architecture are visible. It was drastically restored about 1851, at which time evidence was found that the tower had been repeatedly injured by -fire.
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22 Henry II., 1176. The site of the bailey has been levelled, and the ditch filled up. It is now a hop garden ; nothing is left save a crumbling wall on the western side, and the ruins of the small rectangular keep at the southern extremity. It is about 38 feet square, with walls 8 feet thick, the floors being of timber ; in the south front of the upper storey are the beam holes, and two mural chambers, which may have been an oratory and a garderobe. There were large windows on this floor, the basement being lighted by loops. The walls are much broken down ; on the north side are remains of what may have been a destroyed forebuilding. The simple construction and rude masonry, together with the absence of any known licence to crenellate, all point to its having been built about the time of Henry II. The castle was probably allowed to go to ruin about the time of Henry IV., and it had no interesting incidents con- nected with its history.
Sutton Castle may have been the work of William le Gros, Earl of Albemarle, who died in 25 Henry II., 1179, as in i John, IIQ9,1 his daughter and sole heiress Hawisia, married Baldwin de Bethune, who held Sutton jure uxoris. Their daughter carried the estates into the family of Mareschal, Earls of Pembroke, from whom they passed to Eleanor, daughter of King John, and so to her second husband Simon de Montfort. After his death at Evesham, their estates were forfeited to the Crown, and Sutton was subsequently granted by Henry III. to his half-brother, William de Valence, who bestowed his own name upon the place, in order that it might be more readily distinguished from the many other Suttons in Kent. After passing through the families of Hastings and Grey it was sold, and at the present time is held by Sir Robert Filmer, a descendant of the author of the Patriarcha.
1 Arch. Cant., vol. xxv., p. 205.
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THORNHAM CASTLE (Minor)
The history of Thornham is substantially that of Binbury, save that before becoming a fief of the de North- wodes it passed intermediately through the families of Say and Turnham, of which last Robert de Turnham (the founder of Combwell Priory, near Goudhurst) held it in the time of Henry II., and it did not vest in the de North- wodes till about 1270. It remained in their family until 3 Richard II., 1379, when it became the property of Robert Corbye, of Boughton Malherb, from whom it passed to the Wottons. The castle crowns the point of a steep spur that juts out from the great chalk range of the North Downs, which rise here to their maximum elevation of 650 feet. It lies about four miles north- east of Maidstone, and is placed about 50 feet below the summit of the range, and some 300 feet above the village of Thornham, from which it is named, thus serving to command not only the road from Maidstone to Sitting- bourne, but also the old Pilgrim Way to Canterbury.
The castle is, as might be expected, of the usual Norman mount and bailey type, but here masonry has from a comparatively early date taken the place of its primitive wooden defences. The ground has been so extensively quarried for chalk, that it is now somewhat difficult to trace the original design, as the site is encum- bered with heaps of quarry refuse. The bailey is placed on the west side of the mound, upon a platform of about three-quarters of an acre in extent. Advantage has been taken of the steep slope of the hill to reinforce the south face of the enceinte by a bank and ditch, thus converting it into an outer and lower bailey, commanding the road that winds up the ridge from below, and which in its turn is commanded by the inner bailey and the mound. There are two parallel walls of the inner bailey gatehouse, which project some 25 feet northwards beyond the external face of the bailey wall. In them are two round- headed recesses, dividing the gate passage into two bays,
198 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
and there are two small round-headed doorways, which led into rooms on the east side of the gatehouse, probably those of the porter's lodge and the guard room. A low curtain wall (now about 12 feet high and 4 feet thick) extends about 90 feet westwards from the gatehouse, where it terminates in a broad, flat pilaster buttress, possibly the base of a corner tower. Remains of the wall are traceable southwards for about 200 feet along the edge of the bank, after which it turned eastward and ran up the mound. There are now no traces of any ashlar, but much of the wall shows a face of coursed flints, resembling that of Berkhampstead Castle in Hertford- shire. The great mound at its base is about 280 feet in diameter, diminishing at the summit to about 75 feet diameter. It is slightly oval in shape, like that of Tun- bridge Castle, and was upwards of 100 feet in height. The traces of flint masonry which remain upon it show that it was crowned by a polygonal or oval shell keep, resembling that of Lewes in Sussex (prior to the subse- quent insertion of its towers). The bailey walls were carried up the mound on each side, to unite with the wall of the shell keep (as at Richard's Castle, in Herefordshire). A sunk road cut in the chalk winds up round the castle from below, beneath, and close to the west wall, and bending sharply to the right, gives access to the gate of the inner bailey on the north face, where alone any masonry remains above ground, as on the other sides the walls have been quarried away, and demolished down to the foundations.
At a point about two miles east of Thornham Castle, and, like it, a little below the summit of the ridge, the place-name " Snakeshaw Castle " occurs on the one-inch Ordnance map. It does not, however, appear that there ever was any castle here, nor do any of the County Histories contain any reference thereto, so that, to borrow from the nomenclature of the Patent Office, it is probably "an invented name."
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 199
TONG CASTLE (Minor)
Tong forms yet another item in the interminable list of manors held by Odo of Baieux, who might, from the extent of his possessions in Kent, be fitly described in the expressive language of the old Norse poets as " breid gripr," the widely seizing one. At the time of Domesday Survey Hugh de Port held Tangas (as it was then called) from the Bishop, and the village even then boasted a little church, in which at the present day Norman work is still in evidence. The legend of Hengist the Jute having built the castle upon ground measured with thongs of ox-hide may be dismissed as an idle tale. After the de Ports the manor was held by the St. Johns, and in 34 Edward I, 1306, by Ralph FitzBernard,1 whose daughter carried it to the de Badlesmeres, Castellans of Leeds Castle, passing afterwards through the families of Bohun and Mortimer to Richard Duke of York (father of Edward IV.). On his death at the battle of Wakefield, in 1460, it reverted to the Crown, and was re-granted in i Edward VI., 1547, to Sir Ralph Fane, from whom it has since passed through many hands by purchase and sale. The castle stands embowered in cherry orchards about 1 1 miles east of Sittingbourne, and close to the line. of the L. C. & D. Railway. It is of the usual Norman mount and bailey type, surrounded by a wide moat. A portion of the bailey on the south side has been excavated away in order to form a yet larger store pond for Tonge mill, which stands just without the bailey on its east side, so that the Manorial Mill might receive the protec- tion of its owner's castle, as at Little Billing, on the Nene, in Northamptonshire. The millpond and the castle moat were supplied with water by a small stream that, rising
1 Aid of 20 Edward III., 1347, towards Knighting the Black Prince Hundredum de Mideleltone, De Domino Willelmo de Boun, Comite Norhamtonie, pro. ii. f. que Radulphus filius Bernardi, tenuit apud Tonge de predicto Johanne de Sancto Johanne, iiij. li. (equivalent to four pounds sterling, or at the rate of 40 shillings for each Knight's fee, one of the few payments recorded as made in pounds).
200 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
about a quarter of a mile away, at the spring of St. Thomas a Becket, hard by the vanished wayside chapel of the martyr in the village of Bapchild, on the Watling Street, flows into Teynham Creek leading in from the Swale, here some two miles distant. The mill dam also contains an island 120 feet square, a little to the south of the bailey, from which it is reached by a bridge. Probably it was the site of a later manor house, when the old castle was abandoned on account of its unsuitability to more modern residential requirements. The great mound is about 80 feet in diameter at the summit, which is slightly oval in shape. The ditch surrounding it and the bailey is about 40 feet in width, and is now dry. It is nearly perfect on two sides and part of a third.
WESTENHANGER CASTLE (Minor)
At the Domesday Survey Westenhanger or, as it was then called, " le Hangre," was divided between two manors — Heyton, then held by Hugh de Montfort ; while the land where the castle now stands was a part of the manor of Berewic, or Berwick, then held by William de Eddesham (or Adisham) from the Archbishop of Canter- bury. At a later period the manor appears among the possessions of the de Aubervilles (already mentioned in connection with Stockbury Castle). By the marriage of Joan de Auberville to Nicholas de Criol, or Kiriel, the manor was transferred to that great Kentish family. One of them is said to have rebuilt the old manor house at " le Hangre " during the reign of Henry III. The present castle came into existence in 17 Edward III., 1344, in which year John de Kiriel has a licence to crenellate " mansum suum de Westynhangre, Kane." The Kiriels seem to have retained the manor down to 1461, when, on the death of Thomas de Kiriel without male issue, the estate passed to Thomas Fogge, of Ripton, near Ashford, who had married his daughter Alice. In 18 Henry VII.,
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 201
1503, it came by bequest to Sir Edward Poyning (himself a descendant of John, younger brother of Nicholas de Kiriel). The estates subsequently lapsed to the crown, and in 1585 they were granted to Thomas Smythe, farmer of the Customs to Queen Elizabeth. From him they passed through divers families, and the castle is now a mere farmhouse surrounded by the buildings of the Folkestone race course. In 1347 John de Kiriel paid the forty shillings customary for a Knight's fee to the Aid for Knighting the Black Prince.
Westenhanger Castle is situated in the valley of the East Stour, about 400 yards from the S.E.R. station of the same name. It is a moated, castellated house, of the novel type introduced into England towards the close of the fourteenth century, the inception of which is due to French influence.1 The house is a rectangle of about 200 feet square in plan, having at three angles drum towers about 22 feet diameter, and at the fourth a tower 16 feet square, standing like a diagonal buttress to both faces of the walls. On the north, east, and south faces are similar square towers, placed about the centre of each front. On the west face another square tower contains the principal gatehouse. There was a central courtyard 100 feet by 90 feet square, round which were arranged the kitchen, great hall (50 feet by 32 feet), the private chapel, and other apartments. Access to the upper floors was obtained by newel stair- cases at the angles of the courtyard. At the present time all that remains of this are portions of the west, north and east walls, and portions of the towers. An early sixteenth century house, having eighteenth century additions, occupies the north-east angle of the court, and a new approach has been made on the east face. The site of the great hall and chapel is now a garden. There was an exterior courtyard on the west front in which were
l Scotney, Bodiam, Cowling, Lumley, Bolton, Wressle, Sheriff, Button, Maxtoke, Shirburn, and Nunney Castles are all of this type.
202 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
situated stables, barns, a large chapel dedicated to St. John, and the manorial mill worked by the Stour, which was dammed up and diverted to supply the moat (about 50 feet wide) which surrounded the castle on all four sides. The greatest damage was done to the place in 1701, when it was sold for £1,000, and two-thirds of the house and St. John's Chapel were pulled down for the sake of the building materials. The Roman road running from Lympne to Canterbury, known as the Stone Street, passed about a quarter of a mile to the east of the castle.
BRENCHLEY CASTLE (Minor-Nonexistent)
The Hundred of Brenchley is not mentioned in the Domesday Survey (like several other places lying within the Weald), because it was then probably wild, un- reclaimed forest land. As early as 1 190 the village was of sufficient importance to have a small church, which was given by Richard de Clare to his newly-founded Priory of Tunbridge in Frankalmoign. According to the Hundred Roll for Kent, completed in 3 Edward I., or 1274, the entire Hundred is returned as being "in the King's hands, and as worth only one mark (135. 4d.) by the year, because there is not in the said Hundred one penny of rent." The manor, however, about the time of Henry III., was held by Richard de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, and probably was included for want of a well- defined boundary in his holding of the Lowy of Tun- bridge. The castle seems to have been absolutely devoid of history, nor is the date even of its erection known. It was probably abandoned for the more important one at Tunbridge at a very early date. All that now remains to mark the site is a large mound, roughly circular in shape, about 200 feet in diameter at the summit, and surrounded by a ditch about 40 feet in width. Standing as it does about 70 yards from the road, and buried in copse wood, it easily escapes the notice of the casual
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 203
passer by. There is no trace of any bailey or ditch surrounding it. The position is an elevated one, about a mile north-east of Brenchley village on a by-road lead- ing to Pearson's Green and Yalding, and about 250 feet above the Medway Valley. Not far from it is the con- spicuous clump of tall trees known locally as " Brenchley Toll."
BROMLEY-SIMPSON'S MOAT (Nonexistent)
Strictly speaking this was not a castle but a fortified house. It was rectangular in shape, 102 feet long by 45 feet broad, and was surrounded by a deep moat 30 feet wide. The walls were of flint and rubble masonry, with large buttresses at the angles, having facings of dressed stone.
Originally it was probably a defensible house of the courtyard type, but about the time of Henry VIII. this was partly pulled down and a timber and brick house erected on the old foundations.1 The moat was filled up by the last tenant before i8i5.2 The house stood in the valley of the Ravensbourne (then a considerable stream), the moat being fed by a small brook, which ran through it on its way to the Ravensbourne. The site was to the south-west of the main road to Sevenoaks, about a quarter of a mile west of the present L. C. & D. Railway Station. Soon after 1815 it ceased to be occu- pied, and falling gradually to decay, was finally pulled down and the site built over about 1869.
In 862 Ethelbert IV., King of Wessex, gave ten caru- cates of land3 at Bromley to one of his thegns, and
1 See Archeeological Journal, 1868, vol. xxv., p. 176. A drawing of the house about 1800 is preserved in the King's (George III.) Library, British Museum. See also Warren's Sketches of the Ravensbourne.
2 Jeremiah Ringer, who lived there over fifty years, and whose name is preserved in that of Ringer's Lane, Bromley, so called from its leading from the main road to his house.
3 A carucate varied from a geldable Domesday carucate of 60 acres to one of 180 acres in some manors.
204 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
subsequently King Edgar granted about the same amount of land there to the church of Rochester. In 1076 there was a dispute as to the ownership of the manor, and the holding of the Bishop of Rochester was reduced to three sulings (a measure of land only found in Kent, which varied in different manors from 2 to 6 carucates), for which he was duly taxed at the time of Domesday Survey. About 1 1 80 the Bishops of Rochester had converted portions of their land in Bromley into knights' fees held by the usual military service, but in the absence of any evidence to connect this manor (afterwards known as Simpson's) with their estates, it would rather seem that it was not a portion thereof. It appears that a family named de Banquel,1 who held the manor in 1296, also held a great part of the land comprised in the Saxon Charter of 862, which was not subsequently bestowed upon the church. The de Banquels were great landholders in Lee, Bromley, Beckenham, Hayes, and West Wickham. The family was of considerable importance. William Bonquer, or Banquel, in 1256 was employed by Henry III.2 to negotiate with the Pope the purchase of the Crown of Sicily for Prince Edmund Crouchback. At a later date, between 1262 and 1265, we find him acting as Sheriff of Norfolk, and a Justice in Eyre for Kent. In 1307-8 John de Banquel is one of the Barons of the Exchequer. In 1305 there is a protection for John de Banquel and William de Bliburgh, who were going beyond the seas on account of the affairs of Edward, Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.3 In the Patent Rolls of the next reign there is a licence to this William de Bliburgh, the King's Clerk, to crenellate his dwelling house at Bromle, Kent.4 From the connection between de Baquel and de Bliburgh
1 They appear in the Bishop of Rochester's register as Bakwel, Bacquel, and Bankwelle ; most probably the name is a corruption of Bonquer, or Bon Cceur, as Crevequer was of Creve Cceur.
2 Close Roll, 43 Henry III., m. 13, d.
8 Pat. Roll, 33 Edward I., part ii., memb. E.E. * Pat. Roll, 4 Edward II., part i., memb. 17.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 205
(who was Rector of Bromley about 1310), it is not improbable that this licence may have related to the house afterwards known as Simpson's Moat. In 1302 there is a grant of free warren to Sir John de Banquel1 and his wife Cecilia,2 of their demesne lands in Bromley and elsewhere.3 According to Philipott, their estate passed temp. Henry V. "to one William Clarke, who received a licence to crenellate his house there," but I may say that a careful search among the Rolls has failed to reveal the existence of any reference either to Bromley, or a licence to crenellate there during that reign, nor could Lysons, writing in 1792, find any reference to such a grant among the Records (then kept at the Tower of London), and the licence cannot be assigned to that reign with due certainty.
From the Banquels the estate passed to Sir Richard Stury, the friend of Froissart.4 There would appear to have been some confusion between the William de Bliburgh, clerk of the earlier reign, and a hypothetical William Clarke of the later one; but in u Edward IV., 1472, Robert Sympson died possessed of this manor,5 and his descendant Nicholas Sympson (said to have been barber to Henry VIII.) re-built the house, and sold it to the Styles of Langley ; yet the name of Simpson's Moat has, despite other changes of the ownership to the Raymonds and Burrells, clung to the place since that date until its extinction in recent times under the advancing tide of suburban brick and mortar.
1 The same, who, at the Coronation of Edward II., was pressed to death in the crowd. Fabian, 417, Ellis. Stow, Annals.
2 Quo Warr., 314, 6 Ed. II., Ro. 4.
3 The residence of the de Banquels was a house called " Banquels," since, by corruption, " Bankers," in Lee, of which it was one of the manors.
4 Froissart, Chronicles, vol. ii., ch. xlvi., p. 574 ; Edn. of Thomas Johnes, 1844.
5 It is, a curious coincidence that in 19 Henry VII., or 1504, Robert Sympson and Cecilia, his wife, sell property in Bromley and elsewhere (including a mill close to Sympson's moat) for ^200 to Sir Richard Guldeford and his heirs. East, 27.
2o6 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
DEPTFORD CASTLE (Nonexistent)
The manor of Deptford having been granted by William the Conqueror to Gilbert de Magminot, he is said to have erected a castle there, which, as it would have commanded the passage of the Thames, the adjacent great road to Dover, and the deep ford of the Ravens- bourne, is by no means improbable. The family becom- ing extinct in 1 192, the castle seems to have fallen into ruin at a very early date. Hasted, writing in 1778, remarks that the site of it was to be traced in some old foundations " not far from Says Court, near Bromneld, on the bank of the Thames adjoining the mast dock." The site has long since been built upon, and incorporated in what is now the Royal Victualling Yard. There was another old house in Deptford commonly called " the moated place," " Stone, or King John's House," from that monarch having been supposed to have built it. Edward III. is known to have resided there,1 and Henry IV. dated his will, 21 Jan., 1408, from his manor of Greenwich. It was no doubt just such a hunting seat as King John's House at Tollard Royal, Wiltshire, a defensible house of no great strength or importance, but for additional security protected by a moat.
After the death of Charles I. the surveyors for the sale of the Crown lands presented2 " that the moat house was in (Rederith) Surrey,3 and that it consisted of a hall and kitchen, several rooms below, with six or seven chambers above, a courtyard, and stables, and that, to- gether with some workshops then lately erected for the manufacture of earthenware pottery, it was let for £30 per annum."
i Rymer Feeder a, v., 68, 638. '2- Part. Survey, Kent, No. 53.
3 Now Rolherhithe. It is really in Kent, but at that time the county boundaries were not very carefully denned.
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 207
FOLKESTONE CASTLE (Nonexistent)
In 1066 there was apparently a small harbour at Folkestone, probably little more than a creek forming the embouchure of the little river Foord. At the time of the Domesday Survey the place boasted no less than five churches and seven mills, and was of sufficient importance to warrant William de Arcis in erecting a castle there for the protection alike of town and harbour. Owing to the rapid denudation of the cliffs (here composed of layers of lumps of rag stone, interspersed with sand, resting on a bed of wet soft clay), the castle was undermined and washed away by the sea at a comparatively early date, for Leland, writing in the reign of Henry VIII., mentions a place " hard upon the shore called the castle yard, where was a great ruin of an ancient nunnery," which from his description appears to have stood some little distance to the south and west of the present church of St. Eans- with ; but castle yard and nunnery ruins have long since entirely disappeared, some 800 yards of cliff having been washed away or been destroyed by landslips since the Norman Conquest.
LULLINGSTONE CASTLE (Nonexistent)
At the time of the Domesday Survey the manor of Lolingstone was held of Odo of Baieux by three tenants : Malger, Goisfrid le Ros, and Osborne Peyforer, who has been mentioned elsewhere. In 1307 the manor was held by the family of de Poyntz, and during the reign of Edward IV. there was a lawsuit as to its ownership, which terminated by its passing into the family of de Newborough, by whom it was held from the Crown by knight service tenure till the reign of Queen Elizabeth. In 1347 the fief paid forty shillings to the Aid for Knighting the Black Prince.1 The old castle was situated
1 Aid of 20 Edward III., 1347. Hundredum de Godeshethe, De Roger de Chaundos Milite pro. j. feodo quod Hugo de Poyntz tenuit in Lullyngestone, de Archiepiscopo Cantuariensi, xl. s.
208 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
close to the western bank of the river Darent, about three- quarters of a mile to the south of Lullingstone Church ; but Leland, writing in the time of Henry VIII., states that the castle had long been in ruins, and was so in his own time. The site is now occupied by a comparatively modern farmhouse called " Shoreham " Castle. The house at Lullingstone Park had the name of the old castle transferred to it about 1740, when the estates of the family of Hart, then seated there, passed by marriage to that of Dyke of Horeham, in Sussex (now known as Hart-Dyke). There was a fine outer gatehouse of late Perpendicular work, with bold projecting turrets and machicolated parapets, formerly attached to Lullingstone House, but Sir John Dixon Dyke had it pulled down and the moat filled up about 1763, because he disliked passing over a bridge every time he entered or left the house! A similar inner gatehouse still remains. The old castle (now called Shoreham Castle) is invariably meant when " Lullingstone " Castle is mentioned in the early records, which do not apply to the present house in Lullingstone Park.
SANDWICH CASTLE (Nonexistent)
There are no remains of the castle which formerly stood here, and little is known of its history, but from the time of the Norman Conquest the place appears to have taken the lead among the Cinque Ports on account of its safe and commodious harbour, and it was a favourite port of entry from the Continent. Becket and Richard I. both landed here, one on his return from exile in 1 1 70, the monarch on his arrival fresh from his Austrian captivity. Edward III. frequently used the port as a point of departure for his foreign expeditions, and the first mention of the castle occurs in his reign. The foreign pilgrims to the shrine of St. Thomas of Canterbury generally landed here.
Being apparently a royal castle, the Castellan was
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 209
appointed by the governor of Dover Castle. The French plundered and burned the town in 16 Henry VI., 1438, and in 1471 the castle was held by the bastard Falcon- bridge against Edward IV., but was surrendered on the approach of the King. The town was protected by a wall with a broad ditch and five gates, of which the Fishers Gate and a portion of the Barbican Gate on the Margate road still remain. The castle stood immediately without the town on its south-west side, commanding the entrance to the old harbour and the approach by the Deal road. The site is low and level, the ground being not more than 12 feet above sea level. The Grammar School in Manwood Road occupies a portion of it. Like the town, the castle probably relied for protection on wide ditches filled by the tide and the river Stour. The adjacent town ditch (here 50 feet wide) may also have served for that of the castle bailey, which would have communicated with the town by the now destroyed Sandown Gate. The dates alike of the foundation of the castle, and when it was allowed to go to ruin, are unknown, but we may presume the latter to have been coeval with the decay of the town, which dated from the sinking of a " grete caryke " in the haven in 1464 ; and Sir Thomas More, in his dialogues, relates how funds were diverted by the Archbishop of Canterbury (to whom the town belonged1) which should have been employed in keeping the haven free from " wose mwdde and sande," and employed in the building of Tenterden church tower, of which living His Grace was patron. The shipwreck in the harbour mouth of a great Spanish ship belonging to Pope Paul IV.,2 which could not be removed, accelerated the shoaling up of the port, and would appear to have administered the final coup de grace to the naval pros- perity of the town.
1 Kent Domesday Book extension, p. 10. The Archbishop of Canterbury holds the Borough of Sandwich, which lies in its own hundred.
Z In 1557. Cinque Ports, Burrows, p. 200.
P
210 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
SHURLAND CASTLE (Non-Existent)
The family of Shurland had a fortified quadrangular manor house near the village of Eastchurch, in Sheppey, that occupied the site of an earlier castle, of which nothing now remains. Sir Geoffrey de Shurland was Constable of Dover Castle in 9 Henry III., 1225. His son, Sir Robert, with other levies from Kent, fought in the Scotch wars of Edward I., and for his services at the siege of Caerlaverock Castle had a grant of all the wreckage on the sea coast of his manors. He lies buried in the Church of Minster, in Sheppey. The horse's head carved upon his tomb commemorates the curious story of the cause of his death, which may be read at length in the Ingoldsby Legends, under that of " Grey Dolphin." The estate passed by the marriage of his daughter to the Cheyneys, and her descendant, Sir Thomas Cheyney, again rebuilt the house in the time of Queen Elizabeth. It was sold by his spendthrift son, and after many vicissi- tudes has been converted into a farmhouse. Nothing now remains of the second mansion of the de Shurlands save the old gatehouse.
THE BLOCK HOUSES
The so-called " castles " erected by Henry VIII. for the defence of the coast in 1539, after the suppression of the monasteries, having been constructed for use with modern fire artillery, can scarcely claim to be regarded as such in the feudal acceptance of the term. A leading principle is apparent in their plans, which only differ in detail. The forts of Sandown, Deal, Walmer, Sandgate in Kent, and Camber in Sussex, all have a low, central tower, surrounded by an outer enclosure of semi-circular bastions, which, varying in number from three to six, caused the plan to assume a trefoil, quatrefoil, or sexfoil figure. They appear to have carried batteries of 12 or
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 211
14 guns, which were probably armed with culverins of about 5^ inch bore, carrying 17 Ib. shot1 Those who desire to know more of their history should consult the interesting papers by Mr. W. L. Rutton, F.S.A., in Arch- <zologia Cantiana? in which they are exhaustively de- scribed in detail. It is interesting to observe in them how the earlier mediaeval influence continues to prevail so long after the introduction of modern fire artillery, and how, as in the feudal castles, elaborate precautions are taken to mask their entrances and render them difficult of access, and how the idea of the ancient keep is replaced by the low tower, forming the central battery. Hasted3 supposed there had formerly been a castle at Sandgate, and quotes in support of that opinion a writ of 22 Richard II., 1398, directing the captain of his castle of Sandgate to admit his cousin Henry of Lancaster (afterwards Henry IV.) with his family and train (he being then banished the realm), and allow him to tarry there for six weeks in order to refresh himself. This writ is, however, followed by a similar one of like tenor and date (3 October, 1398), directed to the Captain of Calais Castle. There being then a castle at the French Sandgate (now Sangatte), then within the English pale, about nine miles from Calais, it is clear that the French, and not the Kentish Sandgate is the one alluded to in the writ, especially as there is no mention in any record of even as much as a watch tower at the latter place before the building of Henry VIII.'s "castle" there.
The " castle " at Upnor is on the north bank of the Medway, nearly opposite to Chatham dockyard, and was built in 1561, by the order of Queen Elizabeth, for the defence of this reach of the river. It consisted of a long, castellated, oblong building, three storeys in height,
1 Archaologia, vol. vi., p. 129, " Sir William Monson's Naval Tracts." t-Arch. Cant., vol. xx., pp. 228, 257, "Sandgate Castle"; vol. xxi.,
pp. 244, 259, " Sandgate Castle " ; vol. xxiii. pp. 24, 30, " Castles of
Henry VIII."
3 Hasted History of Kent, 2nd edn., vol. viii., p. 182.
212 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
having a high, round tower at either end, to which has been added a casemated ravelin in front, where was a platform for guns at the river's edge, defended by a stockade. The entrance was by a square tower at the rear of the west side, the governor having quarters in the south tower.
Gillingham, as already mentioned, had not even as much resemblance to a castle as Upnor; it was a regular modern fort for guns, built in the reign of Charles I. for the defence of the dockyard at Chatham, which lies about one and a half miles to the south-west of it.
OLD MAP OF CANTERBURY
(A twofold interest attaches to this curious old map, from its being the earliest known plan of the city, while the name of its designer is a matter of some uncertainty. The original from which it has been reproduced forms one of the illustrations to a work called Civitates Orbis Terrarum, published at Cologne by Braun in 1572. Possibly the work of Remigius Hogenberg or Cornelius Hogius, two Flemish artists employed by Braun, it has been usually attributed to George Hoefnagel, who is known to have executed large maps of Bristol and Oxford for the work in question (both of which are the earliest known maps of these cities),1 but, unlike his other drawings, it does not bear his signature, and it remains open to question whether it is by him. From internal evidence, the map is considerably earlier in date than 1572, and may possibly have formed one of a series of drawings of Kentish scenery executed for Philip II. of Spain in 1558 by Antony Van den Wyngaerde, several of which, after many and strange vicissitudes, are now preserved in the Bodleian Library at Oxford.
1 Archaologia Cantiana, vol. xxv., pp. 250-254.
< ?.
s <
>, a
SOME KENTISH CASTLES 213
As regards accuracy, these early attempts to combine plans with bird's-eye views must be taken cum grano salts, yet the artists were careful to render what they saw with attention to detail, albeit in faulty perspective. The point of view is from the rising ground to the south of Canterbury, which is shown surrounded by the wall with its six gates, two posterns, and various towers. The monasteries of Christ Church, St. Augus- tine's, and the Grey Friars are readily distinguished. No less than twenty-four other churches appear, several of which (among them those of St. Mary de Castra and St. John le Poor) are no longer in existence. The Stour is seen dividing into two arms, enclosing the great island called " Binnewith," upon which, in 1273, the Franciscan Friars founded their church. A branch is shown extending further eastwards from the eastern arm of the Stour, possibly all that then remained of that ancient watercourse which (according to Somner)1 once flowed through the centre of the city, passing what is now known as the Butter Market, and which perhaps formed the outer ditch of the Roman city, at which time the site of the present Cathedral was an impassable morass.2 The manner in which the city wall was carried across, the Stour upon arches is clearly shown. The northern ones were not removed until 1769, the southern ones having been previously demolished. Next to the last is the postern gate ; some distance in the rear of it is seen St. Mildred's Church with its early tower on the north side ; then comes the castle with the great keep surrounded by a wall with towers, and having a ditch with a bridge facing the city, remains of which were found in 1868 during the excavations for the drainage works.3 The so-called " Roman " arch of
1 Somner, Antiquities of Canterbury, First Edition, pp. 38-45.
2 Archaologia Cantiana, vol. iv., pp. 27-42. 8 Archaologia, vol. xliii., p. 151 tt seq.
214 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Worth gate, having been long stopped up, is of course not shown, but Wincheap gate is seen much as it remained until its removal, about 1786. Beyond it is the low hummock subsequently converted into the sham mound now known as the Dane John. The city ditch, filled with water from the Stour, is shown encircling the southern side of the wall as far as St. George's gate, beyond which the curve of the wall conceals the rest of its course. By the closing years of Elizabeth's reign much of the northern portion had been filled in and built upon.
PENSHURST PLACE BY PHILIP SIDNEY
IHE Crown Manor of Penshurst was granted, as an inscription over the gateway tells us, by " the most religious and renowned Prince Edward the Sixt " to Sir William Sidney, Knight-Banneret, in the year 1552. At the Norman Conquest, it had been given to a family of the name of Penchester, or Pencestre, whose most distinguished member was Sir Stephen de Pencestre, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports under Edward I. Dying in the year 1299, he was buried in the Church of St. John the Baptist, Penshurst. Twice married, he left no son to succeed him, and his lands were divided between his two daughters, the younger of whom, Alicia, married John de Columbers, and inherited Penshurst. From her heirs the estate was bought by the wealthy Sir John de Poulteney, four times Lord Mayor of London, and at his death passed from the Louvaine family into that of the Saint Cleres, from whom it was purchased by the Duke of Bedford, then Regent of the Kingdom, at whose decease it went to his brother, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and thence to the luckless line of the Staffords, Dukes of Buckingham.
After the execution, in 1521, of Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, Penshurst reverted to the Crown, but soon passed, for a short time, into the hands of Sir Ralph Fane, at whose attainder Edward VI. presented it to Sir William Sidney, chamberlain and steward of his household, and eldest son of Nicholas Sidney by Anne, daughter of Sir William Brandon, and aunt of Charles Brandon, Duke
215
216 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
of Suffolk, husband of Mary Tudor, sister to King Henry VIII. This Sir William Sidney was lineally descended from Sir William de Sidenie, who came over to England with Henry II. in 1154, and from whom the present owner of Penshurst, Lord De L'Isle and Dudley is also descended, although in the female line.
Penshurst Park adjoins Penshurst village, and is situated about five and a half miles west-to-south-west of the Norman town of Tonbridge, and about six miles north-west of the more modern Tunbridge Wells. It lies low down, surrounded by an undulating park, now not half its original size, but still containing some magnificent timber. The church stands within a stone's-throw of the Place. It is situated in the prettiest part of Kent, within an easy distance of other fine historic houses, such as Knole Park, Hever Castle, Ightham Mote, Bayham Abbey, Eridge Castle, and Groombridge Place. Of these country seats, Hever, Ightham, and Groombridge are surrounded by moats. Penshurst was never moated ; yet of all the " Stately Homes of England," hardly one presents a more impressive and picturesque appearance than this old mansion, the birthplace of the accomplished Sir Philip Sidney, " The great glory of his family, the great hope of mankind, the most lively pattern of virtue, the glory of the world." Its old walls possess a majestic charm which no pen can faithfully describe on paper. The very air seems to inspire the curious visitor with stirring memories of the bygone days of chivalry, and the pilgrim approaching this Kentish shrine appears to have wandered into the glorious realm of that veritable Arcadia portrayed by Penshurst's worthiest son.
Here " Sacharissa's Walk " calls to mind the love-songs of her rejected admirer, Edmund Waller, who soon, however, consoled himself by marrying a wealthy heiress. Here stayed Henry VIII. on at least one pleasant visit. Here often stayed Frances Sidney, Countess of Sussex, foundress of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Here
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Edmund Spenser composed a part of his Shepheardes' Calendar; here Lancup Well recalls Ben Jonson's oft-quoted lines, included in his poem called The Forest, commencing : —
Thou arB not Penshurst, built to envious show Of touch or marble, nor can boast a row Of polished pillars, or a roof of gold ; Thou hast no lantern, whereof tales are told, Or stair, or courts ; but stan'st an ancient pile, And these, grudged at, are reverenced the while. Thou joy'st in better marks of soil, of air, Of wood, of water, therein thou art fair.
Here came Queen Elizabeth and danced with her favourite, Robert Dudley, in the ball-room. Here suddenly arrived, whilst out hunting one day, King James I, with his son Henry, Prince of Wales. Here came John Evelyn, a day too late, as he noted in his diary, to attend the second marriage of the peerless " Sacharissa " with his old schoolfellow, Robert Smythe. Here was born Sir Robert Sidney, Governor of Flushing, and the first Earl of Leicester of the Sidney line. Here Algernon Sidney walked and mused beneath the oaks and beeches. Here for a time, by order of the Parliament, the Duke of Gloucester and his sister, the Princess Elizabeth, were confided to the tender care of the Countess of Leicester, sister of the famous Lucy, Countess of Carlisle, after the execution of King Charles I. had deprived these royal children of their father. Here Sir William Temple, the statesman, the husband of Dorothy Osborne and patron of Swift, was educated by his relative, the pious Dr. Henry Hammond, who was Rector of Penshurst in the reign of Charles I. before the Civil War, at the outbreak of which the Loyalist Hammond fled from his rectory at night and joined the King at Oxford.
The architecture of Penshurst Place goes back, as regards its older portions, to the time of King Edward III. ; as regards its later, to that of Robert Sidney, Earl of Leicester, whose father, Sir Henry, the Lord President
218 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
of Wales and Viceroy of Ireland, built the gatehouse, and added largely to the original edifice, in the reign of Elizabeth. A portion of the pile is still called, in his honour, the " President's Court." But the masterpiece of all is the old and unrestored feudal hall, probably the finest and best-preserved example of its kind extant in Great Britain. It forms a perfect specimen of the hall of a nobleman or country gentleman's residence during the era of the later Plantagenets, and its central chimney and hearth, oak tables, dais, and minstrels' gallery have luckily suffered lightly at, the hands of Time. Tradition relates that the Black Prince and his young wife, Joan, the " Fair Maid of Kent," once ate their Christmas dinner in this hall.
From the baronial hall a stone staircase leads upwards to the state apartments, the first of which is the ball-room, whence one passes into the tapestry-room, Queen Elizabeth's drawing-room, the picture-gallery, and the china-closet. On the walls of these rooms hang paintings by Holbein, Zucchero, Marc Gheeraedts, Guido, Lely, Van Dyck, Rubens, Poussin, Titian, Gainsborough, Dobson, and Lawrence. Family pictures are very numerous, and many generations of sad-faced and auburn-haired Sidneys look down from their frames upon the visitor. They include portraits of Sir Philip Sidney; Sir Henry Sidney, "the brave soldier, the consummate general, the able counsellor, the wise legislator " ; Sir William Sidney ; John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland ; Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester ; Dorothy Sidney, Countess of Sunderland, the " Sacharissa " of Waller's verse ; Henry Sidney, Earl of Romney ; the stern and solemn patriot, Algernon Sidney; Lady Mary Sidney, Sir Philip's mother, of whom he wrote, "For my own part, I have had only light from her"; Mary, Countess of Pembroke, the subject of William Browne's immortal epitaph (so often ascribed in error to Ben Jonson) : —
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Underneath this sable hearse Lies the subject of all verse : Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother. Death ! ere thou hast slain another Learn'd, and fair, and good as she, Time shall throw his dart at thee ;
and Barbara Gamage, the Welsh heiress, whose secret marriage with Sir Robert Sidney proved to be a happy and fitting ending to a most sensational courtship.
There stands no more romantic manor-house in all England than the classic home of " Astrophel," the lover of " Stella," of " Sacharissa," and of Algernon Sidney, " the noblest Roman of them all " ; it has figured vividly in the pages of our history, and kings, queens, princesses, soldiers, statesmen, and poets have lodged within these walls. Well might Southey ask : —
Are days of old familiar to thy mind, O reader? Hast thou let the midnight hour Pass unperceived, whilst thou in fancy lived With high-born beauties, and enamoured chiefs, Sharing their hopes, and with a breathless joy, Whose expectation touched the verge of pain, Following their dangerous fortunes? If such love Hath ever thrilled thy bosom, thou wilt tread, As with a pilgrim's reverential thoughts, The groves of Penshurst.
The church at Penshurst, dedicated in honour of St. John the Baptist, is well worthy of its surroundings, and from the summit of its tower a very fine view of the Place can be obtained. Although restored, it has been renovated in good taste. Its Sidney Chapel contains many interesting monuments and tombs ; in it are buried the valiant Sir William Sidney, who did yeoman service fighting against the French at sea, and on land against the Scots at Flodden ; Sir Henry Sidney, K.G. ; and Sir Stephen de Pencestre : whilst beneath its floor has long ago crumbled into dust the headless corpse of Algernon Sidney, executed on Tower Hill, Friday, December /th, 1683, after having been condemned to death by Judge Jeffreys for his
220 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
alleged share in the Rye House Plot, of whose untimely end Lord John Russell truly testified, " There is no murder which history has recorded of Caesar Borgia exceeds in violence, or in fraud, that by which Charles II. took away the life of the gallant and patriotic Sidney."
It has often been conjectured that Sir Philip Sidney may have written his great pastoral romance, Arcadia, at Penshurst Place. But this was not so, for a part of it was written when he was staying with his sister, Lady Pembroke, " the • greatest patroness of wit and learning of any lady of her time " (to whom it was dedicated), at Wilton, and a part of it at Ivybridge House, close to Salisbury ; whilst John Aubrey tells us that he would even compose some of its passages whilst out hunting on Salisbury Plain. That he had, however, Penshurst and " the hills and humble valleys " of its neighbourhood in his mind when writing cannot be doubted ; and the following extract would aptly describe his birthplace as it appeared in Tudor times : —
The house itself was built of fair and strong stone, not affecting so much any extraordinary kind of fineness as an honourable repre- senting of a firm stateliness ; the lights, doors, and stairs rather directed to the use of the guests than to the eye of the artificer, and yet, as the one chiefly heeded, so the other not neglected ; each place hand- some without curiosity, and homely without loathsomeness ; not so dainty as not to) be trod on, nor yet slubbered up with good fellowship ; all more lasting than beautiful, but that the consideration of the exceeding lastiness made the eye believe that it was exceeding beautiful ; the servants not so many in number as cleanly in apparel and serviceable in behaviour, testifying even in their countenances that their master took as well care of served, as of them who did serve."
Sir Philip Sidney, " Lumen familiae suse," as his father called him, was born at Penshurst " at a quarter before five of the clock" on the morning of Friday, November 3Oth, 1554. His sister, the Countess of Pembroke, was not born at Penshurst, in 1555, as her biographers erroneously state, but at Ticknell House, Bewdley, in Worcestershire, on October 27th, 1561. She died at
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Crosby Hall, London, in 1621, and was buried in a plain grave in Salisbury Cathedral. Algernon Sidney was, perhaps, born at Penshurst, although Baynard's Castle, London, has also been named as his birthplace. That gay and careless cavalier, Colonel " Robin " Sidney, reputed by King James II., John Evelyn, and others of his contemporaries, to have been the father of the ill-fated Duke of Monmouth, was buried, but not born, at Penshurst. He and his brother, Henry, Earl of Romney, were both born at Paris. The Countess of Sunderland, " Sacharissa," was born at Syon House, Isleworth, the property of her grandfather, the Earl of Northumberland. The historic tree, immortalised in the verse of Ben Jonson, Edmund Waller, and Robert Southey, planted, on the day of Sir Philip's birth, in Penshurst Park, has long ago withered away, although too-credulous visitors still have an oak tree frequently pointed out to them as " Sidney's Tree." As a matter of fact, it is rather doubtful whether the original tree was an oak at all, and Southey may be somewhat in error when he says : —
Upon his natal day an acorn here Was planted : it grew up a stately oak, And in the beauty of its strength it stood And flourish'd, when his perishable part Had moulder'd, dust to dust.
The aged and gigantic "Bear Oak" is still standing in the park, and is probably the one mistaken so often for " Sidney's Tree." It was standing long before 1554.
Lovers of Penshurst Place in particular, and students of English history in general, must ever be grateful to the researches of the indefatigable Arthur Collins, the genealogist, who visited Penshurst during the middle of the reign of George II., for the purpose of editing his Sidney State Papers. Working diligently, with the help of able assistants, at his laborious task, he printed the greater part of the priceless collection of historical manuscripts, comprising numerous important letters of
222 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Sir Henry, Sir Philip, and Algernon Sidney, as well as of Sir Robert Sidney (afterwards Earl of Leicester), of Rowland Whyte, his faithful and clever agent, and of his son Robert, Earl of Leicester. He also printed and published, for the first time, the hitherto almost unknown defence of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, written by his nephew, Sir Philip Sidney, in reply to the slanders contained in the notorious " Leycester's Commonwealth," which formed the groundwork of Sir Walter Scott's Kenilworth. A great number of the manuscripts printed by Arthur Collins are no longer at Penshurst Place, and he, therefore, made students of our history for ever his debtors by publishing his timely work when he did. A further series of Sidney Papers was afterwards compiled and printed by Mr. Blencowe, a clergyman, who published in book form the invaluable Journal of Robert Sidney, Earl of Leicester, some time Ambassador at Paris, as well as the Diaries of Henry, Earl of Romney, " le beau Sidney " of De Gramont's Memoirs, who carried to William of Orange a copy of the celebrated Invitation to that Prince to come over to England. A cursory, and decidedly deceptive, examination of the remaining Penshurst manuscripts has been made more recently by a representative of the Historical Manuscripts Commission, and is published in the Official Report of that body. The original holograph copy of Algernon Sidney's Essay on Virtuous Love, in the author's firm hand-writing, is preserved in the Manuscript Department at the British Museum.
As in the case of the missing manuscripts, the once splendid collection of armour at Penshurst was in the main dispersed during the latter part of the eighteenth century, during which period Leicester House, the Sidneys' London residence, after being let for some time -to Frederick, Prince of Wales, and his family, was sold. Leicester Square and some of its adjoining streets are named after the titles and badges of the Sidneys ; hence the existing
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Lisle Street, Sidney Street, Bear Street, Leicester Place, and the Porcupine Hotel. The badge of the bear and ragged staff came into use in the Sidney family by the marriage of Sir Henry Sidney, the ruler of Wales and Ireland, with Lady Mary Dudley, eldest daughter of John, Duke of Northumberland, who had assumed it in right of his earlier title of Earl of Warwick. On the death of the last of Northumberland's children, without legitimate issue other than that of Lady Mary, her surviving son, Sir Robert Sidney, adopted the bear as his additional crest or badge. The almost unique crest of his family was a porcupine, quilled, collared, and chained ; his motto, " Quo Fata vocant " ; the charge on his shield, a pheon or broad-arrow, with engrailed inner edges, was adopted by his grandson, Henry Sidney, Earl of Romney, as a stamp upon all Government stores in the reign of William and Mary. Finding, in his official position as Master of the Ordnance, that so many public stores and belongings were often being lost for want of a stamp to identify them, Lord Romney had them marked with his own arms. His practice has survived to this day, and the Government " broad-arrow " is nothing more than an imitation of the Sidney arms, with the difference that the interior edges in the copy are smooth instead of being wavy as in the original.
Father Time has, on the whole, dealt leniently with Penshurst Place, in spite of its great age and eventful history. Its low and sheltered position, aided by the spacious and generous lines on which the mansion was originally laid out and designed, has conduced considerably to its preservation. Of Penshurst, indeed, with its majestic and classical exterior, much the same might be said as the author of Lothair wrote of " Vauxe " (generally supposed to be Knole, Sevenoaks) : —
Vauxe was the finest specimen of the old English residence extant. It was the perfection of the style, which had gradually arisen after the Wars of the Roses had alike destroyed all the castles and the purpose of
224 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
those stern erections. People said Vauxe looked like a college : the truth is, colleges looked like Vauxe, for when those fair and civil buildings rose, the wise and liberal spirits who endowed them intended that they should resemble as much as possible the residence of a great noble.
Truly, Penshurst may lay claim to owe its foundations to " wise and liberal spirits." Even if it does not look exactly like any particular Oxford college, more than one Oxford •college looks like Penshurst. Moreover, as affording some evidence of the spacious way in which the house is built, it should be stated that the hall alone measures some forty-two feet by fifty-four feet, and that its altitude is over sixty feet ; whilst the picture gallery is about ninety feet long. These rooms remind us again of Disraeli's "Vauxe": —
The house was full of galleries, and they were full of portraits. Indeed, there was scarcely a chamber in this vast edifice of which the walls were not breathing with English history in this interesting form.
In addition to its family portraits, old china, tapestry, historical manuscripts, and miniatures, Penshurst Place possesses many other valuable treasures. From the ceiling •of the ballroom is suspended the first pair of crystal chandeliers used in England, said to have been given to Queen Elizabeth by her favourite, Leicester, Sir Philip Sidney's uncle. Queen Elizabeth's Drawing-room is furnished with the same chairs and tables expressly bought, or brought here, for her use when staying as the guest •of Sir Henry Sidney at Penshurst, and in this room several specimens of needlework by the Queen's own hands are still to be seen. Of other pieces of antique furniture, the finest are undoubtedly a pair of splendidly carved and decorated Dutch cabinets, presented by King James I. to Robert Sidney, Earl of Leicester, K.G. Among the curios •are especially noticeable Sir Philip Sidney's shaving-glass, Sir William Sidney's helmet worn by him at Flodden Field, surmounted by his crest, a wooden effigy of a chained porcupine, Algernon Sidney's jack-boots, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester's two-handled sword, an ancient spiten, a stick that belonged to William IV., and an ebony cabinet
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that was once the property of Cardinal Wolsey. Among family relics, the most interesting are the various locks of hair, carefully preserved, of many of the Sidneys, including a lock of Sir Philip's, auburn-hued, of the traditional family shade, as is that of his great-nephew, Algernon Sidney.1 At Wilton House, where " Astrophel " wrote his Arcadia, is kept a piece of Queen Elizabeth's hair, presented to him by the Queen herself.
One of the most remarkable of the many pictures, although not endowed with such distinct artistic merits as those referred to above, is the famous " three-legged " picture of Queen Elizabeth dancing with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. On its canvas Leicester is depicted holding the " Virgin Queen " high off the ground, in such an exalted position that she is made to look as if she had taken a leap into the air, whilst below and behind her skirts is clearly conspicuous the leg of another dancer, painted in such a manner as to appear as if Elizabeth had three legs instead of two. This seemingly boisterous dance, in which the Queen is represented as indulging, must have died out a very long time ago in England, although a somewhat similar form of revelry is said still to be in use among the peasants of Brittany. Another strange portrait is one, by Vandyck, of the Duke of Richmond. The Duke is painted in his night-dress, with a hound standing beside him having a string of pearls round its neck. This is in allusion to the circumstance that, a burglar having hidden himself under the Duke's bed, the dog gave timely alarm and aroused his master in the night. The grateful Duke, in reward, gave the faithful animal a string of pearls for his collar. Yet another rather remarkable portrait is that of Barbara Gamage, Countess of Leicester, with six of her
1 Although Algernon spelt his name "Sydney," and not "Sidney," I have, for the sake of convenience, used the latter form throughout. Sir Philip used both forms, signing himself sometimes " Sydney," and sometimes " Sidney." Sir Henry generally wrote himself " Sydney," but most of his descendants, including Algernon's brothers and sisters, wrote themselves " Sidney."
Q
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children, curiously grouped, and attired in the quaint dresses of their period. It was concerning this Lady Leicester that Ben Jonson wrote, in reference to the surprise visit of James I. to Penshurst : —
That found King James, when hunting late this way
With his brave son, the Prince ; they saw the fires
Shine bright on every hearth, as the desires
Of thy Penates had been set on flame
To entertain them ; or the country came,
With all th'eir zeal, to warm their welcome now.
What (great, I will not say, but) sudden cheer
Didst thou then make 'em. And what praise was heap'd
On thy good Lady, then ! Who therein reap'd
The just reward of her huswifry,
To have her linen, plate, and all things nigh,
When she was far : and not a room but drest,
As if it had expected such a guest.
But all the glories of Penshurst are not to be found only indoors. The old English flower-garden alone is worth a visit, with its strange sense of a far away, silent charm ; with its clear-cut yew hedges, its white and golden lilies floating in " Diana's Bath," its winding walks, its climbing plants, and its Pride of Penshurst, a plant peculiar to the place. In such a haven of repose as this Time seems to have stood still, and one almost expects to meet " Sacharissa " wandering on the terrace, listening once again to the love-lays of Edmund Waller; to see Spenser studiously composing his Shepkeardes' Calendar ; or to hear " Rare " Ben Jonson expatiating on the pleasures of the hospitality here, upon which he set so much store. From the garden a gate leads into the churchyard, and, going through it, we recognise, alas! that Time has indeed moved, and still moves, on ; the white graves outside the church and the stately monuments to the illustrious dead within, call us sadly back to the real life of the present day. From the church's peaceful precincts we pass out by the ancient church-house into the primitive village, and soon leave
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behind us, sheltered amongst its trees, encircled by the sluggish Medway, the noble house of Penshurst Place, whose venerable walls, standing out above its verdant park-land, form a magnificent memorial to those fair women and brave men who formerly lived within them, the stories of whose deeds are imperishably recorded in the golden annals of our country's history.
HEVER CASTLE BY THE REV. P. H. DITCHFIELD, M.A., F.S.A.
ENT is a county that abounds in noble houses. A county that can boast of Knowle, Ightham, Leeds Castle, Penshurst, and Hever, is indeed rich in historic mansions, and amongst them, on account of its natural beauty, and pathetic and romantic associations, the home of the Boleyns will be found to possess attractions in some respects unique. Hever is a fifteenth century castle, erected on the site of an earlier fortress, which was built by Thomas de Hever, in the reign of Edward III, who obtained free warren and liberty to embattle his mansion. The erection of such strong- holds of the type of Hever marks some progress in our social habits and customs. No longer the proud, gaunt keep, or donjon, " four-square to every wind that blew," frowns down upon the intruder. The sterner features of defence are modified. No terrible underground dun- geons echo with the shrieks of tortured prisoners. In the middle of the fifteenth century there was greater security for life and property. And yet the need of defence had not yet passed away. Hever is a curious mixture of a domestic house and a feudal castle. The wide-spread moat, the strong gate, the old portcullis, the loopholes in the walls and towers, which flank each angle of the front of the house,, the strong machicolated parapet, and thick oaken doors, all sufficiently show that times of danger had not passed away, and that each man was obliged to protect his own by strong arm and stronghold from injury and spoliation.
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HI.YER CASTLE 229
Hever Castle stands in a valley, like many of its brethren. This fact does not prove any lack of discern- ment on the part of the mediaeval military architects. It was so placed in order that the waters of the Eden river might be coaxed to form a moat, and guard the castle from marauders and surprise. Before the days of cannon a fortress did not need to fear the danger of surrounding heights, and a good, broad moat with a strongly-fortified entrance gate were sufficient to defy the approach of an enemy. Hence the owners of Hever could view with complacency the surrounding hills, and trust to their own embattled pile girt by the guarding Eden waters for safety against their foes. History tells little of any fights or sieges which befell the old house. As I have said, the De Hevers held the property, and Thomas de Hever, in the time of Edward III., had a licence to crenellate his house. It passed, by the marriage of his daughter Joan, to John de Cobham, of Starborough, and was bought during the reign of Henry VI. by Sir Geoffrey Bullen, or Boleyn, Lord Mayor of London in 1453. Sir Geoffrey was a distinguished member of the Mercers' Company of London, and was the son of Geoffrey Bullen, of Salle, in Norfolk.
Judging from its style and architecture, it is extremely probable that he built the present castle, and it is with his family that its chief historical interest is associated. Sir Geoffrey had a son, Sir William, Knight of the Bath at the coronation of Richard III His son was Sir Thomas Bullen, who, on account of the affection of Henry VIII. for his daughter, the famous Anne, "that brown girl with the perthroat and an extra finger," as Margaret More maliciously described her, was raised to high rank, and became Earl of Ormond and Wiltshire. It is with that " brown girl " that Hever has most to do. History is uncertain as regards her birthplace. Blickling Hall, in Norfolk, and Rochford Hall, in Essex, compete with Hever the honour, but it is certain that her childhood
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was spent at this castle, years of happiness and sweet content, to which, from the glitter and dangers of a throne, she must have often looked back with fond and touching remembrances. There her father lived in the free and hospitable style of an old English squire, entertaining lavishly in the rush-strewn hall, hunting and hawking. His wife was the daughter of Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. He took a leading part in the affairs of the time, went as ambassador to the Emperor Maximilian and the King of Spain, arranged the details of the Field of the Cloth of Gold, and was Governor of Norwich Castle. Anxious to gain from the King the lands of Thomas Butler, late Earl of Carrick and Ormond, in Ireland, and Lord Rochford, in England, he was not very careful or scrupulous about the means for obtaining the favour of the King. It seems fairly certain that his elder daughter, Mary, afterwards provided with a husband, William Carey, was one of Henry's mistresses. The advice and guidance of such a father could not have been of much value in the training of the early life of the "little brown girl." For a time she enjoyed life in the old castle, wandering in the old-fashioned garden, now converted into a tennis-lawn, working embroidery, and studying lessons with her governess. There is a letter of hers extant, which shows that she was not a very learned child. Her father had written to her a stern letter of reproof, and bade her answer it without the aid of her governess or masters. You can imagine the youthful Anne, sitting in the pleasant parlour, squaring her shoulders and preparing to write this terrible letter. Probably she cried over it. It was not a very good letter. You can read it to-day, or try to do so ; some of it is illegible, and much unintelligible ; but the writer was only about ten years old, and her engaging ways made amends for her strange caligraphy. While still young, as a maid of honour, she accompanied to Paris, Henry's sister, Mary, the bride of Louis XII., after whose death she remained
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at the French Court as maid of Claude, the austere Queen of Francis I. She loved the gaiety of that brilliant throng, and legend tells of her presence at the gorgeous pagean- try of the Field of the Cloth of Gold, and how she there attracted the attention of the English King. After seven years of brilliant pleasure she was recalled to England, and renewed her triumphs. She played and danced, and sang with more grace than any other lady at Court, and the gaiety of her conversation, with the buoyancy of her dis- position, attracted a crowd of admirers, among whom was the amorous Henry. She fell in love with, and was beloved by, Lord Percy, the son of the Earl of North- umberland. What a different fate had been hers if the course of this true love-match had been allowed to run smoothly. It was opposed by the King. Wolsey was ordered to separate the lovers. For Percy was found another bride, and poor Anne returned disconsolate to Hever to mourn her lover as she paced the box-lined walks of the garden, to vow vengeance against the Cardinal, as she stamped her angry foot while she walked along the old corridor, and to dream of power and ambition, which the attentions of Henry had encouraged. Sir Thomas Wyatt, her devoted admirer, would often come to Hever, from his own grey towers of Allingham, to console and talk with her. He has given us a portrait of her when she came home from the French Court, describing —
The rare and admirable beauty of the fresh and young Lady Anne Bolein. . . . In this noble imp the graces of nature graced by gracious education seemed even at first to have promised bliss unto hereafter times. She was taken at that time to have a beauty not so whitly clear and fresh, above all we may esteem, which appeared much more excellent by her favour passing sweet and cheerful, and these both also increased by her noble presence of shape and fashion, representing both mildness and majesty more than can be expressed.
Sir Thomas fails not to tell of her defects — of that " little show of a nail upon one side of the nail on one of her fingers," and of the small moles which rumour stated appeared on certain parts of her body ; but these only
232 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
increased his admiration. That ungallant Venetian Ambassador, Ludovico Falier, dared to write that " my lady Anne is no beauty. She is tall of stature, with a sallow complexion, long neck, large mouth, and narrow chest. In fact, she has nothing in her favour besides the King's great passion for her, and her eyes, which are indeed black and beautiful." If good Sir Thomas Wyatt had read that description of his adored one there would have been a mighty duel.
So Lady Anne rages and sighs and waits at Hever. And presently the King comes. He had been hawking and lost his way. Her father welcomes him, and regrets that Anne is ailing and cannot be there to greet her sovereign. Henry returns again and again. There are tender talkings in the old garden. These old walls have listened to the story of that strange love-making, and heard the indignant answer of the lady who declared that she could not be the wife of a married monarch, and would not be his mistress.
And so the affair progressed. The notion of Henry's divorce from his faithful queen was started, and the course of history changed. It was probably at Hever that Henry betrothed his new bride. We will not follow her to her Court. I prefer to picture her the brown girl at Hever. Here she came again before she became Henry's queen. A mysterious disease developed in England, termed the sweating sickness, which seems to have been somewhat similar to our modern influenza. Anne's attendants caught the malady, and she was sent by the King's orders to her home at Hever. But she carried the infection with her, and communicated it to her family. Both Anne and her father were in imminent danger, and the old house echoed with anxious whisperings. Scared faces were seen in the long gallery and the sick room. Dr. Butts, the King's physician, was in constant attendance, and by his skill the patients recovered. Well would it have been for her if the good doctor had not been so careful, and if she had
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breathed her last in the quiet old house at Hever, ere that " crowded hour of glorious life " had run its course, the pageants and the plays, the roars of London's welcome, the pomp and glittering show of that brief triumph that ended in treachery or frailty, in the gloomy prison in the tower, and that piteous scene on Tower Hill, where the headsman from Calais stood ready to strike off the fairest head in England, " perhaps the most revolting murder ever committed." And as we wander in the garden that she loved, or pace the long gallery and corridors that once echoed with her tread and heard her merry laugh, we shall hesitate before we condemn the maid who refused the unworthy attentions of a King, and who was not likely to yield to the seductions of inferior and baser suitors. Whatever her faults were, we shall not think of them at Hever, redolent with the memories of the Lady Anne.
The rest of the story of the castle is soon told. Henry, not content with the murder of his queen, ordered her brother to share her fate, and, on the death of her father, two years later, seized the castle and property. The old house must have been partially dismantled, as Sir John Tebold wrote to Thomas Cromwell in 1539: "Much of the goods in the manor house at Hever has been removed by the advice of the Archbishop of Canterbury ; part of the stuff and all the implements yet remain. I have stayed them by the advice of Sir Thomas Willoughby till the King's further pleasure." Some panelling seems to have been used for increasing the height of the pews in the church. The King subsequently gave the castle to another of his many wives, Anne of Cleves, and some re- ports state that she died there. It was sold in 1557 to Sir Edward Waldegrave, Bart., Lord Chamberlain to the Household of Queen Mary, whose descendant, James, Lord Waldegrave, conveyed the property to Sir William Hum- freys, Lord Mayor of London in 1716. In 1745 it was bought by Sir Timothy Waldo, who came of a Huguenot family, a Solicitor in Chancery and Under-Sheriff of
234 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
London. The last event in the history of the castle is its purchase by America's famous son, Mr. William Waldorf Astor, who also owns another historic house, Cliveden, on the banks of the Thames. Mr. Astor is a scholar, and a lover of all that is ancient, and we feel sure that in the very complete restoration which he is inaugurating, he will treat the historic walls of Hever with reverence and care. He found the castle in a sad condition. It has been used as a farmhouse. Sightseers often visited the old place, carved their names on the stonework and panels, carried away some of the panelling, and did more harm to Hever Castle than the lapse of centuries had caused. Mr. Astor will restore the castle to its ancient glory. He has built a Tudor village in the place of a cluster of barns and out- houses. The cottages are about a hundred in number, all under one roof, which is composed of old red tiles, and connected with the castle by a bridge and a subway. They are intended for guests and servants. An Italian garden is being constructed on the eastern side of the castle, bounded by walls, and in this are four pavilions with arched roofs and a beautiful arbour. A new lake is being formed, covering forty-five acres. The second or outer moat is to be re-opened, the ancient drawbridge re-constructed, a model farm, an extensive deer park, a new public road and bridge spanning the Eden river, and many of the modern requirements of a gentleman's twentieth century house added. About 2,000 workmen are employed upon these vast operations.
But we will visit Hever Castle before its renovation, and try to picture it as it was when poor Anne Boleyn, " the brown girl with the perthroat," lived and dreamed in its pleasance garden, or listened to the quaint discourse of Sir Thomas Wyatt. It is girt by a broad moat. The principal entrance is embattled and strongly machicolated, in order that the defenders might hurl missiles and weapons upon any foes who attempted to force the gates. Above the doorway there is some delicate perpendicular arcading,
HEVER CASTLE 235
and on the projecting buttresses some carved panel-work. The gateway is in three storeys, and has perpendicular windows. On the right is a tower, which may be older than the gateway ; and on the left an ivy-clad tower and a two-storeyed building recessed. The gateway itself looks formidable, defended by a portcullis, made of timber, like a great harrow, riveted with iron ; two thick oaken doors, studded with iron ; and on either side of the entrance are guard-rooms. There is also an iron portcullis, and another timber one. Beneath this archway Henry VIII. often rode when he came to visit the Lady Anne. Passing through the arch, we enter the small but picturesque courtyard, about 40 feet square, around which the various chambers are grouped. There are two storeys, and the building is half-timbered. The first floor is built of stone. Above these are perpendicular timbers with windows let in at intervals, and surmounted by a sort of frieze, curved-shaped timber being used, which form a pleasing picture. On one side of the courtyard, according to Nash's view, these curved timbers were used in the construction of the whole of the wall above the stone base ; but if that was so in his time it has since been altered. Some of the bays in which the windows are placed project from the wall, breaking the line, and giving a picturesque effect. The windows are filled with diamond-paned glass. The hall is the principal room in every mediaeval house, and at Hever it is a fine chamber, panelled, and beneath the window, on the left of the huge fireplace, are two aumbries, where doubtless Sir Thomas used to keep his plate. There is the minstrels' gallery, and there was a large and ancient oak table, which has lately been removed. The entrance corridor has a large fireplace and fine-beamed ceiling, and out of this we pass up the quaint staircase to the main corridor on the first floor. The long gallery, which is about 100 feet long and 14 feet wide, is a charming feature of the house, with its deeply-recessed window, known as Henry VIII.'s window, where doubtless he used often to sit with his future
236 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
queen. The ladies' parlour, formerly called the council room, is over the main entrance of the castle, and here are preserved some family pictures, a small portrait on panel of Anne Boleyn, and some old furniture and needlework, the latter being attributed to the queen. The tracing over the fireplace is worthy of notice. It consists of two angels, each holding two shields, showing the arms and alliances of the Gary and Boleyn families, of Gary and Stafford, Boleyn and Howard, and Henry VIII. and Boleyn. One of the bedrooms is still known as Henry VIII. 's room, and Anne Boleyn's chamber still is redolent with the memory of the luckless queen. Another chamber is known as Anne of Cleve's room. Endless other chambers may be explored, amongst others the chapel, which has been divided into several rooms. If Mr. Astor's workmen have not scared away the ghost of the Lady Anne she, too, may be seen, if legends be true, as her unquiet spirit is said to cross the old bridge over the river at Christmastide. But the old bridge has disappeared, and, perhaps, the ghost has gone too. Another ghost once haunted the castle — that of a farmer named Humphrey, who, returning home from Westerham, was robbed and slain. After this a shrouded figure was seen wandering from room to room, and again peering into the sullen waters of the river. The rector, however, effectually laid this spirit by means of a bowl of Red Sea water, and it was seen no more.
Nothing can exceed the picturesqueness of this old dwelling-place of the Boleyns. The grey stone walls of the fortified portion blend harmoniously with the mellowed brickwork of the chimney shafts. There is no sign here of the rich and vast elegance of the other Kentish houses of Knowle, Cobham, and Penshurst ; but the interesting historical association of Hever, its peculiar and quaint style of architecture, and its wondrous picturesqueness render it most pleasingly attractive. We have reason to hope that its thorough restoration will in no wise spoil this historic mansion, or drive away the memories of its former greatness.
HEVER CASTLE 237
In the village there is the old inn named after Anne Boleyn's lover, Henry VIII., and the ancient church con- tains several memorials of the former owners of the castle. Here is the tomb of John de Cobham, who married the elder daughter of William de Hever, the last of the lords of the manor of Hever of that family, whose other daughter, Margaret, married Sir Oliver Brocas, of Beau- repaire Park, a famous warrior, and hereditary master of the Royal buckhounds. The most important memorial is the Garter Brass of Sir Thomas Boleyn, or Bullen, the father of the luckless Anne. He is attired in armour, and wears the robes of a Knight of the Garter, with collar, order, and garter complete. The inscription runs : —
Here lieth Sr Thomas Bullen, Knight of the Ordre of the Garter, Erie of Wilscher, and Erie of Ormund, which decessed the i2th dai of Marche in the yere of our Lorde 153-8.
Of him the faithful " steward of his house and surveyor of his lands," Robert Cranewell, wrote from Hever the day after the Earl's death : —
He departed this transitory world I trust to the everlasting Lorde, for he made the end of a good Christian man, ever remembering the goodness of Christ.
We will leave the old knight who gained the height of his ambition and saw his daughter seated on a throne, and then witnessed the destruction of all his power, and the inhuman murder of his daughter and son, sleeping calmly his last sleep, and muse upon the transitory nature of earthly glory, and the sad story which Hever tells.
DICKENS AND KENT
BY THE REV. CANON BENHAM, D.D., F.S.A.
lICKENS can hardly be said to have done for Kent what Scott and Burns did for Scotland. He was not born in Kent, nor was the greater part of his life spent there. Much of his best work has London scenes for its subject, but he has written enough to throw a real interest over some Kentish locali- ties. He describes the places with wonderful skill, yet the incidents connected with them are for the most part com- paratively shadowy. No man can ever think of Alloway Kirk or the Brig o' Boon without connecting them with Tarn o' Shanter's ride ; nor of Loch Katrine apart from the fair Ellen and Roderick Dhu. But there are very few passages from the works of Dickens that I can so definitely locate in Kent; I shall mention a very few, all in fact that I am sure of.
He was born at Portsmouth, February ^th, 1812, and the family moved to Chatham when he was between four and five years old. Their residence was at 2, Ordnance Terrace, near the railway station (it is now No. 1 1), a com- fortable and pleasant two-storied house it appears. Here they lived from 1817 to 1821, and the days seem to have passed pleasantly enough to the child. His mother taught him to read, and he says she did it "thoroughly well." His father used to get up theatrical entertainments, in which he and his brothers and sisters took parts, as well as a few of their neighbours, amongst them a cousin, named Lamert, who was to be the original of Dr. Slammer in Pickwick. There was a playfellow, named
238
DICKENS AND KENT 239
Stroughill, pronounced Strohill, who is said to have been the original of Steerforth. Struggles was the name of one of the bowlers in the Dingley Dell cricket match.
There is some very pretty writing in his Uncom- mercial Traveller, describing those youthful days. I think the chapter entitled " Dullborough Town," written when he was over fifty years old, one of the most charming things he ever did. He describes his run down in the train to the place from which he had been carried in the stage- coach, and then proceeds to revel in the memories of his youthful sports, not forgetting certain love-passages when one figure was sufficient to tell his age.
They had to remove in 1 82 1 from Ordnance Terrace on account of his father's poverty, and went to 1 8, St. Mary's Place, a much poorer, two-storied dwelling — " whitewashed plaster front, and a small garden before and behind." Next door was a Baptist chapel, and to the minister thereof, named Giles, the boy was sent for instruction, and always spoke affectionately of him. We may say with confidence that his education was in a large sense begun and finished in Chatham. He tells in Copper-field how his father had a library of old novels, and how he used to read them over and over again. He told Forster the same thing, and the fact displays itself in his letters. He tells further that he was never great at cricket, or marbles, or peg-top ; and this one may say is also seen in his writings. Was there ever such a stupid description of a cricket match as that in the seventh chapter of Pickwick, when Luffey was appointed to bowl to Dumkins and Struggles to Fodder? I never read that chapter without amazement at the colossal ignorance of the game displayed by our author.
But here is a passage which I will quote verbatim from his Uncommercial Traveller, written in 1861 : —
It is midway between Gravesend and Rochester, and the widening river was bearing the ships, white-sailed, or black-smoked, out to sea, when I noticed by the wayside a very queer small boy. "Hullo!"
240 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
said I to the very queer small boy, "where do you live?" "At Chatham," says he. "What do you do there?" says I. "I go to school," says he. I took him up in a moment, and we went on. Pre- sently the very queer small boy says : " This is Gadshill we are coming to, where Falstaff went out to rob those travellers and then ran away." "You know something about Falstaff, eh?" said I. "All about him," said the very queer small boy. " I am old (I am nine), and I read all sorts of books. But do let us stop at the top of the hill, and look at the house there, if you please." "You admire that house?" said I. "Bless you, sir," said the very queer small boy, "when I was not more than half as old as nine, it used to be a treat for me to be brought to look at it. And ever since I can recollect, my father, seeing me so fond of it, has often said to me, ' If you were to be very persevering, and were to work hard, you might some day come to live in it ! ' Though that's impossible," said the very queer small boy, drawing a low breath, and now staring at the house out of the window with all his might. I was rather amazed to be told this by the very queer small boy ; for that house happens to be my house, and I have reason to believe that what he said was true.
That is certainly a skilful fragment of autobiography. For the queer boy is himself, and he is telling in 1861 what he was thinking about all those years before, and how his father first put into his head the desire to live at Gadshill. There can be no doubt that those days were among the very happiest of his life. His later writings are redolent of his childhood. In the second chapter of the Sketches by Boz the old lady was taken from a memory of the dwellers in Ordnance Terrace ; so was the Half-pay Captain. When he got out at the railway station he realised that it had been of yore his play- ground, where, "in the haymaking time," he "had been delivered from the dungeons of Seringapatam, an immense pile (of haycock), by [his] countrymen, the victorious British (boy next door and his two cousins), and had been recognised with ecstasy by [his] affianced one (Miss Green) who had come all the way from England (second house in the terrace) to ransom and marry [him]. On the same renewed visit he went to the theatre, and remembered how it now fell short of his early ideas." " It was mysteriously gone, like my own youth —
DICKENS AND KENT 241
unlike my own youth, it might be coming back some day ; but there was little promise of it." And, further, as he walked along he saw the doctor going into his house, and suddenly recognised in him his old playfellow, Joe Specks, and rapturously followed him and renewed the acquaint- ance to their mutual delight, and found that he had married Dickens's old flame of the Seringapatam days, Lucy Green. I should like to know whether Joe Specks was the original of Mr. Chillip. There is another paper in the Uncom- mercial Traveller describing Chatham dockyard and the Medway.
These happy days came to an end in 1821, when the family migrated to London.
As I left Dullborough in the days when there were no railways in the and, I left it in a stage-coach ; through all the years that have since passed have I ever lost the smell of the damp straw in which I was packed like game, and forwarded, carriage paid, to the " Cross Keys," Wood Street, Cheapside, London ? There was no other inside passenger, and it rained hard all the way, and I thought life sloppier than 1 had expected to find it.
The next few years were miserable enough ; the abject poverty of the family, the father in a debtors' prison, the child drudging in the blacking factory ; but happily we have no concern with those days here. He worked his way onwards into a lawyer's office, then to the position of a newspaper reporter, then tried his hand successfully at authorship, and dropped his first success into the letter box of the Monthly Magazine. Then came the publishers' proposal to him to write Pickwick, and from that time onward his prosperity was ensured. One of the first results of the book was the renewal of his friendly relations with Kent. On the 2nd of April, 1836, he married Miss Catherine Hogarth, and went down to the village of Chalk, between Gravesend and Gadshill, for his honeymoon. And in successive seasons he went there frequently. He had now his mind well fixed on Kent. He had probably been to Maidstone and Canterbury in
242 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
his newspaper-reporting days, but I need not say that Rochester at once takes high place in the opening chapters of Pickwick. The Bull Inn, its great ball-room and coffee room, are to-day much as they were. The staircase in Seymour's picture, on which the infuriated Dr. Slammer is denouncing Jingle, is exactly as then; so are the bed- rooms of Tupman and Winkle, one inside the other ; so is the coffee room in which Mr. Winkle received Dr. Slammer's challenge through Lieutenant Tappleton. Fort Pitt, where the intending duellists met, is on the high ground close to Chatham Railway Station, and the Chatham Lines, where Mr. Pickwick witnessed the review and first met with Wardle, are close by.
The identification of Muggleton with any town on the map I hold to be an impossibility. It certainly is not Maidstone, for the incidents of the journey will not fit. It is evident to me that Dickens did not mean it to be identified, though it is possible, as his son suggested, that he may have had Town Mailing in his mind for a few of the details. So with Dingley Dell ; it might be a dozen places, a typical English yeoman's hospitable home. Local tradition is strong for Cobtree Hall, near Aylesford. There are features within and without the house which correspond with the description. And it is even averred that a Mr. William Spong, who died in 1839 and was buried in Aylesford Churchyard, was Wardle. In Rainham Churchyard is a wooden rail over the grave of Job Baldwin. The local doctor once told me that this was the original of Sam Weller. I asked Charles Dickens the younger about it, and he replied that he had heard it, but could not say whether it was true. Sam Weller said that " Job was the only name he knew that hadn't got a nickname to it." I have sometimes thought that at any rate Dickens had heard that dictum from Job Baldwin.
One inn we have in Pickwick about which there is no doubt — the " Leather Bottle," at Cobham, to which
"THE LEATHER BOTTLE," COBHAM.
DICKENS AND KENT 243
Mr. Tupman retired to recover from the effects of Miss Rachael's faithlessness. It is described to the life, and there it is as Mr. Pickwick saw it, only that they have hung upon the walls of Mr. Tupman's room a lot of pic- tures illustrating Dickens. The site of Bill Stumps's stone is unrevealed.
For several years after the Pickwick success was assured he took a holiday at Broadstairs. The eighteenth number of Pickwick was written there, so were portions of Nickleby and The Old Curiosity Shop. In 1847 he was writing Dombey here, and I may note that though in the other works that I have named Kent does not come in, in Dombey, Carker's terrible death unmistakably occurs at Paddock Wood Station. The villain came there intend- ing to get on to the branch to Maidstone. The place is much built upon now, but as I first remember it there was the inn in which he tarried exactly as described, as are some particular features of the station.
His first lodging at Broadstairs was at 10, High Street, and naturally the house is still a show place, modest and simple, as became his finances in early days. Later he went to the house — still conspicuous — known sometimes as " Fort House," sometimes " Bleak House." He wrote part of the novel bearing this latter name here. He places his Bleak House at St. Albans, but some details of it are taken from the Broadstairs residence. In a letter addressed to his American friend Felton in 1843, he first gives an amusing description of the village and its inhabitants, and then proceeds : —
In a bay window in a one-pair sits, from nine o'clock to one, a gentleman with rather long hair and no neckcloth, who writes and grins as if he thought he were very funny indeed. His name is Boz. At one he disappears, and presently emerges from a bathing machine, and may be seen — a kind of salmon-coloured porpoise — splashing about in the ocean. After that he may be seen in another bay window on the ground floor, eating a strong lunch ; after that walking a dozen miles or so, or lying on his back in the sand reading a book. Nobody bothers him unless they know he is disposed to be talked to ; and I am told he is very comfortable indeed.
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He was very popular among the boatmen, and in one of his late Uncommercial Traveller papers has a good word for them.
Though he puts Miss Betsy Trotwood's residence in Dover, the lady from whom she was drawn lived at Broadstairs, and the green on which she would not allow the donkeys is on" the Fort here. There is a very amusing paper in an early Household Words called " Our English Watering-place," meaning Broadstairs.
In 1849 ne began David Copper-field, and with it re- newed his Kentish reminiscences. We have seen how he had been backwards and forwards to Dover and Broad- stairs, and we have the boy running away from London to his Aunt Trotwood at Dover, selling his jacket at Chatham to the horrible old marine-store man, Dolloby, whom many old inhabitants of Chatham professed to remember, as they pointed out his dwelling-place off the High Street.
At the corner of a dirty lane, ending in an enclosure full of stinging nettles, against the palings of which some second-hand sailors' clothes, that seemed to have overflowed the shop, were fluttering among some cots, and rusty guns, and oilskin hats, and certain trays, full of so many old rusty keys of so many sizes that they seemed various enough to open all the doors in the world.
But of course Canterbury is the chief Kentish town of this story. I avow that I have no doubt as to Mr. Wickfield's house. There it is halfway up the High Street.
A very old house bulging out over the road ; a house with long, low lattice windows bulging out still further, and beams with carved heads on the ends bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the narrow pave- ment below.
The description would do for to-day. I am not so sure about Dr. Strong's. There is no school which would answer to his, and Dickens evidently meant to make it all vague. Some accounts say it was a house in Burgate
BLEAK HOUSE, BROADSTAIRS.
DICKENS AND KENT 245
Street. In my own imagination I have always identified it with the Deanery, and many and many a time have imagined the old doctor walking in the Deanery garden reading the dictionary to the enraptured Mr. Dick. The hotel at which the latter put up when he came over on his periodical visits to David was the " Fountain."
David's school days at Canterbury, I need not say, have no correspondence with Dickens's, though the book is in a great degree autobiographical. There is one sentence in which he evidently intended to express a sadness which was already settling down upon his spirit, and which afterwards brought great trouble — " There can be no dis- parity in marriage like unsuitability of mind and purpose," said Mrs. Strong. And he tells us with unmistakable significance that he kept on ruminating on this, and re- peating it sadly to himself. I reluctantly quote this, and shall refer to it no more. I knew and respected much the originals of Agnes Wickfield and Esther Summerson, of Bleak House. The latter died a year or two ago, a very charming person. The " little inn " at which Mr. Micaw- ber gave his choice dinner to David is the " Sun," just off Mercery Lane. The mean house of Uriah Heep and his mother, " a low, old-fashioned room, entered straight from the street," is in a lane on the south side of Castle Street.
In the books which followed, Kent does not appear for some years. He frequently paid visits to it, especially to Rochester, sometimes for a day, sometimes for two or three. In 1855 he wrote to his friend Mr. W. H. Wills, who was his assistant editor of Household Words, and did a good deal of business for him, that he had seen " a small freehold " to be sold, opposite to the house of which his father in his child days had told him he might some day perhaps be possessor. The negotiation which Wills opened for this " small freehold " came to nothing, but almost immediately afterwards, to his delighted amaze- ment, Wills told him that the other house was in the
246 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
market — Gad's Hill Place. It had been popularly known as " The Hermitage." He called it from that time by the name which it will henceforth always bear. Wills nego- tiated again, and as the result bought it for him for £1,790. This was in March, 1856. The cheque was written on a Friday, and he remarks in one of his letters that all the important events of his life had happened to him on a Friday.
It was not until February, 1857, that he gave up his residence at Tavistock House, and went to Gravesend, whence he superintended the fitting up of Gadshill for his residence, on which he entered in June. And this residence guided his imagination once more to seek out things in Kent. I have already mentioned his papers in the Uncommercial Traveller ; they were written now in his new periodical All the Year Round, started in 1859. Some of his Kent papers were reminiscences of the Rochester and Chatham of his childhood, some of notes which he made during his walks. In December, 1860, he began " Great Expectations " in All the Year Round, and nearly all the interest gathers round Kentish scenes. He opens his story in a village in the marshes (locally " meshes "), and it would be harder to find in all literature a more romantic case of a wonderful glamour thrown over scenery than his descriptions of this wild and picturesque neighbourhood. I was once driven by a prosperous grazier for a whole day over these marshes, and the memory abides with me. I can still see the browned grass, the dykes, the cattle feeding, and seem at this hour to feel the stillness and loneliness, and how, climbing on a gate I saw the white estuary of the Thames. Dickens makes you feel it all. I was prepared for what I saw by the opening chapter describing Pip's village. There is no doubt that this was Cooling. Dickens often walked in its lonely churchyard ; I think he could see it from his chalet at Gadshill. Pip, it will be remembered used to be shewn the little gravestones of his many brothers and sisters.
DICKENS AND KENT 247
I found that this bleak place, overgrown with nettles, was the churchyard ; and that Philip Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgina, wife of the above, were dead and buried, and that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias, and Roger, infant children of the afore- said, were also dead and buried ; and that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dykes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes ; and that the low leaden line beyond was the river ; and that the distant savage lair, from which the wind was rushing, was the sea.
The name belonging to the stones which he thus appro- priated to his own imaginary family seems to have been Comport. The village inn is the " Three Horseshoes," which Pip transmutes into the "Three Jolly Bargemen." Mr. Forster says that Joe Gargery's forge is now converted into a dwelling-house. When I visited the place I set it down that the forge which Dickens drew from was at the neighbouring village of Cliffe-at-Hoo. At any rate I not only heard the musical clink of the hammer on the anvil, but the blacksmith was singing at his work as Joe used to do. By the way, the song which he used to sing, " Old Clem," is said to be one of the " properties " of Chatham Dockyard. The solitary mill in which Orlick nearly murdered Pip can be identified, so can the inn on the river near which Magwitch was captured.
So much for the village, but we remember that a great deal of the story belongs to the town, which it is needless to say is Rochester. Pumblechook's house, which in Edwin Drood also does duty for Mr. Sapsea's house, is in the High Street. Miss Havisham lived at " Satis House " in the story, but here we have to take heed that there is a real Satis House in Rochester which has a different interest to us. Dickens took the name and applied it to Miss Havisham's residence, but her house is really " Restoration House," in the Maidstone Road, formerly Crow Lane. It is so called because Charles II. lodged in it when returning from exile. It is a very beautiful build- ing, over which the fiction has thrown a strange and weird romance.
248 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
By means of Miss Havisham's gift to him Pip was apprenticed to Joe. The ceremony took place in the Guild Hall. There it is to-day, with its " moonfaced clock " projecting into the street, and its internal fittings and interesting portraits, all of which so impressed Pip. And then the party went off to the " Blue Boar " to dinner — no other than our old acquaintance the " Bull." There Mr. Wopsle gave his terrific recitation over the " Com- mercial Room," which produced a message from the " Commercials " that " this wasn't the Tumblers' Arms." On the other side of the doorway is the Coffee Room, where Mr. Pumblechook administered his rebuke to Pip in his adversity, and Brummie and Pip had hostile words by the fire.
The original Satis House was the residence of Richard Watts, whose will, dated 22nd August, 1579, contained the following direction, amongst others : —
First the Alms-house already erected and standing beside the Markette Crosse, within the Citty of Rochester aforesaid, which Almshouses my Will Purpose & Desire is that there be reedified added and provided with such Roomes as be there already provided Six Severall Roomes with Chimneys for the Comfort placeing and abideing of the Poore within the said Citty, & alsoe to be made apt & convenient places therein for Six good Matrices or Flock Bedds & other good & sufficient Furniture to harbour or lodge in poore Travellers or Wayfareing Men being noe Common Rogues nor Proctors, & they the said Wayfareing Men to harbour & lodge therein noe longer than one night unlesse Sickeness be the farther Cause thereof & those poore Folkes there dwelling shall keepe the House swete make the Bedds see to the Furniture keepe the same sweete & courteously intreate the said poore Travellers & to every of the said poore Travellers att their first comeing in to have fourpence & they shall warme them at the Fire of the Residents within the said House if Need be.
The house of the poor travellers is in the High Street, nearly opposite Sapsea's house, and an inscription over the door tells that it is built for the fulfilment of Watts's will. In May, 1854, Dickens visited it in company with Mark Lemon, and at the end of the year he made vigorous use of his observations in his Christmas number of The
DICKENS AND KENT 249
Seven Poor Travellers. In the course of it he took occasion to hint in plainest terms that the funds were mis- managed, and that in the monument of Richard Watts in the south transept of the Cathedral, that old worthy appears to be springing eagerly out of his grave because of the ill-usage of his bequest. Whether or not his article produced the change, a change there is now, and the bequest is a right valuable one to the poor and needy.
Before coming to his last words on Rochester it will be well to say something more about Gadshill. When he bought it, he seems to have had no idea beyond that of making it a summer residence ; he regarded it as an investment, in fact. But continued ownership brought increased liking, and the personal troubles and restlessness which came to a climax just about the time of the purchase caused him to cling to the place more and more. He wanted rest of mind and body, and determined to seek it here ; and so he abandoned the idea of letting it. It was this which led him to be always improving. His first move was to put up an inscription on the first floor landing, which I suppose is there still — it was when I visited the house — an inscription illuminated by Owen Jones, and bidding the visitor welcome : —
on f0e summit of JJ0a#eB:peare*6 d3>aos0iff«. <£uer mcmora6fe for its associations roitfl JJir 3o0n $afstaff in 0is no6fe fancp.
But my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning at four o'clock early at Gadshill ! There are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses : I have vizards for you all ; you have horses for yourselves.
Soon he sank a deep well — much needed. It was a heavy expense, and he declares that the digging and fitting the pump is "like putting Oxford Street endwise." He made a new drawing room, a conservatory, a billiard room, new stables and coach house, a new servants' hall,
250 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
with a room over it for his boys. On the other side of the high road was a shrubbery belonging to the property, much neglected, but containing two magnificent cedars. He obtained the sanction of the authorities, and had a tunnel made under the road, so that he could pass to it privately. He then laid it out very prettily, and when in 1865 Fechter gave him a handsome Swiss chalet, he had it put up in this shrubbery, fitted it luxuriously, and had mirrors placed all over the uprights so as to reflect the trees and flowers and landscape in all manner of forms. Old Rochester Bridge was pulled down, and he gracefully accepted from the contractors one of the balustrades, and made it a stand for a sundial.
And here, as his letters and life tell so pleasantly, he rejoiced continually to welcome his friends. He was always methodical and regular in his work. After breakfast he walked round the house and garden, visited the dogs which he loved so much, and which take a conspicuous place in his life ; then settled down to work, in summer at the chalet, at other times in his study, the front room to the right of the door. This study, it will be remembered, had a door which was all made up into sham books with funny titles. His letters also tell of fetes which he gave to his poor neighbours, of their enjoyment of them, and their orderly behaviour.
His personal worries had as much to do as his desire to increase his wealth, with his undertaking his public readings. Their prodigious success urged him on, and his health suffered. It was a physical breakdown which caused him to go to France early in 1865, and on the Qth of June in that year he was in a terrible railway accident just beyond Staplehurst. I never pass the spot without looking out upon it. Dickens's was the only carriage which was not thrown over the bank. He was unhurt, and won the gratitude of those concerned by his long and earnest ministry to the wounded and dying. In the few days afterwards he wrote as one quite recovered from the
DICKENS AND KENT 251
shock, but in reality he never recovered. He used to have tremblings and jarrings in his head. That day five years he died at Gadshill. For the present he resumed his readings, and in November, 1867, went to America in response to a most lucrative offer to read, coming back in May, 1868, £20,000 richer. Then he resumed his readings in England, but at a terrible cost to health. It was a relief to himself when he resolved that Gadshill, and that only, should be his residence.
On the day of his death, June Qth, 1870, he worked all the morning at his new book, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, and after luncheon went back to it (which was very unusual with him), and returned to dinner at 6 o'clock, intending to walk in Cobham Park with Miss Hogarth afterwards. They had hardly sat down, however, when he was seized with a fit and fell on the ground. They picked him up and laid him on a sofa, " under this window," said the woman who showed me the fatal dining room. And here he died, twenty-four hours after his seizure, on a Friday. The neighbouring churchyards of Chalk and Shorne, Rochester Cathedral, and the cemetery of St. Nicholas', were all proposed as burial-places, but Dean Stanley offered a grave in Poet's Corner, which was accepted. I saw the funeral going into the Abbey without knowing whose it was, and later in the day saw the coffin in the open grave.
It still remains necessary to say a very few words about his unfinished novel, Edwin Drood. Rochester becomes Cloisterham therein ; it had been " Winglebury," " Our Town," " Dullborough," in previous writings. There is no need to quote at length his latest descriptions of the ancient city. Eastgate House, High Street, becomes the ' Nuns' House " in the story, and a very picturesque spot it is as seen from the street. I have been told that he had this house in his mind in telling Mr. Pickwick's adventure at the Ladies' School, though he places it in Bury St. Edmunds. He calls it " Westgate House " there.
252 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
" Minor Canon Corner " is Minor Canon Row. Jasper's residence in the Gateway is identified at once as College Yard Gate, sometimes called Chertsey Gate, and the " Lumps of Delight " shop, where Rosa Bud bought this sweetmeat, is very near the Nuns' House. I believe I knew Mr. Crisparkle, the minor canon, a very pleasant man ; but he still lives, so I must not unveil him. People in the neighbourhood professed to identify Sapsea and Durdles. An old verger who took me round twenty years ago, claimed to be Mr. Tope. He said he did not believe that Dickens ever ascended the tower. If that is so, the weird expedition of Jasper and Durdles is evolved from the great novelist's imagination. I have no doubt, after long reflection, that the solution of the mystery has been found by Mr. Crouch, namely, that Jasper murdered Edwin, and that Datchery is Helena Landless.
One may just note that abundant names in Dickens's books are found in the Rochester Churchyards. It is interesting to identify his localities of course, but it is more interesting and more delightful to come over and over in one's reading upon the grateful respect in which the man was held by his Kentish neighbours. He had his faults, but he was a generous, tender-hearted, lovable man.
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE (NOW THE CORPORATION MUSEUM), MAIDSTONE
BY J. H. ALLCHIN
Chief Curator and Librarian of Maidstone Museum
)NE of the most interesting of the many old buildings in Maidstone is a fine example of the domestic architecture of the middle or later Tudor period, known formerly as Chillington Manor House, but which is now the Corporation Museum.
Like many of the ancient manors in the land, that of Chillington (or Chillingdon, or Chillingden, according to some of the deeds) has passed through the hands of many owners and various vicissitudes.
The earliest mention we can find of Chillington is, that in the fourteenth century the manor of that name was in the possession of the Cobham family, who were barons in the time of Edward I., and in 1343 King Edward III. granted to Sir John, Lord Cobham, Justice Itinerant, free warren of all his lands in Kent, including the Manor of Chillington.
Sir John, who lived to a great age, and died in 1408, married Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay, Earl of Devonshire, and thereby became brother-in-law to William Courtenay, Archbishop of Canterbury — 1381- 1396 — who was so closely associated with the early history of the Parish Church of St. Mary, Maidstone, and who obtained a licence from King Richard II. in 1395, to convert it into a Collegiate Church, which he re-dedicated to All Saints.
253
254 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
From the Cobham family the Manor of Chillingto passed into the possession of the College of All Saint and was subsequently held by the Maplesden (or Mapely: den) family, of Digons, in Maidstone, now known as th Priory, and at the present time the residence of the vicai of Maidstone.
That family continued the owners of Chillingto until the second year of Queen Mary, when Georg Maplesden forfeited it to the Crown as one of the penaltie for his rash participation in the ill-considered an ill-fated rebellion led by Sir Thomas Wyatt of Allingto Castle (1554). It has been conjectured that some of th details of that rising may have been planned by the lead ing conspirators in one of the rooms of the older portio of Chillington House, and it is not a difficult matter t imagine the secret meetings and discussions that ma have occurred in some of those old rooms.
The Kentish historian Philipott tells us that whei the estate passed from the Maplesdens it was granted t Sir Walter Henley ; if so, it evidently did not long remaii in his possession, but must have been restored t( the Maplesdens, because in the Corporation muniment there is a deed by which, in 1561, Chillington was con veyed to Nicholas Barham from George, John, and Robert sons and co-heirs of Peter Maplesden, who, according t< Berry (Pedigrees of the Families in the County of Kent) belonged to " Lyd, co Kent," and whose will was provec in 1526, twenty-eight years before the estate was alien ated by the George Maplesden referred to ante, whc was presumably one of the three who conveyed th< property to Nicholas Barham in 1561, the 4th of Elizabeth Barham was Sergeant-at-law to Queen Elizabeth, anc Recorder and Member of Parliament for Maidstone and it is to him that the building, or re-building ir 1562, of the central portion of Chillington House, with its two bays and gabled fronts, is attributed. He apparently joined his newer structure on to the remains of an older one, for the long half-timbered portion shown in
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, SOUTH FRONT, 1857. [NOW THE MAIDSTONE MUSEUM.]
Built by Nicholas Barham, 1562 — Restored, 1874. Opened as a Museum, 1858.
Reproduced by permission of the Museum Authorities.
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE 255
the accompanying plate, which projects from the north- east corner of the present central building, is supposed to be of about the time of Henry VII. or Henry VIII., and is a very picturesque example of the half-timbered architecture of that period.
Nicholas Barham, who was a member of a family of that name (originally de Barham), long settled at Wad- hurst, Sussex, being a branch of the Barhams of Barham Court, near Maidstone, died from gaol fever at the assize at Oxford in 1577, and was succeeded in the ownership of the estate by his son Arthur, whom in his will he charged —
As he will answer for it before the seate of God, to use himselfe like an obedient child towards his mother, who hath bene unto him a very good and loving mother, as myselfe very well knowe.
Arthur Barham held the estate until early in the seventeenth century, when (circa 1609) he sold it to Henry Haule, a member of an ancient family of that name (or de Aula), settled at Wye, in this county, and from him it descended to his grandson, George Haule, who, dying in 1650 without issue, left the estate to his sister and heiress, Elizabeth, wife of Sir Thomas Taylor, whose son Thomas, the second baronet, married Alicia, heiress of Sir Thomas Colepeper, the last of the Colepepers of Preston Hall, Aylesford. Sir Thomas and Lady Taylor disposed of the estate, or a portion of it, as we shall see a little later on, to Sir John Beale, Bart, of Framlingham, Suffolk ; he died in 1684, and one of his two daughters and co-heiresses conveyed Chillington to her husband, William Emmerton, Esq., of Chipstead, Surrey. From the Emmertons the estate passed into the possession of John Leche, Esq., of Boxley, near Maidstone, and he, in 1698, sold it to Robert Southgate, whose son Robert apparently succeeded to the ownership ; but here we come to a piece of evidence concerning the owners of the Chillington estate at this particular period of its history which appears to indicate that at some time previously
256 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Chillington House had been disconnected from Chilling- ton Manor, and converted into a separate property.
In previously published histories of Chillington House it is recorded that in 1743 the assignees of Robert South- gate, the son, sold the property to David Fuller, an attorney, of Maidstone ; but in the Reference Library in the Museum there are MS. copies of two deeds which tend to prove that it was only the house that was sold to Southgate the elder in 1698, and not the manor, for the name of Southgate does not appear in either of the deeds which refer to various transactions between the years 1718 and 1736.
One deed relates the proceedings under a mortgage between Dame Alicia Taylor, alias Milner (her second married name) of Preston Hall, Aylesford, and Samuel Miller, of Canterbury, in the first place, but afterwards transferred to Thomas Best, of Chatham, by which it appears that the said Dame Alicia Taylor, alias Milner, held possession of the " Manor of Chillington, alias Chillingden," until the year 1731, when, being unable to release the mortgage, she parted with the property to the aforesaid Thomas Best, and he, in 1736, disposed of the estate to Sir George Cooke, Kt, of the Inner Temple, London, which transaction is defined in the second deed. We may therefore conclude that, although Sir Thomas and Lady Taylor sold Chillington House to Sir John Beale, not long after they inherited it — i.e., towards the end of the seventeenth century — Chillington Manor was retained by Lady Taylor, under a deed of mortgage, until after her second marriage, and that she finally disposed of the whole estate in 1731.
It is interesting to note in passing, that in the deeds just referred to, amongst the various properties comprised within the " Mannor of Chillington," mention is made of —
All that ancient Building, Stow House, or Chappell comonly called Saint Faith's Church or the Dutch Church, and now sett apart for God's Worshipp, the West End thereof being formerly used for a Barn but now converted into Tenements together with the Church yard.
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE 257
This entry in the deeds makes it necessary for us to go back to the time of Nicholas Barham, in whose will we read : —
And my mynd and will further is that my wiffe shall have liberty for herselfe and family to resort to the Chappell, and for the residue of her family in the said Chappell.
It is a moot point, and probably one that will never be settled, whether the " Chappell " named by Barham in his will was a private chapel attached to the house, or the old St. Faith's, or Dutch Church, mentioned in the deed of sale. With a public place of worship situated only a few yards from Chillington House, and being a portion of the same property, with a right of way to the same, there was apparently little need for a private chapel to be built as part of the house, especially as Barham would doubtless have reserved a special right to a certain portion of the old Dutch Church for the use of himself and family, and wished that right continued for his wife's convenience. It has, however, been thought by some who have been associated with the place, and investigated its past history, that a private chapel did exist as part and parcel of the house itself, and as will be seen later on, a modern building now occupies the supposed site of the old chapel.
Mr. Fuller, into whose possession the property passed in 1743, died without issue, and, after the death of his widow, Chillington House had several owners until in 1 80 1 it was purchased by Mr. William Charles, who, although a medical man, established, in conjunction with a Mr. Harris, a felting and blanketing business here ; and so the old manor house, which in the past had been a residence of knights and dames, became the scene of a commercial industry for nearly forty years, when, on the death of Mr. Charles's son William in 1840, the property came into the sole possession of his brother, Thomas Charles, who, like his father, was a general medical practitioner (but retired from practice), and a bachelor. S
258 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
He continued to reside in the house until his death in 1855.
During his lifetime he amused himself with the study of archaeology, and in the course of numerous excursions in the county he made several interesting pencil draw- ings of old buildings and other objects of antiquarian interest ; he also formed a collection of objects of antiquity, mostly Romano-British pottery, found in the town and neighbourhood, and at his death he bequeathed the whole of his collection, including several oil-colour paintings, to the town, and thereby gave the nucleus of what is now one of the largest provincial museums in England
In the year of Mr. Charles's death the Corporation adopted the "Public Libraries Act, 1855," then known as the " Ewart Act " ; and in 1857 they secured by purchase Chillington Manor House, with the adjoining garden, now almost entirely covered with the Municipal Technical Schools. In the following year (1858) the old building was opened as a Public Museum, with Mr. Edward Pretty, F.S.A., as the first curator. Mr. Pretty, who was a native of Hollingbourne, a small village between Maidstone and Ashford, was an old and intimate friend of Mr. Charles, and had held the position of drawing master at Rugby School for many years ; he was also of an antiquarian turn, an accomplished draughtsman, and an excellent miniature painter.
In the Reference Library there is a collection of very skilful pencil drawings by him of a large number of the old buildings of Maidstone and district, and of several of the Kentish churches ; several of the former have altogether disappeared, and many of the latter have been " restored " beyond recognition, so that the drawings themselves possess a great value from an archaeological point of view, quite apart from the artistic merit which they undoubtedly possess ; for they show that Mr. Pretty was endowed with a keen artistic talent, and that he
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CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE 259
possessed a rare capacity for the faithful delineation of detail
He died in 1865, aged 73, and left his library of books, chiefly on art and archaeology, and his large collection of prints, and pencil and water-colour drawings by himself and other artists, to the Museum.
Mr. Pretty was succeeded by Mr. W. J. Lightfoot, from the British Museum, who held the appointment until his death in 1 874, and during his curatorship many impor- tant alterations to the old building, and extensions in the shape of new wings, were effected.
It was also during his time of office that the modern chapel was built on to the east side of the long gallery and cloister, on what was supposed to be the site of the chapel referred to in Barham's will ; and in the same year, 1 874, the south wing of the Court Lodge, East Farleigh — an interesting half-timbered building of the time of Henry VIII., with a fine example of kingpost — was carefully taken down, carted 'into Maidstone, and re-erected as an annexe to the cloister, the cost being defrayed by a member of the Tyssen-Amherst family, to whom it belonged.
Between the last-named year and 1890 many other improvements were effected, the expenses of the same being defrayed partly by public subscription and partly by the generosity of private individuals. It is not amiss to record here the names of some of the liberal -hear ted benefactors to the museum during the early years of its existence, for the establishment and expansion of the institution would have been an almost impossible matter without the generous help of Mr. Julius L. Brenchley, Messrs. Balston, Messrs. T. and J. Hollingworth, Mr. William Laurence, Mr. Alexander Randall, and Messrs. Samuel and Richard Mercer, all of whom exercised a par- ticularly active interest in the welfare of the old building, and its gradual improvement.
In recording the history of the Museum within more recent years, two important additions must be noticed.
260 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
In 1890 the annexe, known as the Bentlif Art Gallery, was erected to the memory of the late Mr. G. A. Bentlif, by his brother, Mr. Samuel Bentlif, who, at his death in 1897, bequeathed a large and valuable collection of oil and water-colour paintings to the gallery, and also left a liberal endowment for the maintenance of the same.
A few years later — i.e., 1897-99 — the latest addition to the institution was effected by the erection of the Victoria Library and County Room, for which the necessary funds were provided by public subscription, in commemoration of the Diamond Jubilee of her late majesty, Queen Victoria.
The County Room, as its name denotes, is reserved exclusively for collections of the Kentish fauna and flora.
For some of the information concerning the early history of Chillington House the writer is indebted to an article, entitled " Chillington and its Vicissitudes," written several years ago by Mr. Edward Hughes, an old resident in Maidstone, and. one who is deeply interested in the town and its past history.
CHILLINGTON HOUSE AS A MUSEUM
The contents of Maidstone Museum may be said to represent an epitome of the archaeology and natural history of Kent, and the following summary of its principal collections will be useful for visitors and students.
i. — Brenchley Room (West Wing): — English, Chinese, and Japanese pottery, Japanese bronzes and enamels, Chinese and Japanese carvings of ivory, crystal, and jade, and many other examples of the art of the Far East. Oil colour paintings by Canaletto, Pannini, Nicholas Poussin, Northcote, Opie, George Morland, T. S. Cooper, Albert Goodwin, and other artists of the English and Foreign schools.
2. — Ethnographical Room : — The Brenchley collec- tion of objects illustrating the ethnography of New
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE 261
Caledonia, New Hebrides, Solomon Islands, Friendly Islands, the Fiji and Sandwich Islands, Australia, and New Zealand.
3-4. — Entrance Hall and Great Hall (Portion of Nicholas Barham's structure) : — Armour, weapons, and old furniture of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
5. — Cloister (Henry VIII. period): — Geological collection. Holocene and Pleistocene, Kent. Pliocene, Suffolk and Essex. Miocene, France. Oligocene, Isle of Wight. Eocene, S.-E. England and N.-W. France. Cretaceous and Neocomian, Kent and Sussex. Jurassic, Triassic, Carboniferous, and Silurian.
6. — Long Gallery (Henry VIII. period): — A large general collection of minerals.
7. — Drawing Room (Portion of Nicholas Barham's structure) : — Antiquities of the Bronze, Romano-British, and Anglo-Saxon ages, the majority of them having been found in Kent, and including the Maidstone Neolithic bowl. Egyptian pottery from the Beni Hassan excava- tions, and from the Egypt Exploration Fund ; also other antiquities from Egypt, Greece, and Italy. On the wall at the head of the staircase is arranged a series of por- traits of the Hausted, or Hasted, family, predecessors of Edward Hasted, the historian of Kent (1782-1812).
8. — Bird Room (Upper Floor of West Wing): — Brenchley collection of birds from Australia, New Zealand, South Pacific, and North and South America. Kentish collection of birds, nests, and eggs.
Q. — County Room: — This room is reserved exclusively for collections representing the Fauna and Flora of Kent. At the present time it is only partially furnished, but will ultimately contain the large collection of Kentish birds now in the adjoining room. It is also proposed to arrange in this room a type collection of fossils from the various Kent formations.
The collections now here are : — Some cases of birds arranged in groups with natural surroundings, presented
262 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
by Mr. R. J. Balston, F.Z.S., etc. ; birds' nests and eggs, mammals, fish, land, marine and fresh water shells ; crus- tacea, insects, embracing an extensive collection of bees found in the county, the majority of them from the immediate neighbourhood of Maidstone, including many rare specimens, such as Ceratina cyanea, Stelis pheoptera, Stelis octo-maculata, Cilissa melanura, Andrena laponica, Andrena folita, Andrena cetii, Halictus maculatus, Sphecodes rubicundus, and Prosopis cornuta ; a Kentish herbarium — some of the specimens are exhibited in the wall-case of the gallery; and the Harrison collection of Eolithic, Paleolithic, and Neolithic stone implements from the Chalk Plateau of Kent, the Oldbury Rock Shelters, and the Medway gravels.
10. — Shell Room (Upper Floor of East Wing): — A very extensive general collection of shells from widely- distributed countries, and corals ; also several thousand species of British and Foreign lepidoptera, including the Brenchley, Balston, and Tasker collections: the last named collection includes a very comprehensive series of the lepidoptera papiliones, and lepidoptera phalaenae of Switzerland.
II. — News Room (Lower Floor of East Wing).
12. — Victoria Lending Library.
BENTLIF ART GALLERY
13. — Upper Floor: — The Bentlif collection of oil and water colour paintings, including examples by David Cox, Turner, Copley Fielding, Clarkson Stanfield, Wm. Alexander, J. Varley, Aaron Penley, Samuel Prout, Henry Bright, John Brett, E. M. Ward, E. R. Hughes, Joseph Clark, T. S. Cooper, Arthur Hughes, Walter Shaw, and other artists.
14. — Ground Floor: — Oil colour paintings by the following deceased artists : Salvatore Rosa, Snyders, Steenwijck, Wijnants, Van der Neer, and others. A large
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE 263
and varied collection of about nine hundred examples of Japanese domestic pottery, on loan from the Hon. Henry Marsham. A valuable collection of English needlework of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. Illuminated MSS., Books of Hours, and early printed English books, including a copy (imperfect) of the Golden Legend, dated 1527, printed by Wynkyn de Worde, William Caxton's assistant and successor. Loan collection of art objects from the Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington.
15. — Vestibule: — Plaster casts from the antique.
1 6. — Reference Library: — An extensive collection of books on archaeology, numismatics, topography, genea- ology, history, biography, art, and natural history; and a special collection of works relating to the county of Kent generally, including the topographical drawings by Edward Pretty, F.S.A., Dr. Charles, and Mr. Edward Hughes.
17. — On the walls of the staircase leading from the vestibule to the upper floor is a collection of engravings and original drawings by William Woollett, one of England's greatest engravers, a native of Maidstone 073 5-1 78 5). One of the drawings is a chalk portrait of himself when a youth, discovered a few years since in a country mansion in the neighbourhood of Maidstone, and which had hitherto been unknown, except by the family who possessed it.
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING
BY GEORGE CLINCH, F.G.S.
HERE are two points about Romney Marsh which are perhaps specially noticed by one who visits the place for the first time. One is the number and importance of the churches in relation to population ; and the other, not quite so obvious at first, possibly, is the magnificent pasturage and abundant flocks of sheep. These two features, singular as it might appear, are really closely related. The chief wealth of Romney Marsh has always been derived from its wool, and it is to the wealth and piety of former generations, rather than the needs of a large population, that the fine churches of the district may be attributed.
Romney Marsh occupies a not unimportant part of Kent, comprising, in fact, about one-twentieth part of the area of the whole county ; but its mere acreage is as nothing when compared with its value as rich pasturage. There is, no doubt, a touch of sarcasm in the Kentish people's division of the world into five parts, viz. : Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and — Romney Marsh ; but, at any rate, it tends to emphasize the fact that this district was regarded as a very important part of Kent.
Lambard, in his Perambulation of Kent (1576), has a not very complimentary account to give of Romney Marsh. He describes it, borrowing from a classical writer, as " evil in winter, grievous in summer, and never good."
264
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 265
He writes : —
If a man minding to pass through Kent towards London, should arrive and make his first step on land in Rumney Marshe, he shall rather finde good grasse under foote than holesome Aire above the head.
Still he does justice to the marsh in other respects. Thus : —
Rumney Marshe is famous throughout the Realme as wel for the fertilitie and quantitie of the soile and levell, as also for the auncient and holesome ordinances there used, for the preservation and main- tenance of the bankes, and walks, against the rage of the Sea.
Of course, Lambard's description was written before the proper draining and embanking of Romney Marsh were carried out.
An interesting account of the various stages in the enclosure or reclamation of Romney Marsh is given in The. History of Romney Marsh from its Earliest Formation to 1837, by William Holloway (1849); but in the present article it is neither possible nor necessary to go into the details of this important subject.
The story of smuggling in the marsh and other adjacent parts of Kent, with which this brief chapter deals, affords a less ambitious, but perhaps not less attractive, theme. It may be convenient to the reader, however, to give in a few words some general indication of the extent and features of the marsh, and of the methods and stages by which the shoals and shingle banks on this, the most south-eastern point of the coast of Kent, were converted into dry land whereon is found at the present day perhaps the finest — certainly some of the finest — sheep pasturage in the world.
What is now generally known as Romney Marsh consists, in fact, of several distinct marshes, viz. : Romney Marsh, Denge Marsh, Walland Marsh, Kent and Sussex Rother Levels, Guldeford Level, Brede Level, Tillingham Level, and various other spots.
Romney Marsh proper contains fifteen parishes, the
266 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
V
names and populations of each in 1831 being according to the following table : —
New Romney . • . » 983
Old Romney . . .113
Hope . . . .24
Orgerswick ... 8
St Mary's . . m
Blackmanstone . . . 4
Dymchurch . . . 521
Burmarsh . . .105
West Hythe . . . . . 168
Eastbridge . -. . . 16
Newchurch . . .241
Snave . . . -93
Snargate . . .76
Brenzett . . . . . 262
Ivychurch . . .198
The total population of Romney Marsh proper, somewhat less than a hundred years ago, therefore, was 2,923 persons.
New Romney Marsh, formed by the stopping up of the old mouth of the river, lies to the east of New Romney. In 1831 it contained only 398 acres of land.
The old bed of the river Rother lies between the Marsh Wall, which constitutes the south-western boundary of Romney Marsh, and the Rhee Wall, which is the north- eastern boundary of Walland Marsh. The river once flowed past Appledore to Romney, and thence out to the sea. In 1831 New Romney Marsh contained about 101 acres of land.
Of course, it will be understood that in a sea coast like that of Romney Marsh there have been many gains and losses from siltings and storms during the year.
Denge Marsh lies to the south and south-west of Romney Marsh, and consists largely of broad tracts of shingle beds, now dry. In order to walk over them with
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 267
any degree of comfort, broad pieces of wood called " back- stays," or "back-stayers," are used, attached to the sole of the boot, the purpose of which is to prevent the feet of the pedestrian sinking into the pebbly beds. Denge Marsh contains Lydd, a rather important town, possessing a church which is sometimes called " the cathedral of the marsh."
The other more important division of the level lands in this district is that known as Walland Marsh, in which are Fairneld, with a population in 1831 of 48 ; Brookland, 434; and Midley, 52.
It has been supposed that in Romano-British times Romney was the only spot of land existing in what is now called Romney Marsh ; but the discovery of traces of a Roman pottery factory at or near Dymchurch points to the existence of dry land in that district at least as early as the Romano-British period. The great and important engineering work known as Dymchurch Wall is actually the safeguard of the whole marsh. Its destruc- tion would mean the submergence of much of the low- lying lands and the destruction of much extremely valuable property. Whatever the various gains and losses on other parts of the marsh coast may have been, it is prac- tically certain that this bulwark against the sea is as old as the Roman occupation of Britain.
From time to time various strips of land have been reclaimed from the sea. This is particularly true of the southern or south-western side of Dungeness. In Archaologia, vol. 40, pp. 361-380, there is an extremely interesting account of this district, with map or chart showing " Romney Marsh as it was certainly in the time of the Saxons, probably in the time of the Romans, and perhaps in the time of the Britons."
To a large extent the shingle on the southern part of the marsh has apparently been deposited as a result of natural forces.
There are a good many curious particulars as to the
268 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
enclosure of different parts of the marsh to be found in Holloway's History of Romney Marsh, to which reference has already been made.
Much of the past history of Romney Marsh and the adjacent districts is intimately connected with various forms of smuggling. First and chief was the exportation of wool to France without paying export duty. At certain times English guineas have been sent over privately and sold at a handsome profit beyond their face value. Lace, silks, and spirits have been amongst the principal imports. Fullers' earth, too, was at one time rather extensively exported.
" Wool-running " was the term often used to indicate the trade done in sending the wool out of England in such a manner as to evade the payment of export duty. Of course, this was not confined to Romney Marsh. The trade went on at Dover, at Canterbury, and at Kingsdown.
The shoals and tortuous channels which embarrassed the mouth of the Stour, and covered the approaches to the sandhills and Sandwich, were peculiarly favourable to contraband trade, and all these facilities were enhanced by the fogs and storms of the whole coast, which, whilst they served to cover the operations of the smugglers, interrupted the vigilance of the cruisers by creating dangers which could be lightly regarded only by the experienced, bold, and skilful smuggling seamen, prompted by the incentive of large and rapid gains. These gains were double. The French and Dutch bid high for wool ; the enormous duties levied upon French and Dutch liquors in England left a large margin for illicit importation, and those commodities found a ready sale in this country. Regardless, therefore, both of the dangers of the coast and of the penalties imposed upon them, the smugglers went on smuggling. The French bought the wool and wondered. The smugglers smiled, drank, and sold brandy freely. Public morality and the revenue suffered. The clothiers continued to growl ; Parliament and the Council issued more decrees; and the world wagged on. — Historical Sketch of Wool and Wool Manufactures in Great Britain.
Legislation against the exporting of wool and woollen goods commenced at a very early date. One of the statutes of Edward III (i Ed. Ill, c. 2, 1363-4), in
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 269
providing for the free exportation out of this realm of all "manner of merchandises," makes among others the following interesting exception: — "Except that the English merchants shall not pass out of the Realme with wools or woolsels."
Royal proclamations prohibiting the exportation of wool were issued from time to time by James I. In the time of Charles II., however, absolute prohibition was determined upon, more, it is believed, as a means of increasing the King's revenue than with any intention of benefitting the manufacturers. The natural result was that smuggling in the Romney Marsh district increased at an alarming rate. The greatest part of the wool sold to France was sent from this district, being secretly put on board French shallops by night, with well-armed crews to guard them. Within two years forty thousand packs of wool were landed in Calais alone from the coasts of Kent and Sussex. The Romney Marsh men were not content with exporting their own wool, but went boldly into the Weald, and, purchasing what they could, conveyed it to the coast.
An Act of Parliament of William III.1 sets forth :
Whereas it is a common practice in Romney March and other places adjacent for evil disposed persons to sheer their sheep and lodge wooll near the sea-side and sometimes to bring wooll out of the country more remote and lodge it as aforesaid where by fraud and force in the night time the said persons do cause the same to be transported to France to the increase of the trade of that kingdom and the destruction of the trade of England. To prevent these practices for the future be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid that all and every owner and owners of wooll shorn or housed laid upp or lodged within ten miles of the sea side within the counties of Kent and Sussex shall be obliged to give an exact account in writing within three days after the sheering thereof of his her or their number of fleeces and where lodged or housed to the next adjacent port or officer of His Majesties Customs or the like notice before he she or they shall presume to remove any part or parcel thereof of the said number of fleeces and
i 9 William III., c. 40.
270 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
weight and the name of the person or persons to whom it is disposed and the place to which it is intended to be carryed and take a certificate from the officer who first entred the same upon penalty of forfeiting all such wooll as shall not be so entred or otherwise disposed of and the owner or owners also to be liable to the further penalties of three shillings for every pound weight of all such wooll as if the same had been actually transported which said account the officers respectively are hereby required to take gratis and give such certificate or certifi- cates without delay to the party or parties demanding the same, and shall therein specify the name or names of the owners and buyers thereof and limitt it to such times and places to be removed. For which duty and service the said officer or officers shall take and demand the sum of six pence and no more for each certificate upon any account or pretence whatever.
And whereas it is a common practice in the said Marsh for divers persons not resident upon the place to buy upp great quantities of wooll and transport or cause the same to be transported out of the kingdom. For preventing such practices for the future be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid — That no person or persons residing within fifteen miles of the sea in the counties of Kent and Sussex shall presume to buy any wooll before they do enter into bond to the Kings Majesty His Heirs or Successors with sureties that all the wooll they buy shall not be sold by them to any person or persons within fifteen miles of the sea. And in case wooll be found carryed towards the sea side in the counties aforesaid unless such wooll be first entred and security given the said shall be forfeited and the person or persons offending therein shall also forfeit three shillings for every pound weight of all such wooll.
The following rather good story of smuggling on the coast of East Kent was published in The Kentish Garland (vol. ii., pp. 648-649) in 1882 : —
During the French war an eminent banking firm of Hebraic origin carried on a flourishing connexion between the rival interests of France and England : needless to state that each belligerent was totally un- aware of the services rendered to the opposing nation. A large swift vessel, propelled by sails and the oars of hardy Deal boatmen, carried to the former country despatches from the English Government for their French spies, and to the French Government a cargo of English guineas, which at that time fetched thirty shillings ; and having safely disposed of this freight, the ship was laden in return with silk, brandy, lace, and tobacco, also letters from the spies : the latter were duly delivered to our authorities, and the former disposed of in and out of our county at a con- siderable profit. The captain was much trusted by his employers, and on
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 271
one voyage he was informed his cargo was the largest he had carried — from ten to thirty thousand guineas. The head of the honourable firm anxiously awaited the return of his faithful servant, who appeared with a very rueful countenance, and informed him that, being chased by a government vessel, and fearful of being overhauled, they had cut the throats of the bags, and the yellow-boys were at the bottom of the sea ! The banker raved, and demanded the spot where the catastrophe had occurred ; the information, rather reluctantly given, specified a spot close to the French coast, and the honest Hebrew, instinctively feeling that he had been " done," communicated with his French agents. Divers descended and brought back the bags, not, however, with their throats cut, but intact, save that, in place of their original contents, a stone was in each of them ! All parties being engaged in an illegal transaction, the only revenge the banker could take was by dismissing the captain from his employment, who laughed in his face, when he literally danced and swore with rage. The crew, who shared in their chief's disgrace, seemed rather " flush " of money for some time, while the captain first bought a piece of ground and built himself a house ; in a short time he got a few more houses, land followed, and ... in the second generation his descendants were squires, and parsons, and justices of the peace.
Many of the romantic as well as ordinary everyday incidents in the story of Romney Marsh were more or less intimately associated with the smugglers and the smuggling trade. A great amount of freedom prevailed. Money easily earned was quickly and freely expended. Laxity in reference to the marriage tie was proverbial. A species of handselling was in vogue, and the marriage of maidens was notoriously rare. This is illustrated by the humorous explanation of the curious detached spire and belfry of Brookland Church. This is said to be due, not to design, but to surprise and consternation occasioned by a maid coming to church to be married. The spire is said to have leapt down from the church in amazement at such an unusual spectacle.
In some cases the churches were used as receptacles for smuggled goods. Popular tradition points to Fair- field Church as having been used for this purpose. Fairfield is situated about two miles to the north-west of Brookland in a secluded part of the marsh. The area of
272 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
the parish is over twelve hundred acres, whilst the population is about fifty souls.
It is a curious fact that Benenden Church, near Cran- brook, in the Weald of Kent, which is said to have been used as a place for concealing smuggled goods, once had also, like Brookland, a detached belfry or campanile.
One of the chief needs of a smuggler was a convenient and safe hiding-place for the articles in which he traded. At various points round the chalky coast of Kent and Sussex there are caverns excavated by the waves which were probably employed for this purpose. At Birchington1 large underground chambers containing about twenty thousand cubic feet of space were excavated in the chalk by the smugglers, and could only be approached from the shaft of a well thirty-two feet under the surface. The Grotto at Margate may very well have been excavated originally as a hiding-place for smuggled goods. St. Clement's Caves, at Hastings, although natural fissures in the rock, have evidently been improved and expanded so as to make them useful as hiding-places.
Romney Marsh afforded no such means of concealment. Moreover, wool is a rather bulky material and difficult to hide. Smuggling here, therefore, had to be carried on according to bolder and more daring methods. The wool was carried boldly down to the ports or sea-shore to be shipped. The following account is given of an attack made in 1688 by the smugglers on W. Chater, a revenue officer : —
Having procured the necessary warrants, he repaired to Romney Marsh, where he captured eight or ten men who were carrying the wool on horses' backs to be shipped, and desired the Mayor of Romney to commit them. The Mayor, wishing, no doubt, to lead a peaceful life among his neighbours, admitted them to bail. Chater and his assistants retired to Lydd, but that town was made too hot to hold them — they were attacked at night. Adapting the advice of the mayor's son they next day came towards Rye. They were pursued by some fifty armed horsemen till they got to Camber Point. So fast were they followed that
1 See The Antiquary, vol. xiv., p. 132.
NEW ROMNKY CHURCH.
L
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 273
they could not get their horses over Guildford Ferry, but, luckily, some ships' boats gave them assistance, so that the riders got safe into the town.
The following is a curious ballad relating to the subject of smuggling in Kent, which, in spite of manifest faults of composition and rhythm, has considerable charm and delicacy of sentiment. It is, of course, valuable on account of the light it throws on the life of the smugglers of the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries rather than for its literary character. It is reprinted from a collection of ballads in the British Museum. Its date is uncertain, but one would be inclined to ascribe it to the end of the seventeenth century, say, perhaps, about the year 1690.
THE SMUGGLER'S BRIDE
Attention give, and a tale I'll tell,
Of a damsel fair that in Kent did dwell,
On the Kentish coast when the tempest rolled,
She fell deep in love with a smuggler so bold.
Upon her pillow she could not sleep, When her valiant smuggler was on the deep, While the winds did whistle, she would complain, For her valiant smuggler that ploughed the main.
When Will arrived on his native coast,
He would fly to her that he valued most —
He would fly to Nancy, his lover true,
And forget all hardships he'd lately been through.
One bright May morning the sun did shine,
And lads and lasses, all gay and fine,
Along the coast they did trip along,
To behold their wedding and sing a cheerful song.
Young Nancy then bid her friends adieu,
And to sea she went with her lover true ;
In storms and tempests all hardships braves,
With her valiant smuggler upon the foaming waves.
One stormy night, when the winds did rise,
And dark and dismal appeared the skies,
The tempest rolled, and the waves did roar,
And the valiant smuggler was driven from the shore.
274 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
" Cheer up," cries William, " my valiant wife." Says Nancy, " I never valued life, I'll brave the storms and tempests through, And fight for William with a sword and pistol too."
At length a cutter did on them drive ;
The cutter on them soon did arrive :
" Don't be daunted ! though we're but two
We'll not surrender, but fight like Britons true."
" Cheer up," says Nancy, with, courage true, " I will fight, dear William, and stand by you." They like Britons fought, Nancy stood by the gun, They beat their enemies and quickly made them run.
Another cutter now hove in sight
And join'd to chase them with all their might ;
They were overpowered, and soon disarmed,
It was then young Nancy and William were alarmed.
A shot that moment made Nancy start, Another struck William to the heart ; This shock distressed lovely Nancy's charms, When down she fell and expired in William's arms.
Now Will and Nancy love bid adieu,
They lived and died like two lovers true.
Young men and maidens now faithful prove,
Like Will and Nancy who lived and died in love.
A significant point about the smuggling of the Romney Marsh districts, and, indeed, of the other parts of the Kentish coast, was that not all who were associated with this illicit trade were men of humble origin or mean station. A writer in 1675 says :
It is well known that smugglers are not of the meanest persons in the places where they dwell, but have oftentimes great interest with the magistrates ; and, being purse-proud, do not value what they spend to ingratiate themselves with persons of authority, to distrust all such as discover their fraudulent dealings, or else by bribes to stop their mouths. . . . The smugglers are not only well acquainted with some attorneys and clerks, but they make good interest with the under-sheriffs in the counties where they drive their trade ; and these have strange tricks and delays in their returns, in which some of them will take part with the offenders instead of executing the law against them.
ROMNEY MARSH IN THE DAYS OF SMUGGLING 275
But if some of the more prominent people were asso- ciated with this illicit trade, there were others of the lowest and most depraved character amongst them. The gang of smugglers who about the middle of the eighteenth century murdered Daniel Carter, a Custom House officer, were miscreants of the lowest type. The group, seven in all, were hanged at Chichester, January i8th, 1749. Their dead bodies were hung in chains for the delectation of the fowls of the air at Rake, at Selsey Bill, and at Rook's Hill, near Chichester.
The scenery of Romney Marsh is not at once so striking as one might expect, but it is really of singular beauty, and possesses a charm which certainly increases on renewed acquaintance. Seen from a passing ship, the marsh-land looks flat and uninteresting, and no one whose acquaintance was limited to this method of seeing it would be very enthusiastic in its praise. The solitary lighthouse at Dungeness, standing on what looks like a narrow bank of shingle, presents a curiously desolate picture. The waves are crushed into white, boiling foam on the pebbly shore, the wind whistles in weird melancholy cadence across the expanse of marsh and water. The whole scene produces upon the mind a rather uncomfortable impression of barrenness and desolation.
To see the beauties of the marsh one must walk or drive about its quaint old-fashioned villages, or ascend the lofty towers of New Romney Church or Lydd Church ; or, still better, view the land from the commanding heights near Lympne, where a glorious, comprehensive, and striking panorama of the whole of Romney Marsh and the adjacent country is spread out at the beholder's feet.
The late Dr. Parry, Bishop of Dover, caught the true inspiration of the Marsh. In an address to the Kent Archaeological Society in 1879! he writes:
But take our Roman-ey, this Roman Marsh of ours, in one of its calmer, brighter, happier moods. The sun, let me say, is hasting to his'setting over 1 A re haologia Cantiana, vol. xiii., 171-177.
276 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Fairlight, and the shadows are lengthening out Hythe-wards. A gentle evening breeze rustles peacefully among the flags along the dyke-side. The blue sky overhead was never more blue. Where are we ? Is this Kent ? Are we in England at all ? Or have we dropped down somewhere on the Cam- pagna, outside the walls of Rome ? For lack of a ruined aqueduct your eye rests on the grey wall of Hope, or Eastbridge, or on the solitary arch of Midley. On the one side rises a tall landmark across the plain, the Campanile of Lydd ; on the other stretches far away the long ridge of the Alban and Sabine hills, which folk hereabout call Lympne and Aldington. But I know better, for while my friend the Marsh Rector and I are still arguing the point, there comes creaking along the road to Ostia (New Romney, he calls it), a heavy waggon drawn by the wide-horned, mild-eyed, melancholy oxen, which every Roman artist knows so well.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE IN KENT
BY J. TAVENOR-PERRY
I HE style of ecclesiastical architecture which was in vogue during the seventeenth century does not appeal either to the artistic or the archaeo- logical sentiment with the same force as does the work of the earlier centuries ; and belonging to no definite style, despised by the Gothic architect as " debased," and by the classic architect as rude and de- formed, and with nothing but some accidental picturesque- ness to recommend it to the artist, it has been to a great extent ignored by architectural writers, as well as by the contributors to our archaeological journals. This is the more to be lamented since examples of the period are gradually becoming rarer, as neglect suffers them to fall into ruin, or destruction at the hands of the " restorer " converts them into the semblance of what they never were. Sometimes, as at Halsted, they are removed to make way for a correct modern-Gothic church ; or deformed, as at Plaxtole, with incongruous excrescences, which seek to persuade one that they themselves are the restorations of an older building to which the original structure was but a later addition. Sometimes, as at St. Nicholas', Rochester, the window tracery has been converted into the correctness of an earlier date, and the puzzled archaeologist is left to wonder how it is that the fabric of the building is mani- festly of a later date than its details. But whatever the artistic merit of such buildings may be, they form an inseparable part of the history of the architecture of the country, and, as such, require to be considered equally with
277
278 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
the more perfect buildings of the earlier or the later centuries.
The period of the English Reformation and the years which immediately succeeded it were not favourable to church-building ; whilst the eviction of the monks and the destruction of their convents left, in such of their churches as were permitted to remain, ample accommodation for any increasing congregations. But even before the opening scenes of that great revolution were enacted, building operations in connection with church-building had languished, or been confined to such memorial works as the great chapels at Cambridge, Windsor and West- minster ; and the remains of the architectural magnificence of the sixteenth century are only to be looked for in such as these and in the colleges which were erected and endowed out of the revenues of the suppressed monasteries, or in the great houses such as the new-made men were building for themselves all over the country. Kent was, perhaps, less affected by these events than most other parts of the kingdom of equal importance. It had comparatively few great monastic establishments, and it abounded in parish churches sufficient for all the wants of the community. Perhaps the only Kentish edifice of any importance of this period to which reference can be made is the lofty tower of Aldington, the church to which Erasmus was appointed as rector when he first came to England, and from which, for many years, he drew a pension. This tower was erected by Archbishop Warham, who had a palace near by, in the early part of the sixteenth century, and it shews, in the rich ornamentation of the lower stage, signs of the approaching debasement of Gothic architecture.
With the opening of the seventeenth century, in conse- quence of the more settled conditions of the country resulting from the peaceful accession of the Stuart dynasty, and the wealth acquired during the prosperous years which succeeded the turbulent opening of Elizabeth's reign,
UPPER DEAL CHURCH : WEST TOWER.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 279
some return to the building activity of mediaeval times becomes noticeable. The willing or enforced submission of the people to the church as by law established, turned their attention to the edifices which had survived the neglect or destruction of the previous century, and some attempts were made to repair and embellish them ; whilst the revival of the ecclesiastical spirit, which culminated in the administration of Archbishop Laud, fostered the tendency to church-building which had already been evoked Thus in Kent we find, early in the century, that many important restorations or rebuildings were taken in hand. At Charing, where the church of St. Peter and St. Paul had been nearly destroyed by fire in 1 590, a large part of the church was soon afterwards rebuilt. In 1609 the tower and considerable portions of the church of Halsted were erected, and in 1624 the large church of St. Nicholas, Rochester, which was only first consecrated in 1423, had become ruinated, and was entirely recon- structed. In 1621 the chapel of Groombridge was rebuilt, any earlier edifice, which may have before served the chapelry, having been entirely destroyed ; and by 1640 the nave and tower of Charlton Church, as they now stand, were completed. At Plaxtole, in the parish of Wrotham, a large and important church was erected, probably through the influence of Laud, although the date assigned to it is four years subsequent to his execution. During the second half of the century, however, the Rebellion and the Revolution, and all the troubles incidental to the disturbed state of public affairs, interrupted the progress of church-building ; but in the east of the county, at Deal, which the fresh activity in the naval affairs of the country had rendered very prosperous, the tower and nave of St. Leonard's were rebuilt in 1684. Besides these larger works there were numerous addi- tions made to existing buildings, such as the porches of Ashurst, Chiddingstone and Hucking, many of which are undated, and their period only to be surmised from their
280
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
details. There was also a great deal of wood-work inserted in the existing buildings during the seventeenth
CHARING CHURCH : BENCHES.
century, among which may be particularly mentioned the rood screen of Chalk Church, and the west gallery of St. Peter's, Ightham, erected by Sir William Selby in
CHIDDINGSTONK CHURCH : SOUTH PORCH.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 281
1619, pulled down a few years ago. Besides these there are numerous pulpits and font covers, more or less en- riched, which, not only in Kent, but throughout the country, were added to the churches during the early part of the century.
When building activity was resumed, the traditions of the old styles were almost forgotten, and the workmen were but ill-educated in the arts of the classic renaissance, which were then spreading over the country. Thus when the design to be executed was of an ambitious character, drawings for the work, or instructions of more or less com- pleteness were obtained from some master ; or, if of a more modest character, the mason was left to his own de- vices, and attempted to imitate the forms by which he had always been surrounded. This is well exemplified by three porches built within a few years and a few miles of each other in the south-west corner of the county, viz., those of Ashurst, Chiddingstone and Groombridge. The first of these, according to the date upon it, was built in 1621, and is of a simple, if not rude, character. It is of rough stone- work with a plain, unmoulded arch of the depressed form common of all late Tudor work, having in the gable a small, worn sundial, beneath which, under a label, and within a square recess, are the arms of Sir John Rivers of Chafford, two bars dancett'ee with three bezants in chief, who was created a baronet the igth July, 1621. This porch has been restored, and the apex of the gable is new, and the only architectural features of the original seventeenth century construction are the sundial and the shield of arms. The porch of Chiddingstone Church is of a much more interesting character, and has been described in Bloxam's Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture. It is a particularly good example of the combination of classic detail with the forms of the departing Gothic style. The arch is semi-circular, with a keystone and capitals to the jambs, all moulded in the renaissance style, but the whole is placed within a square-headed dripstone in the
282 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
perpendicular manner. The corbels under the springing of the gables are formed into classic trusses ; and in the centre of the gable is a well-finished sundial, over which is carved the date, 1626. As is shewn by the illustration, the upper part of the porch is now covered with ivy, so that the gable-cross is hidden, but Bloxam describes it as " a cross of the form heraldically-termed bottonee, or trefoiled at the extremities, and this cross is of a date coeval with the porch."
The porch of Groombridge Church, which in point of date occupies a place midway between those of Ashurst and Chiddingstone, is altogether of a more ambitious design, and exhibits no traces of Gothic tradition. It is a question whether, as we now see it and as shewn in our illustration, it is complete, as the apex of the gable is finished meanly in wood and in a manner not consonant with the solidity of the lower part, and it is known to have been tampered with in 1750, when, perhaps, some alterations were made. The arch is semi-circular and the mouldings classic in profile, the angles of the piers being boldly rusticated. The gable bears, besides the dedicatory inscription and date of 1625, tne coronet and plumes of the Prince of Wales, with his motto, " Ich dien." This badge is executed in a different stone from the rest of the work, and may belong to the alterations of 1750.
There are now no traces left of the earlier chapel which stood at Groombridge in the reign of Henry III., for the new chapel, erected in 1621, was apparently built on an entirely new plan. It is merely a large hall of red bricks, unbroken by any transept or indication of a chancel, and with the projection of the south porch and the but- tresses alone to mitigate the bareness of its outline. It has suffered by restoration, but, as we now see it, exter- nally at least, it remains pretty much as it was when first built. The main alteration has been in the roof, which, although doubtless of the original pitch, has been entirely reconstructed. In 1820 the old roof was thought to be
GROOMBRIDGE CHURCH : SOUTH PORCH.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 283
unsafe and was removed, and the roof which was then sub- stituted with tie beams and a segmental-shaped ceiling was superseded in 1896 by the present one, which can only be an imaginary restoration of the original. In style the
NORTHFLEET: WEST TOWER.
chapel is distinctly Gothic ; and it is only when the details are examined that the debased character of the work is discovered. The interior is divided into three bays, each with a pair of three-light windows ; and there is one of four lights at the east end and one of five lights at the
284 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
west. These windows are contained under four-centred arches, all boldly moulded, with cusped heads, but with the eyes at the intersection of the heads with the mullions unpierced, and they might well pass for work dating a hundred years earlier; but the buttresses, bold and wide spreading, are most curiously ornamented at the angles and on the faces with boldly projecting stone rustics, betraying their classic origin ; whilst the porch, as we have seen, is wholly renaissance.
It is of common occurrence to find in an old church a font of a date anterior to the oldest part of the existing structure, as it was the laudable custom of our ancesters, before it became fashionable to present new fonts and windows to a church for the glorification of their donors, to preserve the ancient font through all the changes the fabric of the church might undergo ; but this was not the case at Groombridge, and a font of a classic and not ungraceful form was placed in the chapel at the time of its rebuilding.
On the borders of the parish of Speldhurst, to which Groombridge is a chapelry, another effort at church-build- ing, not so successful architecturally, was made at the end of the century. After the Restoration the fame of the Tunbridge waters attracted the fashionable world in its search for health and diversion combined, and the village of the Wells sprang into being ; but it was not until 1685, when a subscription was made to build a chapel, that it arrived at a perfected existence. Then was raised that curious edifice, dedicated to King Charles the Martyr, which still stands at the end of the Pantiles, the centre of the fashionable life of the eighteenth century, and the scene of the unhappy meeting of the Hebrews with Maria Esmond and Parson Sampson. It is a strange, mis-shapen building of red brick, with stuccoed ceilings not without merit, and curious two-light windows with pointed heads (its architect's tribute to ecclesiology), and, rising over all, a lofty wooden cupola.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 285
In the last years of the reign of James I. the church of St. Nicholas, Rochester, falling into a ruinous condition, was taken down for rebuilding in 1620, and on the 24th of September, 1624, according to an inscription placed over the west door, the present building, erected in its place was consecrated. The original structure was built as a parish church early in the fifteenth century, the parishioners having previously had their altar within the cathedral, and was first consecrated on the 1 8th December, 1423, the second year of Henry VI. In its style, there- fore, the edifice was perfected Perpendicular, and any remains of the original work should evince the character- istics of that style ; and we may, perhaps, consider that two or three of the windows we now see are restorations, more or less bad, of those belonging to the first church ; but the remainder are merely the fanciful creations of a modern architect who ignored the history of the building on which he was engaged, and thrust in incongruous representations of work anterior in date to the original foundation of the building. A writer in the Gentlemen's Magazine for 1803, who was a hundred years nearer than we are to the period of the second consecration, and saw the church before it had been restored, throws doubt on the correctness of the in- scription. He avers that the invitation for subscriptions for the seventeenth-century restoration contemplated repair only ; and he remarks that a cursory view will satisfy any- one that the old walls and windows belong to the church of 1418, and that all that was done was "a new tower, roof, pews, together with a trifling alteration of the pillars, and an entire new glazing." There seems to be but little doubt that this view is in the main a correct one, and that though the reconstruction of the interior was so radical an alteration as to necessitate reconsecration, the description on the tablet exaggerates in describing as a rebuilding what was, in fact, only a reparation. The reconstruction of the interior was not a happy architectural effort ; the nave arcades were rebuilt with rough, pointed arches standing on
286 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
rude columns, modelled on the Tuscan order, and the old tower was crowned by a wooden cupola. If the original church had any bells they shared in the general ruin, for two new bells, perhaps the old ones restored, were hung in the seventeenth century, the earlier of which is dated 1654.
The fate which befel St. Nicholas', Rochester, at about the same time overtook St. Nicholas', Plumstead; and, although we have not such detailed accounts of what happened in its case, we may take the history to be pretty much as it is related by Lysons. Early in the seventeenth century the roof of the church fell in, and the place seems to have been left in ruins for twenty years, when, by the efforts of a Mr. John Gossage, a new building was erected within the ancient walls, which has itself made way, in recent years, for a partial restoration of the original. Whether the grand tower now standing at the west end of the north aisle was due to the labours of Mr. Gossage, and who was the architect by whom it was designed, per- haps can never now be discovered, which is the more to be regretted since the tower is one of the most satisfactory architectural efforts of the period. In its outline and pro- portion it is essentially Gothic ; and the graceful manner in which the stages rise one out of the other has resulted in a composition comparable to works of the best period. The moulded brickwork of the cornices and window dress- ings is, of course, renaissance in detail, but shews the hand of a skilled designer. Standing as it does now, among streets of mean houses, its mellowed red-brick walls do not shew to advantage ; but as Felix Summerly saw and described it years ago, embowered among fine old trees, it was, as he said, " a subject for the pencil."
The church of Charlton, near Woolwich, was, with the exception of portions of the chancel, entirely reconstructed in the seventeenth century. The works were begun soon after the death of Sir Adam Newton, of Charlton House, and completed in 1640 during the tenure of the See of Rochester by Bishop Warner. This bishop
PLUMSTEAD CHURCH : WEST TOWER.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 287
shared in many of Laud's ambitious views, and, like him, was a church builder ; and he became the founder, after he had returned to his see at the Restoration, of the college at Bromley. There he built a chapel, which was destroyed in 1864 to make room for a modern
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HOLLINGBOURNE CHURCH : THE CULl'EPER ClIAPEL.
incongruous successor, which, as an excuse for its destruction, was described as " built in the spurious Italian style introduced into England in the reign of Charles II, having round-headed windows intersected by a single stone mullion."
288 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Sir Adam Newton, the builder of Charlton House, had been tutor to Henry, Prince of Wales, and had no doubt frequently met with Inigo Jones, who held the position of surveyor to that Prince ; and the tradition that Jones was the architect of Sir Adam's house, although it has never been satisfactorily confirmed, is extremely probable, par- ticularly as in its style it recalls the work of the Fredriks- borg and Rosenborg palaces in Copenhagen, and other work in Denmark, with which he would be familiar. Although the work at the church was not commenced during Sir Adam's lifetime, he being, perhaps, too much occupied in completing his own house, he had set aside a sum of money for the rebuilding, and, very probably, had had the drawings prepared for the work by his own architect, possibly Inigo Jones himself, so that at his death, in 1629, his executors proceeded at once with the build- ing, completing it, as we have seen, in 1640. Moreover, they gracefully concluded their labours by employing the celebrated Nicholas Stone to erect a monument to the benefactor in the church at a cost of £180; and to that sculptor's chisel are due the effigies of Sir Adam Newton and his wife, who was a daughter of Sir William Langhorne.
The work of Charlton Church is executed almost entirely in red brick, and is characterised, in the tower especially, by a massiveness which atones, in a measure, for the lack of ornamentation. There is scarcely a trace of the Gothic tradition to be found in it except in the pointed arches of the belfry stage and the battlements of the parapets ; but the main cornice of the tower, and all the mouldings and rustics of the porch, shew distinctly their classic origin. Taken as a whole it is not an ungraceful composition, or unworthy of so unique a position on the hill-top overlooking the river.
In the year 1590 the church at Charing was burnt out through the unfortunate mishap of one Mr. Dios, who on a Tuesday in August, the weather being "extreem hot,"
CHARLTON CHURCH: WEST TOWER AND SOUTH PORCH.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 289
aiming with a fowling-piece at a pigeon, hit the shingle of the roof instead and set it on fire. Nothing was left of the church but the bare walls, except the parvise over the vaulted porch, and all the bells were melted as they hung. Charing was then, as it appears to be to this day, a well-to-do place. It had been an important stopping-place for the Canterbury pilgrims ; the Arch- bishops had there one of their principal palaces ; and the sovereigns, in their progresses to the Continent, made it one of their halting-places. It did not, therefore, sit down tamely to bewail its misfortune, but applied itself with energy and expenditure to repair the damage. Whether the epithet " smoky," which, accord- ing to Dr. Pegge's collection of proverbs relating to Kent, seems to have been attached to its name, bore any allusion to this event is uncertain, but the thoroughness with which they obliterated all traces of the fire rendered it undeserved. Within two years, from the great oaks of the Weald, was raised over the lofty nave a fine new roof ; and, later — for perhaps funds were for the time exhausted by this great effort — early in the seventeenth century, the more ornate roof was built over the chancel, as the inscription, " DONI 1620 ANN REGNI JACOBI XVIII," painted upon it, testifies. These roofs are framed with collars, and in the nave with ponderous tie-beams as well, and at the angles of the collars with the principal rafters are moulded strengthen- ing brackets framed in. The soffits of the timbers are richly carved in low relief, and there is a good deal of the original painted decoration still remaining on them. The old benches, with the rest of the woodwork, were destroyed by the fire, and had to be renewed ; and some of the seats which were inserted in 1622, now relegated to lowly places, remain as elegant examples of Jacobean woodwork. The four bells of the tower and the sanctus bell, which were all melted, were replaced in 1608 by a single bell, which gave rise to the uncomplimentary distich which runs : —
Dirty Charing lies in a hole, It has but one bell and that was stole. U
290
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
In 1628 the old tower of St. Botolph, Northfleet, collapsed. The church is one of the largest and most beautiful in the county, and the old tower was on a scale proportioned to it. Its size was so large that the
-
PLAXTOLE CHURCH : INTERIOR, LOOKING WEST.
present tower is erected within the old walls, of which the north one, cut down to a rake, carries the flight of steps giving access to the upper stages. The new tower, which was erected mainly of the old materials, with flints
PLAXTOLE CHURCH : WEST TOWER.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 291
and brickwork interspersed, possesses no architectural merit, although the inevitable battlements appear, and was built solely for use as a belfry; and in the absence of buttresses, and in its proportions and bareness of outline, looks at a distance like a piece of Saxon work.
In the church of All Saints, Hollingbourne, to the north of the chancel is a chapel of considerable interest, which was the burying-place of a branch of the Culpeper family. The building may have been originally contem- porary with the rest of the church, but seems to have been wholly, or in greater part, reconstructed in the seventeenth century, when it was prepared to receive the monument of Lady Elizabeth Culpeper, of the Cheney family of Guestling in Sussex, the wife of Thomas Culpeper, of Hollingbourne, who died in 1638. This monument, which is of singular beauty, and must have been the work of a talented sculptor, perhaps Nicholas Stone or Hubert le Sueur, consists of an altar tomb with a plinth of black and white marble, bearing a black marble moulded slab, on which is laid the effigy of the lady, attired in the costume of the period, with her left hand on her breast and her right, wearing one ring, lying by her side. Her attitude, symmetrically arranged, is perfectly natural, and the whole forms a most finished piece of sculpture in the best style of a period still under Italian influence. Her feet rest against a heraldic dog, which may have been her cognizance, but curiously enough, it is not repeated in any of the armorial bearings by which she is surrounded ; and her head lies on a tasselled and embroidered pillow. On the head of the plinth is placed a shield of arms with twelve quarterings for the Culpeper and Cheney families, and at the foot another bearing the personal arms of Thomas Culpeper impaling those of his wife, while at the sides are the inscriptions on raised tablets, between six small shields, bearing the several arms quartered on the large one at the head of the tomb. The walls of the chapel are
292 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
diapered round with squared stones of finely-worked Kentish rag from the Boughton quarries, near Maidstone, bearing, alternately, raised shields J\ inches wide, which are now plain, but some of which retain traces of arms slightly engraved, all of which were no doubt intended to be, and perhaps were, blazoned in colour. The diapered wall lining is crowned with a small cornice along which, on the north and south sides, slightly cut into the stone, and retaining on the south traces of a black pigment, is the inscription " DEO SANCTO ET MISERICORDI SINT GRATLE ET GLORIA IN /ETERNUM AMEN." On the east side of the chapel is a three-light window, contemporary with the rest of the work, containing in a cartouche all that remains of the stained glass, which, perhaps, at one time filled the rest of the window. This displays a repetition of the shield of arms at the head of the tomb, somewhat defective and partly transposed, but giving the tinctures, and over the two halves of the shield, on helmets, in profile — on the tomb the helmet is placed affrontee — are crests, that to the dexter being a falcon, and that to the sinister a bull's scalp and horns. It may be mentioned that the arms in the first quarter of the shield, which are those of Culpeper — Arg., a bend engrailed, gu. — has, placed on the bend, a crescent, the cadency mark indicating that Thomas Culpeper was a second son.
The importance that Deal assumed during the latter part of the seventeenth century on account of its position as the port of the Downs in that period of active naval enterprise, added considerably to the wealth which its inhabitants, engaged in seafaring pursuits, legitimate and illegitimate, were able to accumulate ; and the end of the century witnessed, not only its incorporation as a borough, but to a great extent the rebuilding of its Parish Church. If, in erecting the tower of their church in 1684, the men of Deal aimed at producing an architectural monument, they failed ; but in solidity and massive proportions they produced a pile with a certain air of nobleness. It was
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 293
constructed of red brick with plain cornices to each of the diminishing stages, free from all attempt at ornamentation — for the rustics at the angles and surrounding the windows are a nineteenth century addition — and retaining no trace of Gothic influence, save in the battlements, the traditional finish of every church tower. Indeed the erection seems to have been for use rather than for decoration, as within a year of its building they hung in it five new bells, cast by Christopher Hodson, of London. The great cupola, which surmounts the tower, may have been meant for a gazebo, but it has been covered over with weather-boarding, on which they painted, in black, imitation windows, now, fortunately, gradually fading into indistinguishable gray- ness.
The one complete seventeenth century church of Kent (complete until its recent unfortunate, and, to all appear- ance, useless alteration) is that of Plaxtole. The history of the fabric is confined, so far as definite record goes, to the sculptured inscription placed on the eastern gable of the old church, but broken to pieces when it was enlarged, which runs thus: "THIS CHURCH WAS BYLTE FOR THE WORSHIP OF GOD AN. DO. 1649," and no tradition lingers to explain why it was erected, or to whom its erection was due. Thus, in writing its history, there is little or nothing to start from beyond what can be gleaned from the building itself; and the origin of the name and the foundation of the village in which it stands are lost in equal obscurity. The first sure ground we have is the evidence of a wall tombstone, recently lost or destroyed, to a member of the Ducke family, dated 1605, which suggests that at that date there was already a churchyard ; and the account remaining of the gift by Thomas Stanley, of Hamptons, in the parish, in 1638, for the augmentation of the salary of the curate. Hasted says it was made parochial in 1647, and the inscrip- tion quoted above distinctly calls it a church two years later; but at the Restoration it was evidently once more absorbed into the mother parish of Wrotham.
294 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
As the building stood until recently, it consisted of a great hall, without any structural chancel, a fine western tower, and north and south porches. The interior is covered with a fine open timber roof of oak, designed on the hammer-beam principal, like that of the Middle Temple, London, but without ornamentation of any kind, the wall- pieces springing from half piers, built against the walls. The two-light side windows are restorations, perhaps not quite correct, executed in 1851, but the two west windows and the windows of the tower belong to the original build- ing. There was a western gallery, which would appear by the arrangement of the windows to have been part of the original construction, but it was ruthlessly torn out quite recently for no obvious reason, unless to display a new font, of the usual memorial character, which made its appearance about the same time. The font which was removed to make room for this was itself not the original, as that had disappeared in the previous century ; so that Plaxtole Church, unlike so many which can boast of fonts older than themselves, has had, in its comparatively short existence, a new font for each century. In much the same way the old bell, dated 1709, which was perfectly sound, has gone no one knows whither, to be replaced by another which is certainly no better.
In every particular, in spite of the lateness of the date which must be assigned to it, the building is essentially Gothic, without a trace in any detail of the renaissance work which was being carried out at the same time in other parts of the country and county; and although we have no records to guide us, the one or two known facts, together with the character of the building, enable us to sketch its history. The district of Plaxtole formed part of the parish of Wrotham, which was a peculiar of the Archbishops of Canterbury, and in which was one of the archiepiscopal palaces ; hence the archbishops were brought into personal association with the place. Laud became archbishop in 1633, and we find the augmentation of the Plaxtole living
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 295
was made very shortly afterwards ; the zeal of the arch- bishop for church-building, and his interest in his parish of Wrotham, are enough to account for the rest ; and it
GROOMBRIDGE : FONT.
would seem probable that he prepared the scheme for a church at Plaxtole, and commenced the work which, perhaps, dragging on slowly during the last troublous
296
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
years of his life, was only completed after his execution, when there was no bishop to consecrate it, in the recorded year of 1649.
KEMSING CHURCH : FONT COVER.
The seventeenth century woodwork to be found in the county is not in any way remarkable considering the enormous quantity of oak in the forests of the Weald ; but for this destruction, in the guise of restoration, is in
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY CHURCH ARCHITECTURE 297
part accountable. The only important roofs are those of Charing and Plaxtole, which we have described, and Groombridge, which has been lost ; but there is a good deal of woodwork in furniture, such as pulpits and font- covers, to be found in the churches, though of no particular merit. There was at Chalk Church a rood screen, dated 1660, which seems to have been recently removed when the church was restored. At Aldington there is some fine Jacobean wood panelling, dated 1621, round the walls of the south chancel, but this was placed there by a late rector, who obtained it from another building. In the same church is a good font-cover ; but perhaps the one we give from Kemsing is as good a typical specimen as can be found.
These examples of seventeenth century architecture in Kent which we have given probably embrace the principal works now remaining, although there may be a large number of smaller features, such as windows and doors, which have not been included ; but possibly enough have been collected and described to shew the character of a phase of architectural art which has been so unfortu- nately despised, and of which so many examples have been but recently defaced or destroyed, so that if they in their turn fall before the onslaught of the restorer, some sort of record of them will remain.
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT
BY S. W. KERSHAW, M.A., F.S.A.
CANTERBURY
circumstances made Canterbury the centre and home of refugee life in the sixteenth and following centuries. One important attraction was the religious freedom which was denied them abroad, where persecution had driven them from France and other countries.
Long before this time the trade begun by the Flemings had developed along the winding Stour, where mills for dyeing and other crafts existed.
" Colchester for bayes, Canterbury for sayes " was a well-known old saying. The manufacture of these materials was much encouraged by local and protective measures, as well as by guilds, the merchant adventurers, and other bodies for mutual co-operation.
Two distinct settlements were formed here: one in 1572, after the St. Bartholomew massacre; another in 1685, at the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
From early times Canterbury was a centre for trading purposes. We find indications of this in local names. Mercery Lane, Wincheap, Jewry, and other spots point to industrial occupation.
A wool staple was set up here in the reign of Edward III. ; merchants in wool, leather, and cloth carried their wares to this place. The cloth market was held for
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 299
many years in the district of the " White Friars," and an old lane then known as " Iron Bar Lane " is described by Somner, the Kentish historian, as " Vanella quae ducit, a 'cloth market,' versus Burgate."
The proximity of Sandwich, Dover, and the ancient port of Fojdwich was favourable for Canterbury's com- mercial enterprise. The last named town had in times past the privileges of the Cinque ports, and it was a member of Sandwich.
We read that " lighters and boats " came in Elizabeth's days " up to Canterbury from Sandwich laden with coals." With the welfare of her people always in mind, the Queen in 1565 issued a commission to enquire into the state of the Kentish ports ; better transit would thus ensue, and a check be kept on unlawful passage of goods.
The encouragement given to trade in London and elsewhere would re-act on the provinces, and in 1582 mention is made of a " plan for employment of French refugees in manufacture of cloth and a staple for wool." l
Guilds had already existed, several trades which dealt in similar wares formed a union. Private help was also forthcoming; Archbishop Grindal left "£100 to be kept in stock for ever for the use of the poor traders and dealers of wool in Canterbury."
Sir Thomas White, Lord Mayor and Master of the Merchant Taylors' Company, gave in 1599 £100 to be laid out in encouragement of spinning and weaving. The industries at Canterbury now became very flourishing, and the city might truly be called the " home of the loom and shuttle."
The earliest Elizabethan settlers in Canterbury appear to have migrated from Sandwich, having come thither from Northern France, especially from Lille, Abbeville, Tournai, Dunkirk, and other towns.
" Blackfriars' Hall," in the parish of St. Alphage, which
1 Domestic State Papers.
300 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
dates from an earlier time, became a centre or station for the examination, searching, and stamping of all goods.
Similar halls for this purpose existed at Norwich and Colchester.
The Burghmote Records of Canterbury are replete with details as to this period, and in 1577 we find an entry, " Paid to the Walloons, for their allowance given them towards their hall for one year ending May, 1577." Some of the rules as to the sale or export of goods are curious and interesting. " Strangers were compelled to bring the baize they wove to the officers of the city to be stamped, for which a fee was charged." They also paid "loom money," probably for the hire of or tax on their looms. This item is described as " Collecting the money of the strangers for their looms."
The Burghmote City records frequently refer to the refugee industries, and contain rules for the exercise of their trades. The following examples may suffice : —
Liberty to make bays and cloths after the Flanders fashion, with a sufficient house or hall to keep, riew, oversee, and seal them in, likewise liberty to dye them all sorts of colour.
They may sell all sorts of merchandize made by them, and every one by great or in gross, and not by retail, and to transport them out of the kingdom in paying the duties as others.
The Burghmote also allowed the strangers to have two seals to mark the different kind of " sayes." Stamps and seals were also attached to the woven goods at Norwich. Cloth made in that city had a castle and a lion impressed, or, if made outside the city, a castle without the lion. The counterfeit of seals and stamps led to stricter supervision, as the Royal arms got woven at times into inferior articles.
An " alnager " or officer was appointed to measure cloth, and during the sixteenth century some acts of Parliament were passed in protection. One of these pro- vided that " every piece of broad cloth made in the shires of Kent should contain so much length and breadth, and that after being fully dried should weigh 84 Ibs. at the
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 301
least." Other commodities were subjected to a like scrutiny, and the dyers had to put the mark on their goods.
Weaving in silk and stuffs now became a regular business, and in 1561 appeared the Queen's letter of licence for such as were approved to remain in the exercise of their trades. The clearness of the air seems to have given Canterbury an advantage over London in the excellence of its woven goods, for Camden in his Britannia states that the " silks wove here equal, if not exceed, any foreign silk whatsoever, great quantities being much esteemed by the merchants." It had been usual for the cloth to be dyed and dressed abroad, but a statute was passed to the contrary, providing " that the cloth should be dyed and dressed, as well as woven, before it left the country."
Among the Walloons was a body called "Wool- combers," also another the " Drapery," regulating the manufacture and sale of cloth, which had flourished some time in the Weald of Kent
The Mayor of Canterbury and his colleagues were also interested in the refugee craftsmen, and gave them certifi- cates as to the benefits conferred on the city by their industries.
King James I. showed much sympathy with the " strangers," and an order of the Privy Council in his reign supported the trade bodies in Canterbury. He further said —
I will protect you as it becomes a good prince to protect all who have abandoned their country for religion's sake.l
To encourage the silk industries it is stated that " instructions were issued to the deputy-lieutenants of counties that they should require the landowners to pre- serve and plant mulberry trees for the feeding of silk- worms." In Kent there is a tradition that the first trees were planted by the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem,
1 Strype's Life of Archbishop Bancroft.
302 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
traces of whose sojourn in the county survive at Swingneld and elsewhere. In 1610 the decay of the cloth manu- factory caused an increase in silk-weaving, and of serge, taffeta, and bombazines, and workers in these materials migrated from Sandwich to Canterbury.
Charles I. showed a certain liberal feeling towards his refugee subjects, and in 1634 the Company of Merchant Adventurers prevailed on the King to forbid the exportation of whole cloth, baizes, kerseys, or other commodities to any towns in Germany or the Netherlands. It was, however, the harsh measures of Archbishop Laud, in withdrawing the freedom of worship hitherto given to the refugees, which drove them in crowds to seek toleration in Holland and America. This exodus caused a great dispersal of industrial work, a short-sighted measure which bore its disastrous results far and wide. The Commonwealth changed the course of affairs, both in ecclesiastical and civil matters — the return to a more enlightened policy favoured enterprise and skill.
From the year 1660 and a century onwards we can chronicle the brightest pages in Canterbury's " arts and crafts." In 1665 there were in that city 126 master weavers, the whole number of artisans being over 1,300. Charles II. granted them a charter to become a company with a master, warden, and court of assistants. The first master was John Six, and John Du Bois and James Six, wardens, with nine assistants. All met once a month in their hall, in the Black Friars, to admit masters, journeymen, and to transact business.
The foreign colony at this time spread all over the city, especially on the banks of the winding Stour, where stood the fulling and other mills. Indeed, so marked was the refugee circle that one district thus occupied was called "Petty France." This fact is recorded in the parish registers of Holy Cross, St. Peter, and St. Alphage, wherein the French and Flemish houses are to be found. Activity reigned all around, many
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 303
fabrics were now made as brocades, black and coloured velvets, satins, lustrings, rich and flowered silks, wrought with gold and silver, and stuffs of wool mixed with silk. The incorporation of the Weavers' Company, in 1676, produced a great increase of the silk products, and its jurisdiction extended one mile outside the city. At times much discontent prevailed by the importation of foreign goods, and about 1672 several petitions of the Weavers of the United Kingdom prayed that a stop should be put to these practices.
The year 1685 was at hand, that great exodus from France which by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes made England the home of the refugee; and Canterbury, the first city on landing, naturally attracted the eye of the skilled craftsman and worker. Here he would meet many of his compatriots, already settled in the Kentish metropolis. In the crypt of that glorious minster he would hear the old French service, recalling that of his native land, and he would remember his perilous flight to a welcome land of freedom.
Cathedral and city are thus linked in the historic annals of France and her fugitive sons. Another cause which led to a union of commercial interest was the admission to the freedom of the city, which now became numerous. Although it was ordered that no "stranger" should have this privilege as a matter of right, it is surprising how soon he acquired it — chiefly by inter-marriage with freemen's daughters. Some of the earliest admissions of silk-weavers, dyers, etc., were Nathaniel Ricquebourge in 1693, and Samuel Lefroy in 1695, and from this date till about 1720 many of those artisan workers were thus enrolled.
An act was passed about this time, supported by William III., " to prohibit the wearing in England of any unwrought silks or printed calicoes imported from India and Persia." Foreign workmen were employed by the London weavers, in obedience to the wishes of
304 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
the before-named King, a result which embittered the native artisan. This action roused the popular discontent, expressed by Defoe in his True-born Englishman:
We blame the King that he relies too much On strangers, Germans, Huguenots and Dutch ; That foreigners have faiflbfully obey'd him And none but Englishmen have e'er betray'd him.
The remedial measures adopted revived for a time the Canterbury trade, but it had to contend against much opposition. The protective acts were often evaded by goods being clandestinely brought from India and Persia. Many trading companies had become too power- ful for local industries, and the 1,200 looms which had been at work at Canterbury were reduced in the year 1 720 to about 200, and in 1786 to twenty, and only ten master weavers. The Silk-weavers' Company tried to aid the dying cause ; they applied year after year to Parliament, but without success. The greater opportunities at Spital- fields, Coventry, and the North attracted the Canterbury craftsmen, and the few who remained there took to other occupations. In 1787, however, a revival occurred, due to the efforts of Mr. John Callaway (Callave), the then master of the Silk Weavers' Company. His name is long associated with the introduction of the Canterbury muslin, and the manufacture gave employment for some time.
Hasted, the Kentish historian, thus refers to Mr. Call- away: — "I cannot quit the subject of the Walloon and refugee manufactory at Canterbury without paying a due tribute to the ingenious and public-spirited manufacturer of this place — Johi? Callaway. After long journeys he found the means of mixing Sir Richard Arkwright's level cotton twist in his own looms of silk warps, by which contrivance he introduced a new manufacture which gave employment to the unemployed workmen in Canterbury and elsewhere. This new article was called ' Canterbury muslin ' ; the demand for it was very great."
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 305
Mr. Callaway also built a cotton mill near the city, which gave employment to many women and children. The machinery was afterwards applied to the making of woollen yarn for worsted. The workshop of Mr. Call- away in St. Alphage Lane was destroyed in 1892. Another industry, the making of " fingering worsted," lately survived in the Lefevre family, whose ancestors escaped from France in the sixteenth century.
A century has passed since Canterbury was the home of the industries described. Hasted, the Kentish historian, states in 1 799 " there were not more than ten master weavers in the city, and only a few looms at work."
The romance of trade was destined to live again in this old cathedral city, for about the year 1897 a revived industry under the name of the " Canterbury Weavers " was started by the Misses Holmes and Phillpotts. Additional interest attaches to the fact that the house where this work is carried on was the former abode of the master of the Weavers' Company here, and the gabled windows and picturesque timber front of this house form a choice " bit "of ancient Canterbury.
In its time-honoured annals we can realise the past import of this city, which greatly contributed to our industrial progress — a city where the story of refugee life and work has long been linked with that of history, religion, and art.
THE WEALD
The Weald of Kent also unfolds a large and important phase of our subject ; an almost central position in the county offered advantages for industrial trades — the coast could be reached to the ports of Rye, Sandwich, Hythe, and Dover. Little streams glided along its forest tracks, leading to larger rivers, which gave facilities for transit, while the towns of Cranbrook, Tenterden, Maid- stone, and Tunbridge were centres of much activity. The first-named town was the metropolis, as it were, of the v
306 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
cloth trade from the fourteenth century. In and around this town are some remains of the old cloth halls, in gabled and picturesque houses, much altered and alienated from their original use. Though the early industries were of native growth, it must be remembered that the foreign settlements in Kent had great influence in extend- ing and introducing new crafts into the county.
The encouragement given by Edward III. to the Flemings resulted in the woollen and cloth trades being further established in England. A wool staple existed at Calais in the thirteenth century; relations could then be maintained by the Flemish and their English brethren. Later, in 1552, among the Privy Council acts of Edward the Sixth, we read of indentures between that King and the merchants of Calais. We can thus picture a friendly trade and intercourse between these closely neighbouring shores.
The persecutions by the Duke of Alva in the Nether- lands led to another flight of the refugees, some of whom came to the Weald, finding there a source of livelihood already established by their compatriots before them.
The St. Bartholomew massacre in 1572 induced others to come, mostly of French descent, so that by the end of the sixteenth century a large foreign element existed in this part of Kent.
Cranbrook can be named as the cradle of the cloth trade, both by natives and "strangers." Of the latter, Dr. Thomas Fuller, in his Church History, wrote : —
Edward the Third began to grow sensible of the gain the Netherlands got by our English work, in memory whereof the Duke of Burgundy instituted the Order of the Golden Fleece, wherein indeed the fleece was ours, the golden theirs.
The Flemings were found in all parts, and the same writer remarks that "Broad cloth was made in Kent and called ' Kentish broadcloths.' "
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As occasion required, protective laws were made for the foreign workmen, and in 1337 a royal proclamation was issued that the "King's subjects are warned not to harass these cloth workers, and to see no harm is done to them by others." The historian of the Weald, the late Robert Furley, F.S.A., further states that the King named " special parts of his kingdom, wherein the artisans should be located, and the Weald was selected for broad cloths of good mixture and colours." It is of interest to know why the Weald was chosen, and the answer is probably because there were found beds of fuller's-earth, besides small streams to drive the fulling and dyeing mills, and timber in plenty for other purposes.
A statute of Henry VIII. provided for "clearing, deepening, and widening the river Stour from Great Chart, on the Wealden border, to Sandwich," thence an outlet to the sea. So much had trade increased that cloth halls built after the Flemish fashion had been erected, and acts were passed for the maintenance of the trade. One such Act was introduced about 1592 in the House of Lords, and is curious as attributing the temporary failure of the cloth trade to the iron works also in the Weald. A kind of competition in labour! When we read of the busy traffic in goods and their conveyance, chiefly by pack-horses, there is little cause to think that the industries were affected, even by those of an opposite character.
Journeys were long and roads bad through the Weald of that day. This, however, did not deter Queen Elizabeth from making one of her " progresses " through this district in 1573 — a journey described by Lord Bur- leigh as a "hard beginning" and "much worse ground than was in the Peak." News was very scarce, and was chiefly brought by the packmen to and from the markets and mills, or by pedlars with their goods. The track- less ways and river outlets were often used for carrying cloths through, in order to avoid payment of duties, or
308 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
for contraband trade. In 1586 people came from Dun- kirk, in France, into Kent, under pretence of landing goods, but in truth to obtain the Weal den cloth, which was afterwards transported abroad. To restrain this evil, Queen Elizabeth passed statutes, and Lord Cobham (Lord-Lieutenant) was directed to see the measures properly carried out.
At this time the Wealden foreign colony was numerous. A glance at the parish registers and marriage licences of Canterbury Diocese (1568- 1725)! will show, among long lists, the following names: — Bacheler, Benison, Geffrage, Duncken, Gruer, Morline, Perrin, Vallance, Van Dale, Veron, and several others, which may rightly claim a Flemish or French origin.
The policy of the Stuarts towards the foreign crafts- men (unlike that of Elizabeth) was greatly restrictive, and the religious aspect of the policy had much influence in breaking up the industrial centres and their work.
It cannot be denied that Archbishop Laud's action towards a uniformity in church matters was a misguided step, and that many intelligent workmen left England to the " lessening of manufactures and transporting their mystery into foreign parts." This is further expressed in the famous Kentish petition of 1640,2 and the results to have been " discouragement and distraction of all good subjects, of whom multitudes, both clothiers, merchants, and others being deprived of their ministers and over- whelmed with their pressures, have departed the kingdom to Holland and other parts, and have drawn with them a great part of the manufacture of cloth and trading out of the land."
Even before this time, in 1616, owing to severe measures, two thousand Kentish cloth workers went to the Palatinate, where already a foreign settlement existed,
1 Canterbury Marriage Licences (five series). Edited by J. M. Cowper.
2 Proceedings in Kent (Edited by L. Larking), in 1640. Catnden Society, 1862.
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 309
to which those at home would naturally look. The action of Charles I., favourable and conciliatory at first to the workers, native and foreign, afterwards became hardened, probably from selfish motives and in the interests of government by autocracy. So keen was the struggle that the merchant adventurers at last prevailed on the King "to restrict the export of cloths, baizes, and English woollen commodities."
The Commonwealth caused a transient revival of Kentish industries, but not of long duration, for the cloth trade had to a great extent gone, and its place was taken for a time by flax culture and the linen industry, both of which flourished in the late seventeenth century. At Smarden and Headcorn were flax fields. The linen trade was also encouraged by William III., who specially invited over a Huguenot gentleman to superintend the production.
The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) caused a temporary influx of workers, and though many of the " strangers " went to London and large towns, without question the Weald maintained such a settlement at this time. In 1689 we read of a collection at Cranbrook for the refugees, and that Sir Thomas Roberts, an old inhabitant of the Weald, greatly sympathized in their cause.
Besides other trades, the iron industry had been practised, and some of the old fire backs and slabs, carved with Scripture and legendary lore, would have had traces of foreign workmanship. The railings once around St. Paul's Cathedral were cast at Lamberhurst furnace, in the Weald, that town claiming to be partly in Kent and Sussex. The exquisite work of the iron grilles leading to the choir was by one Tijou, probably of refugee descent.
Glass work and glazing flourished to a small extent in the Weald. The chief workers were at first Dutch or Walloons, who afterwards became naturalized among the native population.
3io MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
The close of the eighteenth century saw a change in the industries. The loom and the shuttle were sup- planted by machinery. The Kentish trade went to the great towns of the North, and at the end of that period there was not a clothier left in the Weald.
The Union of Scotland with England led to a development in that northern country. Cloths were woven there, and trade also established in Leeds, Halifax, and Bradford.
The iron manufacture was similarly affected. The supply of timber had failed owing to the clearing away of the woods. The increased price of charcoal also added to this result. The furnace works were closed, and about the year 1796 not one was existing.
These industrial districts, once alive with labour and movement amid the deep-wooded roadways, are now deserted, and the cloth halls no longer are loaded with merchandise and goods.
The master clothiers, though bereft of their trade, held land in the Weald, and their descendants are still to be1 found in some old families.
The " Grey Coats of Kent," as they were so called, were a large and influential body, and often held the fate of an election in their hands. Though the former importance of this district has long passed away, there remains an occasional manor house, some vestige of the cloth halls, the neglected hammer ponds, or the tablet wrought in iron-work, to tell the story of Wealden activities. This story can also be realised by a search in church or parish books. The refugee element can be identified, even if the surname is wanting, that of " Stranger " or " Frenchman " being sometimes found among city archives or similar documents.
In any review of Wealden history one cannot ignore the part (though not so large as elsewhere in Kent) played by the foreign craftsman or settler. The religious toleration granted to them in this county was another
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 311
cause which aided their enterprise — a fact which has been clearly demonstrated by the late Canon Jenkins:1
The vast numbers of foreign Protestants who were received and tolerated in all the ports and towns of Kent, and who tended to leaven the population, with which they intermarried and held daily intercourse, added to the characteristic independence of the Kentish, yeomanry, who had established their industries among them — the clothiers of the Weald, the iron-workers of the district bordering on Sussex, and the gardening population of Sandwich and South-Eastern Kent — all contributed to the signal and almost unparalleled success of a movement which brought at the same time temporal prosperity and spiritual freedom.
MAIDSTONE
On the Wealden border was Maidstone, which had a distinct refugee history, chiefly of the Walloons and Dutch, in the early sixteenth century. Many causes helped to make this town a resort of foreign life and industry. Guilds had been formed here, and they would naturally be an aid, by co-operation or other means. The Drapers, Mercers, and Cordwainers existed. A stranger, however, had to be admitted to membership before he could practise his craft, and each guild had its own rules and customs. The fraternity of Corpus Christi was here in the fifteenth century, and the old hall (Refectory) still stands, and, though greatly changed, is a memento of mediaeval life. Once used as the grammar school of the town, it is now occupied a* a storehouse, retaining the lofty roof and windows of the Decorated period, with carved stonework.
In 1544 we read of hammer-makers, cannon-founders, and coppersmiths at Maidstone, and the Naturalization Acts record the name of one " Peter de Lillo, a capper," who lived here.2
The persecutions by the Duke of Alva in the Low Countries brought many to Maidstone, and in 1567 royal sanction was obtained for the Dutch artificers to establish
1 Diocesan History of Canterbury. R. C. Jenkins, 1880. * Denizations and Naturalizations of Aliens in England. Huguenot Society Publications, vol. viii., 1893.
312 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
their crafts here. In 1573 Queen Elizabeth issued licences for the strangers to practice, and in her reign there were five guilds at Maidstone, each guild enjoying its own rules, and products of its industries were exhibited at fairs and markets. The State Papers (Domestic) of Elizabeth have references to the Dutch settlers here, and their manufacture of " sackcloth, arras and tapestry, Spanish leather, Flanders pots, tiles and bricks, brasiers, white and brown paper, and all kinds of armour and gunpowder," is mentioned. Dyeing, weaving of linen thread known as " Dutch thread," and a small trade in cloth were the principal industries. Sackcloth and baize were also woven and sold. The thread trade was especially famous, and even when the trade declined there and was set up in the West of England, where labour was cheaper, " Maidstone thread " was still preferred to any other.
Houses were hired by the strangers for their looms, and many poor inhabitants gained employment thereby. Long before the advent of the refugees a market had been granted to Maidstone, to which, as a commercial centre, it was very advantageous.
Harris, in his History of Kent, asserts that the " thread made at Maidstone was for hop bags." This statement has been disputed, as such bags would be made of coarser material. In 1585 there appears to have been over a hundred resident foreign workmen ; many also would come to and fro for a time to this central town, where the Medway afforded easy transit of goods to London and elsewhere. Several foreign names attest the sojourn of strangers here — names which can be found in the local registers and parish books. The religious freedom granted was another phase of our history, for the Corporation gave the refugees the use of St. Faith's Church and burial-ground. Near this church (now rebuilt) stands the Museum, enshrined in the old Chillington Manor House of the sixteenth century — a
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 313
house with oaken galleries, large hall and panelled rooms, replete with choice antiquarian treasures.
It does not seem that Maidstone produced the silks and rich fabrics of Canterbury, but it is probable that the guilds exercised much influence for the trading welfare of this town. The fairs here seem to have been noted, for the Kentish Post or Canterbury News-letter (1715) has the following advertisement : —
At the fair at Maidstone on 1st & 8th May, will be sold by Daniel Lepine, silk weaver from Canterbury, a very curious parcel of newest fashion brocades, broad and narrow damasks, Mantua silks, rich borders, and half tabbies.
On the decline of the weaving, thread, and other industries, paper-making appears to have arisen. The various rivers in this district lent a ready aid to production and transit. Fulling mills also existed, and when water was scarce in the Weald cloth made there was brought to these mills near Maidstone. At Leeds, not far distant, fuller's-earth was found, so needful in the manufacture of cloth. We also read of this product at Boxley, and it was often conveyed by sea for the use of clothiers to distant parts of the country.
At Boughton Malherb, more in the Weal den district, but not far distant from Maidstone, a small company, under the Marquis de Venours, settled when driven from France in 1685. A French service was arranged in the parish church, and Archbishop Sancroft showed much liberality in this matter, appointing one Monsieur Rondeau to perform service for the strangers in their own tongue. Similar permission was given for their worship in the churches of Leeds and Hollingbourne, also in the Maid- stone district. Somewhat more distant was Chart Place, built by Sir Christopher Desbouverie, a descendant of the same family who came from the Low Countries and first settled at Sandwich.
Thus, to an extent, we can localize the foreign element in and about this ancient town.
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SANDWICH
The natural site of this historic port offered a ready access to those who landed from abroad. At Sandwich a river communicated with the inland parts of Kent, where land, goodly and fertile, everywhere met the eye.
Strangers from the Low Countries had already settled here, preceding those who arrived in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The appearance of the town is unique in interest — traces of old walls and ramparts ; the " Fishers' Gate " and Barbican are still there ; the streets in their maze-like windings ; the central square and the fine churches of St. Clement, St. Peter, and St. Mary make a picture, appealing alike to artist, antiquary, and historian. The veteran author, Joseph Hatton, thus writes : l
I am impressed with the remarkable way in which Sandwich has retired from the sea, gone inland as it were, like a migrated city, nursing its strange traditions, its memories of Elizabeth and the Armada.
We can picture even now this town once busy with its many trades, life and movement in the streets and bye- ways, the harbour full of vessels and craft as they came from distant shores or from London city. Along the winding Stour sail-driven barges would float with wares or goods to neighbouring town and village. The hum of voices and the click of the weaver's shuttle was heard — strange contrast to the almost deserted look of Sandwich to-day.
Now, as of old :
We breathe the air of the past in these antique streets, up and down, hither and thither, roughly paved, with many a gabled house, strange ruins, gates and towers.2
A place where poets still may dream,
Where the wheel of life swings slow,
And over all there broods the peace
Of centuries ago.
Sandwich has its own peculiar history, its own laws and usages, while records from the time of Henry VIII.
1 The Old House at Sandwich. 2 The Cinque Ports, Hewitt.
ST. CLEMENT'S CHURCH, SANDWICH.
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 315
are among the choicest of the Cinque Port documents. A glance at these will reveal many an old-world custom — this borough was governed by its own assembly of free- men, and elected its own Reeve or head-bailiff. The so-called Custumal of Sandwich supplies us with such particulars, while the Black Book of Sandwich contains numerous entries as to the former trades of this town. Such a spot offered special advantages to the refugees, whether French or Flemish, who came to its shores, thus forming a distinct chapter in Kentish annals. Though there had been a settlement of Flemings in the time of Edward L, and traders in wool had been greatly encouraged, the foreign industry was greatest in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In 1561 the strangers made supplication to the Mayor and Jurats for a place to be appointed to them for the sale of their " yarn." The Town Hall was given for this purpose ; and we read of Queen Elizabeth's letters patent for their admission, and warrant for safe dwelling in the said town. Workers in " sayes and bayes " settled here ; and a letter sent by the Corporation to Secretary Cecil in 1561 states that " six arras cushions," the first work of the strangers, accompanied the letter. This interesting record was followed by many other instances of skilled handicraft. In 1565 there were four hundred and twenty householders in Sandwich, of which a third were refugees. In 1 567 we hear of Laurence de Bouvereye settling here as a maker of serges. The family came from Lille, and their names and descendants have occupied high positions in England, and are to-day represented by the Earl of Radnor. The Huguessens also came to Sandwich from Dunkirk, and have long been enrolled in Kentish history — an eminent descendant was the late Lord Brabourne, the writer and politician. The Duke of Alva's persecution of the Protestants in the Low Countries drove them to England, and many came here. The history of their troubles abroad is given in the graphic and graceful pages of Mr. Motley's
316 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Rise of the Dutch Re-public. A great aid to Sandwich were Queen Elizabeth's visits, one object of which was to see how the children of the settlers were trained in industrious work. At her visit in 1573 the English and Dutch children were stationed spinning " fyne bay yarne " ; and it is further stated that black and white baize was hung about to show what occupations were in hand. Archbishop Parker, who aided the refugee cause at Canterbury, Norwich, and other towns, visited Sandwich, and his remark that " profitable and gentle strangers ought to be welcome and not grudged at," would have its influence. The trade was chiefly in woven and coarse goods, and in a book called the Dutch Foreign Book (1582) other occupations are described, such as basket- makers, fullers, gardeners, flannel -weavers, sack-makers, and wool-combers. In that book mention is made of eighty-six bag-makers, seventy- four bag-weavers, twenty- four other weavers (probably of linen), seventeen fullers, and thirteen gardeners. The windmills, seen even to-day near Sandwich, recall the fact that the exiles were also millers, while others worked as smiths, brewers, and carpenters.
Sandwich truly became a Flemish town. This is partly seen in the survival of its old brick and gabled houses, with quaintly carved door-post and enriched cornice. The flat country around, the tall poplars, and surrounding embanked marshes called " Poulders,"1 com- plete a landscape which transports one in fancy to the level and dreary stretches of land in Holland and Belgium.
Although great freedom had been granted by the Queen and government for foreign work and industry, the "strangers" did not always keep the agreements to which they had been formally bound. They had followed other trades besides those stated in the Queen's letters patent, and had opened shops for business which had
l Poulders, a Dutch word, from land protected from the sea by embankments.
THE FISHER GATE, SANDWICH.
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 317
been specially adopted by the Mayor and Jurats for Englishmen. More stringent rules had to be made, one of which, in 1 592, related to " cloths which were not sold after the market days to be taken at owner's liberty to another market, none to be sold in London, except in the halls there appointed for the purpose."
In 1621 it is stated that the usurpation of English work by strangers had so increased that a " Commission for aliens" was issued. The Lord Keeper, the Attorney and Solicitor-General instructed and advised the " strangers to comply with existing laws."
Fifty years later, in 1670, a Privy Council order was issued regarding foreign weavers, stricter rules to protect English craftsmen were made and passed in the Weavers' Hall, London.
The Sandwich colony was somewhat of a floating nature ; after staying here the refugees went to Norwich, Canterbury, Colchester, and elsewhere.
It appears about the year 1594 the Queen's Council determined to reduce the number of foreign settlers, and Lord Cobham (Lord Warden) reported on the matter.1 Enquiry was made, and the surplus settlers were to be removed to places more remote from the seaside. Many went to Canterbury, where the Mayor had orders to receive them, but specially wished choice to be made of those that were " makers of bayes and grograines," etc.
We find constant allusion to this migration from Sand- wich to Canterbury. Sometimes the pastor accompanied them to that city, as was the case in 1574, when one Antoine Lescaillet, from Sandwich, became pastor of the refugee church in the crypt of the Cathedral.
Restriction had been placed on the Dutch at Sand- wich, urging a greater religious conformity, owing to differences which had arisen among them in 1565. The Mayor and Jurats ordained that on pain of punishment
1 Acts Privy Council (new series), vol. Hi., pp. 306, 345-6.
3i8 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
they conform to the rules of their own church. Another cause which may have led them to Canterbury was the greater advance in weaving there, and the chance of more employment ; the silk industry was carried on in the cathedral city to a far greater extent than at Sandwich. It would be impossible not to notice the two churches here set apart for refugee worship, because it helps to estimate the strength of the foreign colony, and to an approximate census of the industrial workers. In 1634 tne number of the Dutch residents was stated to be five hundred, and they had the use of St. Clement's Church ; St. Peter's was also granted for their service during special hours. The churchwardens' accounts of both parishes contain entries of moment as to the foreign community; also the parish registers. One meets with the names of Beak, de Brock, Dekewer, de Lasaux, Claris, Callaway, Giraud, Famaris, Mayhew, Lemain, Makey, Ridout, Valder, and other " strangers." It seems that constant aid was given by the London Dutch church in Austin Friars towards the maintenance of the Sandwich congregation. Just outside Sandwich is the ancient hospital of St. Bartholomew, founded in the twelfth ,century for poor brethren and sisters, and a portion of this chapel was once used for the refugee service. The Custumal of Sandwich gives a full account of this interesting relic, as well as the statutes of the charity.
In the seventeenth century, when Archbishop Laud issued his peremptory orders that the strangers of Sand- wich were to resort to the parish churches in order to a uniformity of service, the same discord happened here as at Canterbury and Maidstone, with the result that many left the country, and the industries they had pursued went to improve other and distant lands. A short-sighted policy! The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes influenced this, as other refugee resorts, by increased numbers, chiefly from France or French
REFUGEE INDUSTRIES IN KENT 319
Flanders. Collections were made for their relief in the Sandwich churches. In St. Clement's the carving of the Royal Arms has the motto of William III., "Je mientiendrai."
The encouragement by that King of the strangers' cause is a known historical fact; in 1689 a proclamation was issued that " all French Protestants seeking an asylum in England will not only receive Royal protection for themselves, their families, and goods, but will be assisted in their different callings." *
Previous to this time, in 1681, orders were granted for free letters of denization by the King (Charles II.). This measure originated with Viscount Halifax, whose brother, Henry Savile, had travelled in France a few years before, and had personally seen the persecutions to which the Protestants were subject, and that they were ready to go to England if the access could be given them. This order was of wide import, and would probably have been accepted by the Flemish as well as those of direct French descent.2
One homely industry, that of gardening, may well be associated with Sandwich, for the Flemish here cultivated the growth of vegetables so well that many gardeners went from hence to Battersea, Southwark, and Bermondsey, and made fine garden ground, which once supplied the London markets.
The industrial annals of the "strangers" may well claim to be a part of our own national history, in the development of manufactures and in the greater skilled labour brought to bear on them.
Kent then assuredly holds a unique position among other counties, inasmuch as it was one of the first to welcome the foreign craftsmen on their landing and to receive the benefits of their experience.
1 State Papers (Dom. series), William and Mary, 1689-90.
2 Savile Correspondence (Camden Society), 1858.
THE RIVER MEDWAY AND ITS MEDIAEVAL BRIDGES
BY J. TAVENOR-PERRY
iEW rivers in Great Britain can compare with the Medway in the possession at once of such sylvan charms and such historic associations; and yet few of such importance are less known to the average tourist. Lying, as it does, away from the main railway lines and great roads of the county, or crossed by
HERSFIELD.
them only at one or two points where the river itself is scarcely visible, it remains almost unknown to everybody but the dwellers in the towns and villages which dot its banks ; and it is, perhaps, better appreciated by the cockney hop-picker on his annual jaunt than by the casual and generally unobservant cyclist, or even than by the local archaeologist, as the contents of the Archceologia
320
THE RIVER MEDWAY AND ITS MEDIAEVAL BRIDGES 321
Cantiana testify. Yet this beautiful river, with its, per- haps, more beautiful tributaries, pass in their course some of the most interesting" mediaeval remains in the kingdom, among- which not the least important are its bridges ; and some of the most stirring events in our history have occurred in the passage of its main stream. It was across one of its fords, most likely Aylesford, that Caesar found his way into the interior of the country ; it was over the same ford, in spite of their defeat by the British, that the Saxons swarmed on their way through West Kent to London ; and it was across East Farleigh bridge that General Fairfax, with the Parliamentarian army, marched, turning the flank of the Kentish Royalists, and capturing Maidstone. The country through which it runs has always been known as the Garden of England, and the Kentish people, at home to its beauties, call the valley of the Medway, par excellence , the Garden of Eden.
The name " Medway " is commonly supposed to be derived from the fact that the river holds a mid position in the county, and hence was called the " mid-way " ; but this is incorrect. The British called it Meduana, which was also the Celtic name for the river Mayenne, in north- western France, and the Romans shortened this to " Madus," whilst the Saxons modified it into the descriptive name of " Medwaege," signifying Mead-wave, or Meadow- water, which, reduced to the modem spelling of " Medway," still describes its charming characteristics. There is nothing remarkable about the length or volume of the river ; it cannot boast of precipitous shores or whirl- ing rapids, but it meanders through smiling meadows, bear- ing on its almost still surface reflections of out-of-the-way villages and stately castle ruins, till, approaching the sea, it opens out into the great estuary on whose broad waters float so many ships of the British Navy, between the famous dockyards of Chatham and Sheerness. The castle of Hever, with its reminiscences of Anne Boleyn ; Penshurst X
322 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Place, the home of the Sidneys ; Tonbridge, Allington, and Rochester Castles, connected with so many events in English history — stand, as they have stood for centuries, by its sides ; and whilst large towns or villages have, since these castles were erected, grown up around them, the river still flows on in its placid way, except for these additions but little altered from the period when the first Celts discovered its course.
The Medway has several affluents, and can scarcely be dignified with the name of a river until they have delivered to it their tributary waters. The main stream rises in
YALDING.
Sussex, near East Grinstead, and meandering through Ashdown Forest, passing beneath the ruins of Brambletye House, it is joined by its first affluent, the Eden river, on which stands Hever, a little above Penshurst. Thence the river follows a sinuous course eastwards to Tonbridge, which was from the earliest known times the head of the navigable waters,. as the great mound surrounded with the mediaeval fortifications of Tonbridge Castle testifies. Still flowing eastward through a marshy country, it next receives on its left bank the river Bourne, which rises near Ightham Moat, and threads the beautiful Plaxtole
THE RIVER MEDWAY AND ITS MEDIEVAL BRIDGES 323
valley. The stretch of the river from Tonbridge to Yalding has been deepened, and partly canalled by the Medway Navigation Company, with the unfortunate result that all the ancient bridges have been swept away, and unpicturesque wooden substitutes have taken their place. On entering Yalding parish the little river Teise joins the main stream on the right bank. The Teise rises in the hilly ground about Frant, and running eastward under the walls of the great Prasmonstratensian Abbey of Bayham, forms for a few miles the boundary of Kent and Sussex ; and receiving the overflow from the moat of Scotney Castle, among the oaks of Lamberhurst, it turns northward for a course of ten miles across the Weald until it reaches the Medway. After passing under Twyford bridge the river receives the last of its great affluents, which for length and volume might almost claim to be the main stream — this is the river Beult, which, unlike the other affluents, is wholly within the county of Kent. The numerous small rivulets which form its stream gather themselves together about Headcorn and Smarden, and it thence flows westward a lonely course, distant from any villages, till it joins the main river at Yalding.
The Weald, through which all these small streams flow, formed part of the great forest called by the Romans Anderida, the original Celtic name which signified the dark forest ; and by the Saxons this was converted into Andreds Wald, or the Black Forest, whence the modern name of the Weald, called appropriately in the times of Elizabeth, after one of her progresses through it, The Wild, is derived. This forest, until early mediaeval times, was quite impenetrable, save by its water-ways, and the Romans never attempted to cut any road through the Kentish portion of it — though they were not often daunted by any difficulties in their road-making — but confined their highroads in Kent to the hilly lands to the north, or to the low lands of the south-east coast.
All these streams, rising in the higher grounds of the
324 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
Weald, when they reach the low-lying lands, pursue most devious courses, returning in the directions from which they have come, spreading out into numberless branches, which after separation join again, forming numerous islands ; and it was generally where these islands occur that the mediaeval builders erected their bridges, taking advantage of them for their main abutments, and forming intermediate arches for the flood waters to pass through. Such was the case with the Hersfield and Stile bridges over the Beult, and may still be seen at Tonbridge, where no less than five branches of the Medway have to be crossed. All run
TWYFORD.
generally in deeply-worn channels, with the steep banks covered in summer beneath a mass of wild flowers and waterside plants, or almost hidden under the shade of over-hanging willows; and the whole of the country along their courses retains many memorials of the ancient forests in the great oak trees abounding everywhere.
It was long after the forest had been explored and partly occupied before any attempts were made to cross these streams except by fords ; the necessity for connecting roads did not arise until a later period. The earliest roads in the Weald were only drift, or drof, ways used by the herdsmen as passages into the interior of the forest, where
325
the mast was plentiful for the feeding of their hogs and cattle ; or by the woodmen engaged in tree-felling and transporting the logs, by means of the streams, to the more open country beyond.
There were no towns within the forest in Saxon times, with the possible exception of Tonbridge ; but various areas had been granted to certain villages lying along the borders of the Weald, and, indeed, to some as distant as Bromley and Sandwich, within which to feed their animals, and in many cases to cut timber. These areas, which were very ill-defined, were called Denes, or Dens ; and the word remains as an affix to a large number of village names in the Weald to this day — as Harden and Biddenden. These denes were in the earlier period only temporarily occupied, but as the forest got thinned out permanent farm buildings began to be erected ; and presently these ex- panded into the villages we find scattered, though still sparsely, over the area of the country which was once the great Andreds Wald. The drof-ways were then widened into roads, and the connections of them across the streams became necessary.
Before any bridges were built in the Weald, the lower reaches of the Medway had been bridged in one or two places by the Romans. The main road to London from the fortress of Rutupiae the modern Richborough, crossed the Medway at Rochester, where there was a ford, pass- able at low tide ; and there was another ford higher up the river, at Aylesford, to which a branch of the Roman road led from Rochester, and which could be used when the more convenient ford was impassable. But fords were ill-suited to Roman requirements, and probably very soon after the conquest of the island a bridge was erected at Rochester, portions of which were discovered when the recent new bridge was erected.
There were three great periods of bridge-building in this country. The first was the period of the Roman domination, when numerous bridges were erected across
326
MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
all the main rivers of the island ; and these were of so sub- stantial a character that through the centuries of Saxon and Norman rule no new bridges were required ; indeed, some of these Roman bridges have remained in use almost to our own day. The re-settlement of the country — which ensued after the troubles entailed by the Conquest had subsided and the land had enjoyed for a time internal peace — led to the foundation of new towns, or the growing importance of the older ones, and the necessity for improved inter-communication ; and new roads meant new bridges. This inaugurated the second bridge-building
LODINGFORD.
era, when a vast number of bridges were erected by wealthy individuals, the great abbeys, or the guilds and corporations of the cities, and remain, like those across the Medway, monuments of mediaeval art. The third bridge-building era was the recent one, when the narrow, picturesque bridges were found unsuitable for the require- ments of modern locomotion, and were pulled down to make room for such ungraceful substitutes as those of Tonbridge, Maidstone, and Rochester, and supplemented by hideous iron-girder railway erections, such as those which deface the last-named cathedral city. The remain- ing bridges may not long resist the onslaughts of the
THE RIVER MEDWAY AND ITS MEDIEVAL BRIDGES 327
traction engines and the motor cars, so that some record of them becomes as desirable as it is interesting.
The bridges over the Eden and the upper part of the Medway itself belong to the uninteresting modern period ; but on the Beult and Teise some traces of ancient work remain. At Headcorn, where the Beult first assumes the appearance of anything like a river, there is a small arch, known as Stephen's bridge, which may embody some ancient remains, and a few miles lower down the stream occurs the first bridge of any size, where Hersfield bridge crosses three branches of the river and a weedy marsh, which shares, with the dyke at Brighton, a dedication to his satanic majesty, and is known as the " Devil's Den." The main road from Cranbrook to Maid- stone crosses the Beult by the Style bridge, which has been entirely re-built, but one a little lower down in the parish of Hunton or, more properly, Huntingdon, may be ancient, but has been widened and refaced in brickwork not un- picturesquely. The last bridge to cross the Beult before it joins the Medway is that which lies at the foot of the main street of Yalding, and connects it with the main road to Maidstone on the further bank of the Medway. It is a long, fairly level bridge with deeply-embayed cut-waters of rough rag stone, and has been frequently repaired and in parts rebuilt, but remains substantially the original bridge as it may have been constructed in the fifteenth century. The road over this bridge continues to the right over another one of much the same date and character, known as Twyford bridge, from the Hundred in which it is situated, but much steeper in its approaches than that of Yalding, and presenting an appearance more picturesque than useful. The road to the left, leading towards Tunbridge Wells, crosses the Teise by an elegant little bridge of two arches with a buttressed cut-water, called Latingford, or Loding- ford, bridge, from the manor of that name to which it belonged.
The first ancient bridge to cross the main river after
328 MEMORIALS OF OLD KENT
all its tributaries have entered it is that at Teston, where a bridge of five arches, of which the centre one may have been rebuilt, connects the two banks. This bridge, which may be of the same date as Yalding, presents a more finished appearance, the stonework of the arches and cut- waters being carefully wrought. The name of this place may be mentioned as an example of the perverse style of Kentish pronunciation, for, in spite of its spelling, no one calls it anything but Teeson. Below Teston occurs the finest of the Medway bridges, that of East Farleigh ; and although there is no record of its erection, which there
TESTON.
would doubtless have been had it been due to the munifi- cence of one of the archbishops, it may, with some like- lihood, be assigned to one of the Culpeper family, who owned so many manors in the neighbourhood, and who would have been mainly benefitted by its building. It is a fine example of fifteenth century work, with four ribbed and pointed arches crossing the stream, and bold cut-waters of wrought stone, and may be compared favourably with the finest structures of the period, of a similar character, remaining in the country.
The river was once tidal to this point, but a system of locks, beginning just below the bridge, now restrain the
THE RIVER MEDWAY AND ITS MEDIEVAL BRIDGES 329
stream, which flows on through charming woodland scenery, past Maidstone, with its picturesque church and college, and under its ugly bridge, past Allington Castle, whence the poet Wyatt started out on his ill-conceived Kentish rising against Queen Mary, till it meets the tidal waters beneath the bridge at Aylesford. This bridge has undergone considerable alteration by the insertion of a wide span arch in the centre for the improvement of the river navigation. The ford here was from early times regarded as of great importance, as being more easily crossed than that at Rochester, and more 'difficult to defend ; but the Normans erected a small castle to protect it, the keep of which forms the lower part of the present church tower. It was across this ford that Hengist and his Jutes crossed into West Kent after he had defeated the Britons in the year 455.
Although comparatively so far from the beaten path, all the best parts of the river may be easily visited by the pedestrian, or cyclist, and no parts of the Medway, Beult, or Eden lie more than a mile or two from some railway station ; and nothing in the nature of a summer ramble can be more enjoyable than a day or two spent on their banks, from Maidstone on the north, to Headcorn on the east, and Hever on the west.
INDEX
Aldington Church, 278, 297 Allchin, J. H., on Chillington
Manor House, 253-263 Allday, 142
Allington Castle, 141, 176-179 Appledore Church, 66, 71, 72, 75 Ash, near Ridley, Church of, 53,
54
Ash (near Sandwich) Church, 89 Ashford, 146, 147 Ashford Church, 62, 78 Ashurst Church, 56, 57, 59, 60,
279-281
Astley, John, 178 Aucher, Sir Anthony, 145, 146 Aylesford, 1-4
Bridge, 328, 329
Church, 98
Ball, John, 137, 138
Banquel Family, 204, 205
Bapchild Church, 66
Barfreston Church, 48
Barharh, R. H., 125
Barton, Elizabeth, the Holy
Maid of Kent, 149 Bayford Castle, 152, 153, 179, 180 Beckenham Church, 89 Beleme, wood-carver, 74 Belknap, Sir Robert, 136 Benham, Canon, on Dickens and
Kent, 238-252 Bethersden Church, 88, 93 Bexley Church, 87, 88 Biddenden Church, 94, 97 Binbury Castle, 180-182 Bishopsbourne Church, 94 Black Prince, The, 127 Blackfriars, Canterbury, 302 Blackheath, 138, 141, 145 Bleak House, Broadstairs, 243,
244 Blockhouses in Kent, 153, 154,
Bohemia, Queen of, 128 Bokeland, John, 77 Boley Hill, Rochester, 172, 173 Borden, 139
Church, 59
Boteler, John, 139 Boughton Malherbe, 140 Boughton-under-the-Blean, 65, 66,
71, 72, 74, 83, 96, 149 Boxley Abbey, 57, 141 Boyes, Sir John, 128 Brabourne Church, 55 Brenchley Castle, 202, 203
Church, 54, 74
Brent, John, 133, 134 Brenzett Church, 94 Broadstairs, 243, 244 Brockman, Sir William, 145 Bromley Church, 88, 89
College, 287
Simpson's Moat, 203-205
Brookland Church, 71, 72, 88,
89 Bullen, or Boleyn, Family, of
Hever, 228-237 Burgh, Hubert de, 164, 170 Burham Church, 62, 72, 88
Cade, Jack, 138-141
Callaway, John, 118, 119
Canterbury, 244, 245
Christchurch Gate, 130, 131.
(See also Frontispiece.)
Castle, in, 165-172
Cathedral, 103-105
Eastbridge Hospital, 129
Grey Friars, no, 113-117
Hospital of Poor Priests, 130
Martyrs' Field, 125
Maynard's Hospital, 130
Refugee industries, 298-305
Royal Museum, 126-128
St. Alphege's Church, 68,
84, 85
332
INDEX
Canterbury, St. Andrew's Church,
55. 56> 70, 7i
St. Augustine's Abbey, 19-43
-burials in, 19, 20
dissolution of, 35
bells, 41
-seals, 41, 42
St. Dunstan's Church, 70,
87. 89, 94, 99-103, 123, 124
St. John's Hospital, 129, 130
St. Martin's Church, 6
St. Mildred's Church, 126
West Gate, 111-113
Weavers, 117-119
Capel-le-Ferne, Church of, 49, 75, 100
Castle Rough, 151
Toll, Newenden, 189-193
Castles of Kent, 7, 150-214
Caxton, William, 12
Chalk Church, 280, 297
Challock Church, 98
Changle, Thomas, 139
Charing Church, 280, 297
Charles, William, 257, 258
Charlton Church, 279, 286, 288
Chartham Church, 75
Chiddingstone Church, 279, 281, 282
Chilham Church, 56, 88
Chillington Manor House, Maid- stone, 253-263
Chislehurst Church, 55, 66, 72, 89
Clench, Thomas, 139
Clerke, John, 139
Cliffe-at-Hoo, 247
Church of, 3, 61, 98
Clinch, George, 5
On Kentish Insurrec- tions, 132-149; on Romney Marsh, 264-276
Cobb, Thomas, 149
Cobham, 242, 243
Church, 98
- — Family, 253, 254
Cogan, John, 128
Colebridge Castle, 182-185
Colomb, Col., on The Royalist Rising, 143
Colepeper, Sir T., 145
Compton, Sir William, 144
Compton Church, Surrey, 51
Cooling, or Cowling, 246
Cooper, T. S., 125, 126
Corbueil, Archbishop William de, 1 88
Cotton, Leonard, 128
Courtenay, Sir W. P. Honey- wood, 149
Cowden Church, 62, 72, 89, 98
Cowling, or Cooling, Castle, 14
Church, 53, 89
Cranbrook Church, 83
Cudham Church, 62
Cuxton Church, 62, 72, 84, 88, 9°, 98
Dane John, Canterbury, 119, 120, 165, 166, 168, 169
Danish earthworks in Kent, 151
Darrell, — , of Scotney, 145
Dartford, 141
Church, 83, 88, 98
Heath, i
Deal, 2, 146
Castle, 147, 159-165
(Upper) Church, 279, 292
Denton Church, 89
Deptford, 147
Castle, 206
Dickens, Charles, 238-252
Ditchfield, P. H., on Historic Kent, 1-18; on Hever Castle, 228-237
Doddington Church, 51, 80, 82, 97
Dorrell, James, 145
Dover, 146, 244
Castle, 147, 149, 165
Downe Church, 55
Drayner (or Dragener), 76
Dudley, Sir Gamaliel, 144
Earthworks of Kent, 7 East Farleigh Bridge, 322 East Peckham Church, 54 Eastchurch Church, 64, 66, 78, 96 Eastling Church, 83 Eastry Church, 63 Eastwell Church, 88 Ebbsfleet, 3, 5 Edenbridge Church, 54, 70 Elham Church, 62, 72, 89 Eltham Church, 71 Erith Church, 84, 98, 100 Evans, Sebastian, on St. Augus- tine's Abbey, 19-43 Eynesford Castle, 185-189
Fairfax, Lord, 143, 147 Farningham Church, 98 Faversham, 146
Church, 94, 97
Finch, Sir John, 128
INDEX
333
Finch, William, 81 Flaherty, W. E., quoted, 135, 136 Folkestone Castle, 207 Fordwich, 127, 128
Church, 77, 87, 88
Frindsbury Church, 48, 62 Fields, 147
Gadshill, 240, 241, 245, 246 Gillingham Church, 53, 57, 60,
66, 90, 98
Fort, 212
Godfrey, Sir Thomas, 145 Goodnestone Church, 98 Gosson, Stephen, 125 Gostling, William, 125 Goudhurst Church, 83, 94, 97 Graveney Church, 73 Gravesend, 141, 146
Church, 54
Grayling, Dr. Francis, 80, 90 Great Chart Church, 84 Great Mongeham Church, 98 Greenwich Palace, 12, 13 Groombridge Church, 281, 282,
284, 250, 297 Gyllam, wood-carver, 74, 93
Hacker, Col., 145
Hackington Church, 65, 66, 73
Hadlow, Thomas, 86, 87
— : — Church, 62
Hales, Sir Edward, 16
Edward, 145, 146
Sir James, 145
John, 75
Hailing Church, 87, 89 Halstead Church, 53 Hammond, Francis, 145
Sir Robert, 146
Harbledown, 120-123 Hardres, Sir Richard, 145, 146 Hartlip Church, 63, 72 Harty Church, 66 Hawkhurst, 140
Church, 54, 83, 93, 97
Haydon Mount, 158, 189, 190 Hayes, i
Church, 71
Headcorn Church, 73, 97 Herne Church, 66, 74 Hernehill, 149 Hernhill Church, 64, 71, 72 Hersfield Bridge, 320, 324 Hever Castle, 228-237 Higham Church, 53, 63, 87, 89 Hoath Church, 90
Hoefnagel's Plan of Canterbury,
165, 212-214
Hollingbourne Church, 287, 291 Holy Maid of Kent, 149 Hoode, wood-carver, 74 Horton Kirby, 88 Hucking Church, 279 Hythe Church, 54, 62, 72, 83, 84
Iden, Alexander, 140 Ightham Church, 280 Insurrections in Kent, 10-12, 132-
149
Ivychurch Church, 97 Iwade Church, 98
Jutes in Kent, 4
Kemsing Church, 296 Kennardington Castle, 158, 159 Kentish Castles, 150-214 Kentish Insurrections, 132-149 Kershaw, S. W., on Refugee
Industries, 298-319 Keston, 136 Kingsdown, near Wrotham,
Church of, 53, 70 Kit's Coty House, i
Leather Bottle, Cobham, 242, 243 Ledes, Walter, 100 Leigh, Col., 145 L'Estrange, Col., 145 Lisle, Sir George, 144 Little Chart Church, 88 Lodinford Bridge, 326 Lovejoy, Elizabeth, 128 Lovelace, Francis, T43, 145
Richard, 114, 115, 125
Lullingstone Church, 66, 67, 74,
77. 95, 207, 208 Lydd Church, 53, 65, 89 Lyminge Church, 50 Lympne, 151 Lynsted Church, 79, 80, 8l, 83, 97
Maidstone, Refugee industries, 311-313
Church, 71, 72, 78
Museum, 253-263
Storming of, 147
Mann, Sir William, 143 Many, Sir John, 145
Sir William, 145
Maplesden Family, 254 Marden, 140
Marlowe, Christopher, 124, 125 Medmenham, William, 135
334
INDEX
Medway Bridges, 320-329
Meopham Church, 75, 84
Midley Church, 88
Milsted Church, 75
Milton, near Gravesend, Church, 89
near Sittingbourne, Church
of, 53. 90, 98 Minster Church, Sheppey, 51, 53,
54, 66, 88, 97, 98 Minster, Thanet, 5, 31 Monastic Houses in Kent, 7, 13 Monkton Church, 86 Murston Church, 62
Newchurch Church, 84 Newenden, 158
(Castle Toll), 189-193
Church, 66, 98
Newington Church, 73, 75, 84, 98 Newman, George, 145 Norman Castles, 155-157 North Cray Church, 88 Northfleet, 140 Church, 51, 283, 290
Oare Church, 98 O'Connor Riots, 149 Odo, Revolt against, 132, 133 Offham Church, 53
Palmer, Sir Henry, 145
Sir Thomas, 145
Parry, Dr., on Romney Marsh,
275, 276
Peche, Sir John, 74 Penchester, Sir Stephen de, 177,
178, 215 Penshurst, 140
Place, 215-227
Penyngton, William, 139 Peyton, Sir Thomas, 145 Plaxtole Church, 279, 290, 294 Pluckley, 141 Plumstead Church, 286 Postling Church, 55, 69 Poulteney, Sir John de, 215
Rainham Church, 53, 83, 84 Rakestraw, John, 135 Reculver, 151
Church, 50, 51
Refugee Industries, 298-319 Richborough, 151 Rochester, 146, 147
St. Margaret's Church, 54
Cathedral, 56, 71, 72, 105-
108, 172-176
Rodmersham Church, 67, 83, 84,
89
Roman Buildings, 3 Remains in the Weald of
Kent, 190, 191
walled towns in Kent, 151
Romney Marsh, 264-276
Rood of Grace, Boxley Abbey,
57-60
Rood-lofts and Screens, 44-109 Rood-screen, Origin of the, 45, 46 Roper, Margaret, 13, 14, 123, 124 Royalist Rising (1648), 142-149 Ruckinge Church, 62, 71, 72, 98 Ryarsh Church, 54, 88, 89
Sabine, Alderman, 143
St. Alphege, 7
St. Augustine, 5, 6, 19
" St. Augustine's Chair," 126,
127
St. Laurence Church, 71, 72 St. Margaret-at-Cliffe, Church of,
48 St. Nicholas' Church, Rochester,
285, 286
St. Paul's Cray Church, 88 St. Peter's, Thanet, 84 St. Thomas of Canterbury, 8 Salmeston Grange, 31 Sandown, 146
Castle, 210, 211
Sandhurst Church, 94
Sands, H., on Some Kentish
Castles, 150-214 Sandwich, 146
Refugee Industries, 314-319
St. Mary's Church, 53, 62, 77
Castle, 208, 209
Scott's Hall, 146 Seal, 88
Church, 86, 87
Sevington Church, 100 Shadoxhurst Church, 71 Shoreham Church, 64, 66, 67, 72,
95
Shorne Church, 62, 72
Shurland Castle, 210
Sidney, Philip, on Old Canter- bury, 110-131 ; on Penshurst Place, 215-227
Sir Philip, 15, 216, 218, 220
Family, at Penshurst, 215-
225
Simpson's Moat, Bromley, 203- 205
Sissinghurst Castle, 193, 194
INDEX
335
Sittingbourne Church, 62, 72, 80,
81, 147 Smarden Church, 64, 68, 69, 76,
89> 97 '» 14° Smuggling at Romney Marsh,
264-276
Snargate Church, 53 Somner, William, 125 Speldhurst Church, 100 Spencer, Henry, 139 Spenser, Edmund, 217 Stalisfield Church, 64-66, 73, 96 Staplehurst Church, 80 Stockbury Castle, 194, 195 Stone Church, near Dartford, 52 near Faversham, Church of,
63. 77
Sumner, Major, 147 Sutton, wood-carver, 74 Sutton Valence Castle, 195, 196 Swanscombe, i Church, 62, 98
Tavenor-Perry, J., on Seventeenth Century Church Architec- ture in Kent, 277-297 ; on Mediaeval Bridges, 320-329
Teston Bridge, 328
Teynham Church, 97
Thornham Castle, 197, 198
Throwley Church, 62
Tom (or Thorn), J. N., 149
Tong Castle, 199, 200
Church, 66, 72, 73, 85, 96
Tracey, Sir Robert, 145
Tudeley Church, 52
Tunbridge Church, 63
Twyford Bridge, 324, 329
Tyler, Wat, 134-138
Upnor Castle, 211, 212
Vallance, Aymer, on Rood-lofts, 44-109
Waller, Edmund, 216 Walmer, 146
Castle, 210, 211
Walton, Izaak, 126
Warenne, William de, 177, 178
Washington, Col., 145
Watling Street, 2, 8, 9
Weald, Refugee Industries, 305-
311
West Mailing, 90 West Wickham, i, 66, 158
Church, 54, 62
Westerham Church, 62 Westenhanger Castle, 200-202 Westwell, 73, 88 Church, 49-51, 71, 72, 83, 97,
98
Whitfield, John, 128 Wiles, Dudley, 143 Willesborough Church, 100 Wingham, 62
Church, 71, 72, 97, 98
College, 75, 76
Wolsey, Cardinal, r3 Woodchurch Church, 98 Worthgate, Canterbury, 169 Wouldham Church, 53, 84 Wrotham Church, 66, 83, 84 Wyatt, Sir Henry, 179
Sir Thomas, 141, 178
Rebellion, 14, 141, 142
Wye, 146
Yalding Bridge, 322, 323 Church, 63
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Being further information relating to this interesting fabrique, by WILLIAM BEMROSE, F.S.A., author of " Bow, Chelsea and Derby Porcelain." Illustrated with 27 Coloured Art Plates, 2 1 Collotype Plates, and numerous line and half-tone Illustrations in the text. Bound in handsome " Longton-blue " cloth cover suitably designed. Price, 42/- net.
" This magnificent work on the famous Longton Hall ware will be indispensable to the collector. " — Bookman.
" The collector will find Mr. Bemrose's explanations of the technical features which characterize the Longton Hall pottery of great assistance in identifying specimens, and he will be aided thereto by the many well-selected illustrations." — Athenaum.
DERBYSHIRE CHARTERS IN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE LIBRARIES AND MUNIMENT ROOMS.
Compiled, with Preface and Indexes, for Sir Henry Howe Bemrose, Kt., by ISAAC HERBERT JEAYES, Assistant Keeper in the Depart- ment of MSS., British Museum. Royal 8vo, cloth, gilt top. Price 42/- net.
"The book must always prove of high value to investigators in iti own recondite field of research, and would form a suitable addition to any historical library." — Scotsman.
THE VALUES OF OLD ENGLISH SILVER & SHEFFIELD PLATE. FROM THE FIFTEENTH TO THE NINETEENTH CENTURIES.
By J. W. CALDICOTT. Edited by J. STARKIE GARDNER, F.S.A. 3,000 Selected Auction Sale Records ; 1,600 Separate Valuations; 660 Articles. Illustrated with 87 Collotype Plates. 300 pages. Royal 410, cloth. Price, 42/- net.
" A most comprehensive and abundantly illustrated volume. . . . Enables even the most inex- perienced to form a fair opinion of the value either of a single article or a collection, while as a reference and reminder it must prove of great value to an advanced student."— Daily Telegraph.
" A finely-got-up book, copiously and well illustrated, giving detailed auction records and other information of value to buyer, seller, and owner." — Times.
" The work is beautifully illustrated, with reproductions of many of the rarest examples of the Silversmith's art, and it should prove invaluable to all who possess old silver." — Morning Post.
HISTORY OF OLD ENGLISH PORCELAIN AND ITS MANUFACTURES.
With an Artistic, Industrial and Critical Appreciation of their Productions. By M. L. SOLON, the well-known Potter Artist and Collector. In one handsome volume. Royal 8vo, well printed in clear type on good paper, and beautifully illustrated with 20 full- page Coloured Collotype and Photo-Chromotype Plates and 48 Collotype Plates on Tint. Artistically bound. Price 52/6 net.
" Mr. Solon writes not only with the authority of the master of technique, but likewise with that of the accomplished artist, whose exquisite creations command the admiration of the connoisseurs of to-day. " — A t/temrum.
"Like the contents and the illustrations, the whole get-up of the book is excellent to a degree which is not often met with even in English books. ... a real mine of information and a beautiful work of art." — Tonindustrie-Zeitung, Berlin.
"Written in a very clear and lucid style, it is a practically exhaustive account of the evolution of English Porcelain." — Connoisseur.
MANX CROSSES ; or The Inscribed and Sculptured Monuments of the Isle of Man, from about the end of the Fifth to the beginning of the Thirteenth Century. By P. M. C. KERMODE, F.S.A. Scot., etc. The illustrations are from drawings specially prepared by the Author, founded upon rubbings, and carefully compared with photographs and with the stones themselves. In one handsome Quarto Volume nf in. by 8f in., printed on Van Gelder hand-made paper, bound in full buckram, gilt top, with special design on the side. Price to subscribers, 42/- net. The edition is limited to 400 copies. [In the Press.
OLD ENGLISH GOLD PLATE.
By E, ALFRED JONES. With numerous Illustrations of existing specimens of Old English Gold Plate, which by reason of their great rarity and historic value deserve publication in book form. The examples are from the collections of Plate belonging to His Majesty the King, the Dukes of Devonshire, Newcastle, Norfolk, Portland, and Rutland, the Marquis of Ormonde, the Earls of Craven, Derby, and Yarborough, Earl Spencer, Lord Fitzhardinge, Lord Waleran, Mr. Leopold de Rothschild, the Colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, etc. Royal 4to, buckram, gilt top. Price to subscribers, 2 1/- net. \In the Press.
THE CHURCH PLATE OF THE DIOCESE OF BANGOR.
By E. ALFRED JONES. With Illustrations of about one hundred pieces of Old Plate, including a pre-Reformation Silver Chalice, hitherto unknown ; a Mazer Bowl, a fine Elizabethan Domestic Cup and Cover, a Tazza of the same period, several Elizabethan Chalices, and other important Plate from James I. to Queen Anne. Demy 4to, buckram. Price 2i/- net.
" This handsome volume is the most interesting book on church plate hitherto issued." — A thenaum.
THE OLD CHURCH PLATE OF THE ISLE OF MAN.
By E. ALFRED JONES. With many Illustrations, including a pre- Reformation Silver Chalice and Paten, an Elizabethan Beaker, and other important pieces of Old Silver Plate and Pewter. Crown 4to, buckram. Price, 12/6 net.
GARDEN CITIES IN THEORY AND PRACTICE.
By A. R. SENNETT, A.M.I.C.E., &c. Large Crown 8vo. Two vols., attractively bound in cloth, with 400 Plates, Plans, and Illustrations. Price 2 1/- net.
"... What Mr. Sennett has to say here deserves, and will no doubt command, the careful con- sideration of those who govern the future fortunes of the Garden City." — Bookseller.
SOME DORSET MANOR HOUSES, WITH THEIR LITERARY AND HISTORICAL ASSOCIATIONS.
By SIDNEY HEATH, with a fore-word by R. Bosworth Smith, of Bingham's Melcombe. Illustrated with forty drawings by the Author in addition to numerous rubbings of Sepulchral Brasses by W. de C. Prideaux, reproduced by permission of the Dorset Natural History and Field Club. Dedicated by kind permission to the Most Hon. the Marquess of Salisbury. Royal 410, cloth bevelled edges. Price to subscribers, 3O/- net. [In the Press.
DERBY: ITS RISE AND PROGRESS.
By A. W. DAVISON, illustrated with 12 plates and two maps. Crown 8vo, cloth. Price 5/-.
"A volume with which Derby and its people should be well satisfied." — Scotsman.
ACROSS THE GREAT ST. BERNARD.
The Modes of Nature and the Manners of Man. By A. R. SENNETT, A.M.I.C.E., &c. With Original Drawings by HAROLD PERCIVAL, and nearly 200 Illustrations. Large Crown 8vo, attractively bound in cloth. Price 6/- net.
" A book which we recommend as heartily to those for whom it will be a memorial of Switzerland as to those who will find in it the revelation of beauties and wonders they have not been privileged to behold." — Glasgow Herald.
THE CORPORATION PLATE AND INSIGNIA OF OFFICE OF THE CITIES AND TOWNS OF ENGLAND AND WALES.
By the late LLEWELLYNN JEWITT, F.S.A. Edited and completed with large additions by W. H. ST. JOHN HOPE, M.A. Fully illustrated, 2 vols., Crown 4to, buckram, 84/- net. Large paper, 2 vols., Royal 4to, ios/- net.
"It is difficult to praise too highly the careful research and accurate information throughout these two handsome quartos." — Athentzum.
THE RELIQUARY: AN ILLUSTRATED MAGAZINE FOR ANTIQUARIES, ARTISTS, AND COLLECTORS.
A Quarterly Journal and Review devoted to the study of primitive industries, mediaeval handicrafts, the evolution of ornament, re- ligious symbolism, survival of the past in the present, and ancient art generally. Edited by J. ROMILLY ALLEN, F.S.A. New Series. Vols. i to 12. Super Royal 8vo, buckram, price I2/- each net. Special terms for sets.
" Of permanent interest to all who take an interest in the many and wide branches of which it furnishes not only information and research, but also illumination in pictorial form." — Scotsman.
BEMROSE & SONS LTD., 4, SNOW HILL, E.G.; AND DERBY.
DA Ditchfield, Peter Hampson
670 (ed.)
K3D57 Memorials of old Kent
PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY
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