Living on the edge: England's coastal history
Senior Historian Paul Pattison explores the history of communities and fortifications on England's coastline
England, part of a large island and a nation state from the 10th century AD, has a long and complex history. The sea and its coastal fringe have always played a major part in the livelihoods, safety and fortunes of England's people. From prehistoric times, the sea, intertidal areas and salt marshes were a major source of animal and plant food in the form of fish, shellfish, seaweed and wild birds. As early as 1,400 BC, people were producing salt by evaporating seawater. Many other raw materials such as wood, reed, clay, stone and metal-bearing minerals, used for building and manufacturing, were available in coastal locations on marshes and exposed in eroding cliffs.
It was logical, therefore, for people to build communities close to these coastal resources, adjacent to river estuaries and alongside harbours sheltered from the worst weather. Closeness to water also made travel and transport of goods easier and quicker, with movement by boat and ship preferable to laborious and time-consuming treks along unmade roads and tracks, which could be exhausting in the heat of summer and cold and impassable mud baths in winter. Boat- and ship-building became an important coastal industry and, as ships were improved and reliable navigation methods developed, it made global exploration a reality.
The growth of towns, the creation of national states, exploration, and trade over longer distances inevitably produced competition and rivalry at regional, national and international level. In turn, rivalry could lead to piracy and warfare at sea and attacks on coastal towns. In such an uncertain and dangerous world, there was always a need to protect trade routes, both at sea and overland, and to defend the coastal towns that formed the hubs of mercantile trade.
During the Middle Ages, many English coastal towns developed strong regional identities, especially in the outer parts of the kingdom. Many received charters – royal permits to trade, hold markets and, to a certain degree, govern themselves - all in return for dues and customs gathered on behalf of the Crown and the promise of service of ships and crews in times of war.
Coastal towns had their own small rivalries with other towns that could involve piracy and fighting. In severe cases where competition and nationality collided, there was sometimes coastal raiding to burn the ships, warehouses and homes of competitors. In wartime, this was encouraged by the Crown to reduce the resources of its enemies.
Credit: Tom Arber
Credit: Tom Arber
Inevitably, such threats resulted in the construction of fortifications at many places around the coast. Some of the oldest date to a time long before the nation of England emerged. In the second half of the fourth century AD, towards the end of the Roman administration of Britain, the military command used coastal forts positioned at important estuaries, associated with flotillas of warships, with the prime task of protecting trade and settlements.
A particular threat was that of Saxon and Frankish raiders whose hit-and-run attacks on coastal settlements resulted in frequent plundering, burning and destruction. Fine examples of Roman coastal forts can be seen at Burgh Castle (Norfolk), Richborough (Kent) and Portchester (Hampshire), while fortified signal stations in prominent locations such as Scarborough (North Yorkshire) enabled early warning of raiders along the coast between fort garrisons.
Much later, in the Middle Ages, defence against coastal attacks and pirates was financed by individual towns, though sometimes with Crown assistance. The castle at Dartmouth (Devon, pictured right) protected a wealthy and important trading town by means of an iron chain stretched across the river mouth to bar ships and cannon to bombard them at close range.
During the Renaissance, defence assumed national dimensions financed by the Crown in response to the growing threats posed by rivalry between modern states. The programme of building that dominated the last eight years of Henry VIII’s reign (1539-47) was national in scope and included over 40 new or modernised fortifications in a programme referred to as 'the device by the king'. This left several remarkable artillery forts such as those at Deal and Walmer (Kent), Calshot and Hurst (Hampshire), Portland (Dorset) and St Mawes and Pendennis (Cornwall), whose careful geometrical designs were intended to achieve all-round defence.
These designs formed part of the beginning of the long development of coastal defences. Initial attempts to introduce advanced European designs can be seen at the artillery forts at Pendennis and St Mary’s (Cornwall), Carisbrooke (Isle of Wight) and at the remarkable town walls at Berwick-upon-Tweed (Northumberland).
Such attempts to securely defend harbours, ports, estuaries and beaches became routine as England became part of Great Britain (from 1707) and a worldwide power that prospered through colonial trade. The engine of the British Empire was a powerful navy that required large, secure bases. Defences became ever more sophisticated and extensive, such as the huge fortress built on Dover’s Western Heights during the Napoleonic Wars (1803-15).
Coastal fortification-building reached its pinnacle in the 1860s and 1870s with another nationwide construction programme, this one centred on the great naval dockyards at Chatham, Portsmouth and Plymouth and the nation’s vital mercantile ports. These colossal new forts, built of granite and iron, became known as ‘Palmerston Follies’ after the prime minister who championed their construction, and include the example at Hurst Castle (Hampshire) overlooking the Solent across to the Isle of Wight.
Lindisfarne Priory (credit: Brian Morris/English Heritage)
Lindisfarne Priory (credit: Brian Morris/English Heritage)
There were, of course, other motives for building on the coast. Monastic communities sometimes chose remote sites for their abbeys and priories for both spiritual and economic reasons. Notable examples are Netley Abbey (Hampshire), Whitby Abbey (North Yorkshire), Tynemouth Priory (Tyne and Wear) and Lindisfarne (Northumberland). Sometimes, smaller chapels were made as even quieter places of retreat and contemplation, a good example being St Catherine’s Chapel (Dorset), established by the monks of Abbotsbury high on a hill overlooking Chesil Beach. Such chapels sometimes doubled as navigation marks for ships at sea, keeping a light burning in a turret, tower or adjacent beacon.
Perhaps most remarkable of all is the purpose-made lighthouse (pictured right), or pharos, at Dover Castle, built by the Romans in the second century AD to help ships crossing the English Channel find their way into the tiny estuary of the river Dour. Another later tower on the Isle of Wight is the remaining part of a 14th-century chapel, St Catherine’s Oratory, known locally as the Pepperpot. It was the duty of a priest there to keep a navigation light burning and to say mass for the souls of those who were lost at sea: that place of danger but great opportunity for the people of England.
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