Author: Published by Nelson

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The fort was later to be manned by Shoreham’s Artillery Volunteers, local men who also had full time jobs. One of the ways that Volunteers were encouraged to drill and practice was through the annual competitions run by the National Artillery Association at Shoeburyness. These involved timed exercises to put together a dismantled gun culminating in a series of shots at targets. Shoreham was to achieve success in this competition when Sergeant Major William.T. Streader’s detachment from the Shoreham Battery took the Prince of Wales prize at Shoeburyness in 1879 ‘the prize consisting of ten silver cups all taken by Major Streader’s detachment’.

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October 1855 Tenders were invited for the building of a fort to house ‘six heavy guns and defensible barracks for the lodgment of troops.’ The project was to be completed by November the following year under penalty of £35 for every week’s delay and forfeiture of £1,000 for non-completion. Whether or not the construction conditions were met is unclear but in February 1858 artillerymen were reported as being still ‘engaged mounting six 68 pound guns on slide and traversing carriages.’

Three guns covered the sea and three were to perform nearly a complete circle over both sea and land (although later reports suggest that the actual extent of the arc of fire was rather more limited). It had a ditch, walls with loopholes for musketry, subterranean passages, magazines and barracks for 70 men but to begin with was maintained by just ‘a few invalids of the late war.’ By November that year Lord Vivian and men of the Royal Artillery delivered shot, shell and ammunition – each gun received 130 rounds and for each shot 16 pounds of powder were required to propel missiles 3,000 to 4,000 yards.

(Image of the fort by courtesy of the artist, Mike Codd)

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The opening of the Swiss Gardens (1838) is well reported and an 1850 article of a balloon flight describes one particularly adventurous event when 56 year old Lieut. George Burcher Gale RN arose from Swiss Gardens, was blown across to France where he landed, was thought by the French to have been a spy (it was at the time of the invasion scares, the building of Shoreham fort etc.,) and imprisoned for a while.

Another report (1857) also concerning Swiss Gardens revealed the existence of a passage way through it. This was a right of way that ran from alongside the Victoria Road entrance through to the path that later became Connaught Avenue and actually went under some of the Garden buildings. It must have been a somewhat claustrophobic experience to walk through as the parish surveyors had inspected the passage and called upon the owner to ‘increase the depth to 6 feet 6 inches, widen it under the cosmoramic views pavilion and prevent the water fountain from leaking into the passage.’

(Images show balloons at Swiss Gardens and a blurred but rare photo of the passage way there).

 

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Shoreham’s roads are mentioned. Before the riverside stretch to the east of the footbridge was built up the turnpike road from Brighton used to run along to Tarmount Lane, up Brunswick, into St. Mary’s Road and down East Street to the High Street. This was the last part of King William IV’s favourite route on his regular outings from Brighton to Shoreham and the new Norfolk suspension bridge (1833) that he much admired. When the railway arrived (1840) the turnpike trustees at first refused to let the railway company build a viaduct over the Kingston wharf so buttresses with a drawbridge were initially designed to go across the line – eventually though the trustees relented.

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Much of the chalk and earth taken out from the cutting through New England Hill in Brighton was reused to build the bank through Southwick and Kingston and in February 1840 a great number of workmen arrived in Shoreham to build the Brighton Road viaduct over the line connecting the Kingston wharves to the main railroad. On the 11^thMay 1840 the official opening was reported with the first trip through the five and a half miles from Brighton to Shoreham being completed in 12 minutes.

One intriguing report of 1841, the year following the opening of the Shoreham line, was taken up and published by all the national dailies and read ‘On Monday, as the Shoreham branch of the London and Brighton Railway was proceeding to Shoreham a hare ran on the rail for some distance but eventually poor puss was overtaken and cut in half by the train.’ J.M.W. Turner’s famous ‘Rain, Steam & Speed’ painting shows a hare running before the train – presumed to represent speed. The painting was first exhibited in 1844 and shows the Maidenhead Bridge, is it possible that the idea of the hare was planted in Turner’s mind by this report?

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Companies were formed (1834) with a view to funding the London to Brighton railway line. There were two main routes proposed and one of them was the line down to Horsham, Shoreham and on to Brighton. Various reports followed during the subsequent years giving arguments for and against the different routes. Although the Adur Valley route was backed by the renowned railway engineer John Rennie and was the least expensive option requiring no tunnels and less bridges to be constructed the more direct route to Brighton was chosen. It was small consolation for Shoreham that that the branch line from Brighton to Shoreham was to be completed first

1839 The new locomotive ‘Shoreham’ was towed into Shoreham drawn by 14 beautiful horses and conveyed on to Portslade where it was put on the rails to join the other locomotive ‘Brighton’ already working on the line’s construction.

There were a number of fatal accidents among the workers on the Brighton to Shoreham line and many more non fatal – so much so that the contractors for the railway ‘presented an extra ten guineas in consequence of the number casualties that had to be sent to the Sussex County Hospital for treatment.’

(Photo: The ‘Shoreham’ like the ‘Ajax’ pictured here, was built by Jones, Turner & Evans of Warrington)

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November 1824 a severe storm hit Shoreham and lasted a week causing the sea to rise over the beach in front of the town that gave the whole area the appearance of being in the open sea. Fields behind the beach were also inundated by the sea and the old wooden lighthouse at Kingston was blown down. The river overflowed its banks, many chimneys were toppled as was the pole on the top of the church tower. 

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Newspaper Reports continued 3:-

1809 ‘Extensive docks’  (i.e., sluices) were constructed ‘between Shoreham and Lancing to drain the low lands in that neighbourhood’ and replaced the marshland with meadowland that one hundred years later was to be used for the airport.

John (88) and Elizabeth (87) Boyce were landlord and landlady of the Star Inn (on the corner of Church and High Streets) for over 50 years.  They had been married for 60 years and both died in July of 1812 within a week of each other.

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Newspaper Reports 2:-

One of the earliest reports (1751) was of two men dressed in mourning clothes driving their hearse from Shoreham who were apprehended by the Revenue men. On opening the coffin they discovered smuggled gold and silver French lace, Cambric (fine cloth)……. and tea!

The luck of the Irish – in 1778 seven Irish sailors had the misfortune of belonging to the crew of a ship embargoed in France. They managed to

Continue reading “Life in 18th and 19th Century Shoreham”

Glimpses of life in Shoreham two hundred years and more ago as provided by 18^th and 19^th century newspaper reports that we’ll be including over the next few days. Horse races and shooting matches held in the Sheep Field at Old Shoreham, punch-ups in the High Street, speeding dog-carts that terrorized pedestrians, murders, suicides, the town’s involvement in the naval war against France, smuggling, cricket matches and ships built in Shoreham that we hadn’t known of before.

Continue reading “Life in 18th and 19th Century Shoreham”