Rye Castle Museum

 by Susanna Mayor

In medieval times the shipyard at Smallhythe was one of the most important on the south coast.
If you look at the landscape now it is hard to believe that the River Rother once flowed through Smallhythe and out to sea at Rye. In the 14th and 15th centuries the Rother was wide enough and deep enough for the largest ships of medieval England to be built and launched here.

Today, there are  fields where there was once a wide tidal channel.

Documents held at the National Maritime Museum dating from 1326 show that shipbuilding, fitting, repair and breaking were carried out at Smallhythe.  From these documents we are able to form a picture of the range of boats that were built here. We can trace the rise of the shipyard to the height of its success with the building of the Jesus, one of the largest ships to be built in medieval England.

14th Century Round Ship

The first detailed reference is to the Eneswithe, a barge built at Smallhythe in 1400 for the town of New Romney. This was a sea going vessel, not a river barge, that made its maiden voyage around Cape Finisterre to La Rochelle. In 1401 a town ship was built for Rye and it is likely to have been a Cinque Port round ship. These were the vessels most commonly used by the south coast ports to import and export goods from the Continent, particularly wine from Gascony.

 

                    

Royal Commissions: The Great Ships

In 1410 Henry IV ordered the Marie, a hundred ton boat, to be built at Smallhythe and four years later Henry V actually came to the shipyard to see two ships being built. It was the year after Agincourt and he had commissioned the Jesus, a 1000 ton ship, and the George, a balinger of 120 tons. A balinger was a craft that could be rowed as well as sailed. In the 15th centuy they formed the scouting and raiding forces of the English fleet.  Â
      

   Although Smallhythe coas a successful shipyard throughout the 1400s, by the 16th century came the steady decline of the river and the establishment of new dockyards elsewhere. The craftsmen had to look further afield for work and in 1514 thirty seven men from Smallhythe walked forty four miles to Woolwich to take part in the building of the Henry Grace a Dieu under the management of Robert Brigandyne; at 1400 tons it could accommodate up to 1000 men. The ship was commissioned by Henry VIII as a replacement for the 600 ton Regent which had been built downsream from Smallhythe at Reading Street in 1486 but which was lost in battle in 1512.

Ordered by Henry VIII in 1546 the Great Gailyon at 300 tons was the last large vessel to be built at Smallhythe. It was the last of the great ships and the last Royal commission for Smallhythe.

The Rother Barge

Small boats and river barges continued to be built at Smallhythe well into into the 17th century. There was a fleet of barges trading on the Rother; they were powered by sail and crewed by two men, each barge carried up to 30 tons of cargo. The cargo including coal, sand, salt and chalk was carried upstream from Rye, returning with timber, bricks, stone and hop poles.

The design of these barges remained the same from the 1500s into the 20th century and were amongst the last type of boat to be built at Smallhythe. (There is a model of one in the museum.)

An  End to the Shipyard

The decline of Smallhythe as a prosperous shipyard began in the 16th century. Smallhythe could no longer provide a haven for the numbers of ships that had once moored here as the River Rother had begun to silt up.

The river still remained an important highway for traffic, especially for cargo such as iron and wood, despite its continued deterioration.

After 1549, records of marrages, baptisms and deaths began to diminish in number suggesting a fall in the population. In 1636 the river was re-routed to the south of the Isle of Oxney and the land was drained in preparation for agricultural use and Smallhythe’s days as a Royal Dockyard were over.

Iden Mote

By Richard Holmes

Beginnings

As historians believe that before the Norman Conquest there were no more than 400 parish churches in the whole of England, it does on the face of it seem unlikely that Udimore church was one of them. However, if there was a Saxon church in Udimore, it was probably wholly or partially destroyed in the autumn of 1066. When William sent armed parties out from his fortified base at Hastings, to devastate the countryside and bring back provisions for his men and horses, they were instructed to raid only the towns and villages that lay outside the territory of the Abbey of Fecamp. Within easy range of Hastings and not owned by Fecamp, Udimore was, therefore, probably a prime target. The sharp decline in its value at this time. and subsequent recovery (as recorded in the Domesday Book) supports this conjecture.

Norman Period

The “church and two acres of meadow” recorded in the Domesday Book 20 years later must refer, therefore, to either an original Saxon church, restored by the Normans, or to a new Norman foundation. The parts of the present structure which experts attribute to the Norman period, seem to date from the early 12th century, which suggests a second phase of building, some 40 years after the Conquest, forming the nucleus of the church as we know it today. In addition to the nave, which seems to have been about one third shorter than the present nave, there was probably a small semicircular apse, serving as a chancel.

Medieval Period

Early in the next century, probably around 1230, a major new building programme was put in hand. The capacity of the nave was augmented by replacing its south wall with an arcade of two arches, beyond which a south aisle was built. At about the same time, the earlier chancel was replaced by a spacious and beautifully proportioned Early English chancel, which has survived, with very few changes, to this day. The brackets of the new chancel arch were decorated with a striking dog-tooth pattern, and the capitals of the two arcade arches were carved with an elegant “stiff leaf design”.

Not long after this, both the new aisle and the nave were extended westwards, by the length of one further bay. This naturally involved the construction of a third arcade arch. It was a simpler structure, far less ornate than the other two. This is not surprising, for funds were no doubt scarce then, as they are today, and soon many more resources had to be found for the construction of the tower, the next major project. Signs of this extension can be clearly seen in the external masonry of the nave North wall, and in the two filled-in doorways nearby. There is an intriguing possible explanation for this. It was customary to locate a north door very near the font.
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 During baptisms , this door was opened wide, to allow the devil to escape from the newly-baptised person, for the north side of the churchyard was generally associated with the powers of evil. When the nave was extended, the font would have been moved further West, so the previous position of the door was no longer suitable.

As a result of these improvements, the building was now large and impressive enough for its role as the family church of the Echinghams, whose manor house, Court Lodge, stood nearby. As the family were on at least two occasions hosts to royalty, we can safely assume that both Edward I and Edward III attended Mass in the church, with their royal households , during their visits to Udimore.

14th Century

England went through difficult times in the 14th century, wars with France, economic problems and the disastrous Black Death. A declining population may well have been the reason for the decision to demolish the entire south aisle built in the previous century. All three arches of the nave arcade were filled in, creating a continuous south nave wall. New windows were set in the east and west bays of this wall, and a door in the central one, with a small porch to shelter it from the prevailing winds. Another theory to explain the disappearance of the south aisle is that its founda tions were inadequate to support this heavy structure in soil, which is to this day liable to become waterlogged after prolonged rainfall. So perhaps it simply collapsed.

18th Century

For the next six centuries, very few structural changes were made. In 1795 (a date recorded in the plasterwork) the height of the north wall of the nave was increased by some 4 ft. This seems to have been associated with structural work on the nave roof A musicians’ gallery was installed, also a three-decker pulpit and box pews. At about this time there seems to have been a need for a new font. Instead of having one carved in stone, as decreed by ancient ecclesiastical edict, the parish officials commissioned a wooden one, carefully painted to resemble stone on the outside and lead on the inside, thereby saving the parish considerable expense. This ingenious fake is still on show in the church today, though we have no record of whether the authorities ever detected it.

19th Century

During the 19th century, however, when many other parish churches underwent radical (and sometimes insensitive) restoration, Udimore church endured a different fate: it suffered from prolonged neglect. By the end of the century it had fallen into a state of severe disrepair . To quote a contemporary description,
“the walls were damp, the timbers rotten, the tower unsafe , the floor uneven and mean, the ceiling full of holes, the bells cracked, the windows broken and the font a sixpenny pudding basin.”

In 1896 Prebendary Frewer of Brede took over the parish. after a period of 27 years during which Udimore had no resident vicar. With the active support of the Patron of the Living, my grandfather, Alfred Holmes, he quickly set about putting things right. We can be extremely grateful to him that his restoration of the building was on the whole very sensitive and sympathetic to its distinctive architectural character.

In addition to extensive repairs to the fabric, to make the church weatherproof again, and the removal of the West gallery, the replacement of the dark old box pews with much simpler pews, lighter in colour, the main changes that he introduced were in the chancel. The style of this work was strongly influenced by his high churchmanship (he was a notable Tractarian). He directed the installation of an elaborate and ornate gradine-style high altar, which was replaced in 1955 by an ‘English” altar and dossal curtains. The only feature of his chancel scheme that remains to this day is the black and white marble paving of the floor and altar steps.

20th Century

His good work was carried on in 1906 by the next vicar, Revd Henry Williamson, during whose vicariate the central arch of the arcade was reopened, to give access to a large new porch, in effect reoccupying part of the space which had been lost when the old south aisle was removed. He also oversaw the installation in the north wall of the nave of three large new windows, similar in style to the original nine lancet windows of the chancel, and like them, glazed with clear glass. The absence of large areas of stained glass makes this a very light church, even on overcast days.

Iden Mote

The mote is situated in the parish of Iden about 3 miles from Rye, in a small shallow valley down which runs a small stream on its way to join the River Rother. In this valley Edmund de Passeley caused a basin to be excavated 460 feet square. On the north side the containing bank must have been entirely artificial, formed no doubt with the material dug from the centre basin.

In the centre of the excavation a rectangular island was left, levelled and raised artificially and to be occupied by the future castle. A sluice was probably provided at the northwest comer of the lake to regulate the level of the water. On the southwest comer throwing embankments across the stream formed two ponds. These ponds were intended as store ponds when the level of the water in the lake became low from any cause, as well as for the keeping of fish. Below the northern side of the retaining bank can still be traced a length of straight bank, which was probably the edge of a wharf abutting onto an artificially formed harbour.

Up to the 1930’s the stream leading to the wharf was quite navigable for small boats. On the west side of the castle side an outer court was formed by enclosing with two subsidiary moats a piece of land measuring 500 ft. by 150 ft. Owing to the eastern side of these moats having to be dug out of the rising side of the valley, the amount of excavation required was very great and the remains are impressive to this day. The similarity in the layout to the site of Bodiam Castle is clear. The same low lying situation, the same forming of an artificial lake instead of a moat and the same artificial island in the centre. A feature of Bodiam Castle, which is supposed to be unique, is the bridge of timber built to approach the castle gateway sideways from the west bank. The illustration on the license granted to Sir Edmund Passeley to embattle his man sion of La Mote by Edward II in 1318 shows that the idea was intended to be put into practice there, 70 years earlier.

The purpose of the building of the first moat castle was to protect the rear approach to Rye from French invaders. In 1460 the Manor of Mote passed by marriage to the Scott family from Smeeth in Kent, 1464. In 1481 the lake was reduced to a moat and the castle was rebuilt in the form of a fortified manor ho se. The main part of the work was the construction of a great tower housing, among other rooms, a new hall, chapel and a high chamber. Stone for the original castle had been transported from Caen but the rebuilt manor was mainly brick, made on site and stone from quarries from Eastbourne, Cranbrook and Fairlight. Timber was imported from the Corke Wood.

The Scott family remained in possession of the mansion for some 200 years until it was abandoned in the 1650’s. Stone from the ruins was used to construct ForstaI Farmhouse on the estate. In.500 years the castle had never heard a shot fired in anger.

From J H Cheney