EDITOR’S NOTES

On the occasion of this first Newsletter of 2006 it is my pleasure, on behalf of the Officers and Committee, to wish all our members and other readers a Very Happy and Prosperous New Year!

It is also my first NL as editor; as you will realise, I will have my work cut out to get anywhere near the very high standards set by Mike Umbers during his ten years at the helm. Happily for all of us he has promised to make a substantial contribution to future editions and my colleagues on the Committee have also agreed to write regularly about their work for HCS. We will also welcome comments, articles and photographs from members on topics within our fairly broad remit of Hythe and its environment. Hopefully then, there will be so much copy that my own work will be confined to wielding my blue pencil – as one famous editor said of his “…to cut a long story short, it’s to cut a long story short!”

 

SOCIETY EVENTS

On 4^th December HCS held its annual party in the Town Hall for the volunteers who deliver the Newsletter and others who help to keep the wheels of the Society turning and generally facilitate our relationships with other official bodies. There was a very good attendance, and a warm, informal atmosphere which made it an ideal opportunity to present Doug Amans with the Civic Award Certificate that he has earned for his voluntary work with numerous Hythe organisations.

 

As always the Winter Talks on Tuesday evenings at the U.R. Church hall have been very well supported and we are now looking forward to the following:

On 14^th February David Featherbe is unable to come and Alan Stockwell will take his place with a talk entitled “Puppets, Piers and Pantomimes” in which he will tell us about the 40 years he and his wife have spent in the world of entertainment.

On the 28^th February Roger McKenna will give an illustrated talk on The Cutty Sark, the famous tea clipper now being extensively restored.

On 14^th March Lt Col Mike Martin will share some reminiscences of his work as a tour guide of famous battlefields throughout the world.

On 28^th March Richard Pitcairn-Knowles’ talk, called “Edwardian Eye” will give insights into the England of a century ago through the lens of his ancestor’s camera.

In addition we would like to tell you about a concert to celebrate 100 years of music making by Hythe Salvation Army Band to be held in St. Leonard’s Church at 7.30. on 4^th March supported by Shepway Gospel Choir and the Hythe Town Concert Band – admission is free with a retiring collection.

 

MRS JOAN WHIPP

It is with deep regret that we have to record the sudden and unexpected death of Mrs Joan Whipp the wife of our Committee member, Alan. Throughout the years that he has been responsible for our membership records and newsletter distribution she was his most active helper.

We shall all miss her cheerful participation in so many aspects of HCS life and give Alan and his family our deepest sympathy.

 

PLANNING MATTERS

BETRAYED: In NL 126 we congratulated councillors on the Shepway Development Control Committee for standing out against officers’ advice, and refusing – on grounds of road safety – to approve a proposal to replace a single house at Tanners Croft, Saltwood, with an estate of six houses – all with double garages.  Their exit would be close to a School entrance and almost opposite a Social Club, where the main road is narrow and curved, with relatively fast-moving traffic and regular Club parking. Nevertheless,  KCC Highways Department was actually prepared to agree to waive the normal 70metre visibility splay requirement – on the grounds they could not fit it in!  Councillors were rightly suspicious of a suggestion that they should “leave it to officials and the developer” to come up with a safety plan. At their next meeting they were shown measures which satisfactorily dealt with the danger, and so gave conditional approval.

Now KCC has pulled the plug on that agreement: it says Tanners Hill is a 40mph zone, so traffic speeds cannot be reduced to 20mph at the school.

It is perfectly clear that that little problem can be resolved by reducing Tanners Hill to 30mph – which would be a very good thing to do anyway – but as it is beyond the wit of man and machine to make that change, the developer has requested the condition be removed.

Councillors will feel let down by a system which has made them look foolish.       

 

THE SPORTS CENTRE

Mike Umbers has asked us to thank the many members who contacted him after he stated his case on the proposed Centre in NL127.  Some agreed with him, and some did not – it is clearly the proposed location on South Road which makes it a contentious and divisive issue.  Your Committee is firmly of opinion that Hythe needs a new Swimming Pool, and we are supporting the Town Council to achieve that in the belief that if it does not go here, we will lose it all together.  Nevertheless, we will keep a close eye on the DESIGN (for the proposed site is within the Conservation Area which was enlarged specifically in August 1992 to provide a vista of the town from South Road) and also on the FACILITIES to be included, which should be co-ordinated, we believe, with those at the new Folkestone Centre, to achieve a mix, and provide the widest possible appeal to young and old, residents and visitors.

 

On the design (and this concerns Folkestone nearly as much as Hythe) Mr Stack, Shepway’s Head of Planning, revealed interestingly at the DCC meeting on the 18th Oct 2005 that these Centres are being rolled out across the country in various locations, and for reasons of cost, are ‘pretty much standard’.

 

Just at the moment a final decision awaits, among other things, a decision by KCC following an application by former councillor Martin Ross to register the recreation ground as a “village green”.

 

SWIMMING POOL SITE REDEVELOPMENT

We told you last time of our “Demon Planner”, hopping Rumpelstiltskin-like round his eyrie in the Glass Palace of Shepway, and chuckling at his own daring in devising a form of words which would convince the innocent members of the Development Control Committee that a block of flats at least five storeys high is actually precisely what Hythe needs to ‘provide the necessary sense of closure’ to the Conservation Area. We understand that the potential affect of this development on the adjacent buildings (Pensand House, which has many windows overlooking the west side of the site and 24, South Road which would be completely dwarfed by an adjacent high rise) is giving cause for concern and we shall continue to monitor this development carefully.

 

“THE WHIM” is an interesting little house built in 1880 in Park Road. It is entirely circular in overall plan with a round courtyard at its centre and is reputed to be one of only two such designs in England. The present owners have applied for permission to demolish it and erect three terraced houses on the site. We have joined with local residents in opposing this on the grounds of its possible architectural merit and on 17^th January Shepway DCC issued a Building Preservation Notice which will delay the project for six months while the Secretary of State considers listing the building. Here is a glimpse of the house – what do you think?

 

LYDD AIRPORT EXTENSION

The planning application has still not been formally made. It is awaiting an Environmental Impact Assessment in line with a new Scoping Opinion published by SDC in the middle of December. This document and related information comes to around 100 pages, and all of the relevant bodies have now been consulted.

Worryingly, however, it reveals the request for a further runway extension of 150 metres which would permit the use of fully loaded 737 type aircraft. This would bring it within 500 metres of Greatstone Primary School and further increase noise disturbance there and at Lydd.

On the other hand, KCC recently confirmed that its new Structure Plan would now exclude a target of two million passengers per year and that tougher acceptability criteria would be used.

 

THE SHORNCLIFFE REDOUBT

Run up Hospital Hill (with a few bricks in your backpack if you wish, as the Gurkha soldiers do), and look up at the fine steep woods on your left.  On the flat bit, now tree-covered, near the top, where the road bends round, stood a square earthwork Redoubt.  You can walk into its remains along a path from just opposite the gates of the Military Cemetery.

 

Sir John Moore came to Shorncliffe in 1802 with the task of defending Kent from Napoleon’s army.  It was here that he formed and trained his Light Infantry Brigade, giving them rifles instead of muskets, putting them in muted green instead of vivid red, demanding fitness and initiative from man and officer, and training them not to stand in vulnerable lines and squares, but to deploy to the bugle signal (far more flexible than the drum-beat), and use ground as skirmishers, to harass the enemy and pick them off.  From the heights they learned to fire down at targets placed on the beach; he built up the Redoubt walls, and they practised the art of storming and defending.

The Canal and Martello Towers were not yet built.  At the time of our greatest vulnerability, the South Coast was defended only by a hotchpotch of forts and minor batteries.  The most likely landing place for the invaders was Hythe Bay, and it was here that he concentrated his resources.  Shorncliffe Battery (you can just see its mighty block walls behind the new builds at Seapoint), was equipped with a dozen 24 pound cannons: Moore’s troops would fight here, withdrawing to the Redoubt only when they had to, while the Cinque Ports Volunteers (under William Pitt, no less, a former Prime Minister, by then Lord Warden) would hold the heights; no longer were they to retreat in front of the French advance – Moore demanded that no yard of English soil was to be given up until stained with blood – ours, or theirs.

It can therefore be fairly claimed that the Shorncliffe Redoubt has a singular historic and military significance; it was the focal point of the defence against Napoleon’s planned invasion and it is the spiritual home of all Light Infantry and Rifle regiments in the British Army – they still wear a Bugle in their badge. 

 

Today there is a real possibility that the whole area could be disposed of for building (We know what that means – the precedent has been set by the Blockhouse on the South side of Hospital Hill!)  The Shorncliffe Redoubt and Trench System will be lost if not protected.  A spokesman from ‘MOD Estates’ is quoted as saying: ‘Nothing will be done to the land which will threaten its heritage’.  That sounds good – but suppose the assessment of historical value – made by MOD Estates? - is negative?  It is worth comparing our treatment of this period of the Napoleonic Wars with the French. Visit Boulogne and you will see the massive Column of the Grand Army, Napoleon’s stone and, as recently as 1995, they built a faithful replica of the Powder Magazine which stood in the Boulogne Camp. There is a museum, formal and informal gardens and the Tourist Office has detailed information booklets in French and English. You’d think they won the war!

And that’s not all.  During the First World War many thousands of soldiers came to Shorncliffe and Hythe camps before sailing to France to the Western Front. Whilst here, they also trained. A short distance from Shorncliffe Redoubt, lower down in the woods, is a system of training trenches – saps and gun pits and bays – where the men practised everything they would soon need to know to survive.  These trenches and structures, part brick, part earth, are practically unique in the UK, but they are decaying fast.

 

Mr. Michael George, well known author of “Coast of Conflict” is helping to draw attention to this matter in co-operation with the Sandgate Society and recently organised a tour of the site which was joined by, among many others, our M.P. Michael Howard Q.C. You could add your support to this campaign by registering your interest at www.shorneclifferedoubt.com or writing to Mr. George at 32 Coolinge Lane, CT20 3QT.

 

THE NEW FOLKESTONE SOCIETY

Hythe’s problems are faced also by every Town and Parish Council in Shepway.  The New Folkestone Society in particular is struggling to preserve what is left of the old town: changes to The Grand, to St Olave’s, to 12 Marine Parade; the preservation of listed Coolinge House (1715 or earlier); the spread of satellite dishes and plastic windows on listed buildings; the staggering insensitivity of the new, advertisement covered, telephone boxes, the second-rate shopping precinct, and above all, the five massive towers of apartments ‘ugly alien monoliths with all the charm of 1960’s council blocks’ (to quote the Society’s excellent Newsletter)  proposed for the seafront. Each local Society must fight its own battles, but it is sensible we should meet together to compare problems and tactics, and just such a session is proposed to take place shortly.  You will hear more.

 

KING ETHELBERT AND QUEEN BERTHA

In NL120 we reported having made a Society donation to the Canterbury Commemoration Project which was set up to raise funds for the installation of statues of Ethelbert and Bertha on Lady Wootton’s Green.  It was Bertha’s presence as a Christian Queen of Kent which encouraged Pope Gregory to send Augustine and his party of 40 or so Monks to England in AD597.  When news of their arrival reached the King he went to tell his wife as she came from Mass in St Martin’s Church – and the moment of their meeting is recorded in the placing of the two life-sized and authentically clad statues. A very suspicious King, a pagan, and fearful of witchcraft, met the party at Ebbsfleet on the Isle of Thanet – the story is told by Bede, a mere 130 years later, which passes as an eye-witness account for those times.  The King gave Augustine, now ordained ‘Arch-bishop of the English’, land for his cathedral and monastery; within months he was himself baptised with ‘ten thousand converts’, and the centre of the Church has remained at Canterbury ever since.

The two figures, now finished and paid for, will remain for the present in the St Augustine’s Abbey Museum but will be formally unveiled on the 26^th May 2006 (St Augustine’s Day) as a tableau on the Green between the Abbey and the Cathedral. Ethelbert has another claim to fame: he left to his kingdom a codified statement of some of its laws – the first surviving text of any type written ‘in English speech’ by and for Englishmen.  Previously our laws and precedents were carried in lawyers’ heads, and passed on verbatim and (we guess) disputatiously.  When Laws were written down in other countries, Latin was always used, but henceforth English prevailed here until the Norman Conquest.  One text only survives – a copy of c1120, made and still held in Rochester Cathedral.  It has to be said, it is not an easy read: for example, scholars dispute still whether the word rithamscyld refers to sexual behaviour or a crime against property!  A feature of these laws is that by specifying a payment or fine of so many shillings for each offence committed, feuding and revenge assaults became – in theory – obsolete.  The late Patrick Wormald, a legal historian and authority on Anglo-Saxon England made a translation of Ethelbert’s Laws and commented: ‘England is today the world’s oldest continuously functioning state, and English is its most widely spoken language.  England’s language and law are the most enduring marks of Englishness, its main claims to anyone else’s attention.’

We are pleased to have supported this historic project.

 

FROM THE ARCHIVES 

AN OCCASIONAL SERIES BY MIKE LILLEY – HCS ARCHIVIST

The Hythe Reporter of March 1905 refers to the fact that there were then no less than 25 public houses in Hythe – one for every 220 inhabitants! The statistics were quoted by an objector to the re-licensing of The Providence Inn – owned by Mackesens and situated at the East end of the High Street at the foot of what is now called Providence Lane. The witness went on to say that it was only 13 yards from The Cinque Ports Arms opposite and 174 yards from the The Kings Head on the North side. Both of these had full licences while Providence had only a beer licence. The witness had been in Hythe for 3 years, had visited the house and “knowing the requirements of the Borough” it was not in his opinion necessary. A second witness cited the above statistics; he had lived here for over 6 years and believed that the Inn “was not required for the legitimate wants and needs of the neighbourhood”

Provisional Licence granted!

No more an inn, the property is now two homes and its restoration was the subject of a HCS Award in 1983.

 

HAVE YOUR SAY!

The Town Council wants to give the Oaklands Local History Room & Museum a facelift and make it more pro-active and user friendly.  The Council's Charities Committee has asked the Society for any ideas for incorporating into the Museum's development.  The Society is keen to collect your suggestions on possible improvements and, through this Newsletter, is asking Members to contact Tony Hill (tel: 01303 239587) with ideas.  He will collate the Society's response to the Town Council.

 

TOURISM IN HYTHE

Always good in Venetian Fete years we couldn’t resist showing you a rare extra visitor – a handsome young Osprey – sociable enough to let our member, Dr John Woodward, record the occasion.

 

CORRECTIONS and EXPLANATIONS

In NL 127 we referred to the new Plane Tree in the Town Square as the “London” variety whereas in fact it is an “Oriental” (Perhaps even more appropriate - given its near neighbours! – Ed.)

We also mentioned Mike’s “compass” - Health and Safety approved but useless for drawing circles – and a Mrs.P.Hare wrote to remind us that we should have referred to a pair of compasses a compass being, of course, a navigation instrument! Ouch!

Finally, both Mrs Hare and a Mrs Beryl Bridge helpfully explained that The Madras System of Teaching involves the use of sand filled trays to teach writing and numbering which was observed by the Rev. Andrew Bell in Madras in 1791 and developed by him in England in 1795. It was used by the National Schools which started in 1811.