A Tudor shipwreck on Dungeness: shipping and wrecks around Lydd in the medieval and early modern periods

This interdisciplinary paper uses archaeological, historical, and local records to reveal the significance of shipwrecks to this maritime community in the period. Civic document records of Lydd and Denge Marsh, part of the Cinque Ports Confederation, indicate the significance of Lydd and its relations with the rest of the county and beyond. Shipwrecks were widely disputed, subjected to acts of piracy and even prompted conflicts between the barons of the ports themselves. Rights, customs, and profits of wreck from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries are explored in detail, providing an intriguing insight into the history of the Romney Marsh Cinque Ports.

In April 2022 the remains of a wooden vessel were discovered in Cemex UK’s Denge Quarry at Kerton Road, Lydd (NGR: TR 08485 19459).[fn1] Five sections of the hull were found and investigated by Wessex Archaeology on behalf of Kent County Council, funded by Historic England. The vessel has now been recorded and reburied so no part of it is now visible.

The initial dendrochronological analysis suggests a construction date of around the mid-sixteenth century and it is adjudged to be a relatively early example of a carvel (Arnold et al. 2022, 3). On 1 January 2023 it featured on the BBC2 series Digging for Britain with Professor Alice Roberts.[fn2] The shipwreck must be understood in the context of the nature and development of both the site where it was found, and the wider locality. This article therefore examines these first, and then the historical evidence for the features of shipping in the area in the medieval and early modern periods. It goes on to explore the possibilities of identifying the shipwreck from the extensive civic documents of Lydd and Denge Marsh as part of the Cinque Ports confederation, and from national records.

The shipwreck was found on the east of Dungeness Foreland, broadly equidistant between Greatstone and Dungeness. The coastline in 1400 lay approximately 100m west of the present-day coastline, at a location more or less exactly where the wreck was found (Figs 1 and 2). This is ‘consistent with the wreck having been beached on either the shoreface sands or the gravels in a seaward-facing setting, and subsequently preserved within or below the deposits of an eastward/northward prograding gravel barrier’.[fn3] These detailed findings of the geoarchaeological context accords with the rather different historical evidence for the development of the area in the medieval period examined in Barber et al. (2008, 7-28) and Draper 2009 (4-11, 39-40).[pg55]

[fg]jpg|Fig. 1 Denge Marsh sewer which bounded the manor on its north, with town of Lydd on far right. CC licence File: Dengemarsh Sewer - geograph.org.uk - 448984.jpg - Wikimedia Commons|Image[/fg]

The formation of the Dungeness foreland

This foreland, which developed from about 5,000 years bp, had two periods of enhanced growth and extension: the first in the 700 years to c.ad 700, the second between c.700 to 1500.[fn4] Between the ridges of exposed gravel which formed Dungeness lay an area of freshwater wetland and saltmarsh, and behind the foreland was a larger area of saltmarsh to the north-west of the early town settlement of Lydd which lay on the edge of the gravel. Beyond the saltmarsh was an adjacent back barrier embayment represented by the later Cheyne Channel and Wainway.

The history of Denge Marsh and Dungeness, or ‘the Nesse’

Denge Marsh lay between Lydd and the developing Dungeness foreland, earlier named Denge Nesse (Fig. 2). Both the Marsh and the Nesse were annexed to the small but important coastal market town of Lydd, which had access to the Channel via the Wainway and the Camber anchorage. Denge Marsh manor, which included Denge Nesse, was a shore-based manor of Battle Abbey from the late eleventh century. It comprised, unusually for Kent, a single large block of land in Lydd parish with a few small blocks to its west in Broomhill parish. It ran from Denge Marsh sewer (drainage channel) on its north to the developing shingle foreland of Dungeness on the south and south-east (Barber et al. 2008, 9, 276, fig. 101, 279; Poker map 1617). Denge Marsh was semi-separate from Lydd which was in the lordship of the archbishop of Canterbury while Denge Marsh was under different lordships, not only that of Battle Abbey, but also those of Canterbury Cathedral Priory, the castle of Rochester and William I’s half-brother, Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, who was Earl of Kent from 1067. By the Domesday Book (1086) Odo had sub-infeudated his holdings both on Denge Marsh and in the borough of Romney to Robert of Romney, who was apparently an important Anglo-Norman layman. Robert’s holdings on [pg56]

[fg]jpg|Fig. 2 The development of the Dungeness foreland in c.1400. It shows Lydd and the Wainway which flowed into the shared anchorage of Rye and New Winchelsea via the Camber which lay to the south of the Rother estuary between Rye and Winchelsea (after Long et al. 2007).|Image[/fg]

Denge Marsh were small but in Romney he was lord of 50 burgesses out of a total of 156 burgesses there.[fn5]

On Denge Marsh Robert held two half-sulungs, sulungs being a Kentish unit of land measurement, nominally 160 or 200 acres. These two sulungs were apparently distinct, and indeed the Domesday entry for Robert’s Romney burgesses separated them.[fn6] In the first entry there was land (in the lord’s demesne) for two ploughs, and eleven villeins together with two smallholders had three ploughs (a plough [pg57]was the taxable amount of land that could be ploughed by a team of eight oxen). There was a fishery valued at 2s. In the second sulung there was again land for two ploughs, of which half a plough was in the demesne. Fifteen villeins together with two smallholders had three and a half ploughs. It was valued at 30s. before the Conquest, when it had been held by six freemen, and in 1086 it was valued at 40s. The tenants of Denge Marsh lived by fishing and/or farming, overseas or coastal trade (Barber et al. 2008, 22-24). The Nesse was the location of seasonal fishing settlements, or cabins), of men of Lydd. These are documented in 1356-57 but probably existed earlier with shipping using the lee, that is the eastern side of Dungeness as early as the eleventh century (Gardiner 1996, 18-20). Denge Marsh was also an important location of watches and defence in wartime by its inhabitants, and there was concern that any socio-economic changes reducing the population of the area could undermine this effort this. The actions of one Andrew Bate of Lydd cause particular concern. The town’s chamberlains’ accounts claimed that in the 1460s Bate ‘wasted and put away from Dengemarsh seventy households and [there were] not eight men left to defend against the King’s enemies’. Bate was a butcher and this clearance of Denge Marsh was likely part of the conversion from arable cultivation to pasture which took place at the time in this area (Finn 1911, xvi, xxx-xxi, 323; Dimmock 2001; Draper 1998).[fn7]

[fg]png|Fig. 3 The description of Romney Marsh, Walland Marsh, Denge Marsh, and Guldeford Marsh by Matthew Poker (1617). DENGE MARSH WATERINGE is shown on a green area on the left-hand side below the town of Lydd, and Dungeness itself between the Wateringe and The Sea. Dungeness is not named but its ‘Cabons’, that is fishermen’s cabins, are depicted at the lower edge, at the end of a road running approximately south from Lydd. Courtesy of Kent History and Library Centre, U1823/13/P1.|Image[/fg][pg58][pg59]

[fg]jpg|Fig. 3a The Cabons [cabins] on Dungeness shown on an extract from Poker’s map. Courtesy of Kent History and Library Centre, U1823/13/P1.|Image[/fg][pg60]

Many ‘Westrenmen’ that is, fishermen from the West Country, came to fish and dry their fish at the Nesse, revealing the types and relative values of the fish they caught. Fishermen from both localities were familiar with each other as they all followed the shoals around the coast, and also some committed acts of piracy together (Draper and Meddens 2009, fig. 17, 24; Draper 2009, 50, 55-56).[fn8] The Western men were firmly treated by the Dungeness fishers and Lydd town regarding giving an account of what fish they had dried; in an example from 1465-66 they were ‘dystreynned by[t]here bodyis’ (distrained by their bodies) to do so. They had to pay 4d. for every thousand of whiting dried, and 2d. for every hundred of ling, cod, and conger. The Westrenmen also had to make a contribution of 4d. out of every 20s. worth of fish they sold ‘to the town’s common profit’.[fn9] In 1571 the bailiff and jurats of Lydd established by ordinance a company or fellowship of fishermen, the owners of ‘cabons’ at the Nesse or Masters of the Stade there, doing so in accordance with the Ports’ royal charters and custom. They laid down 29 rules for the company.[fn10] A map of 1617 by Matthew Poker shows the physical and artificial features of the landscape between Hythe, Appledore and Rye, thus including Lydd and Dungeness and the fishing cabins there (Figs 3 and 3a).[fn11]

Lydd, its economy, and its ship service

Lydd was a settlement which developed between the late eighth and tenth centuries and may have served as some kind of marketing centre for the fishing and agriculture of the area around (Draper 2016, 88-9; Brooks 1988, 98-99). Reclamation of the marsh around Lydd took place from the late eleventh century (Barber et al., 280) and a settled population is represented by the number of parish churches evidenced in the wider locality (Fig. 4). Lydd had a market grant in 1154, became a corporate member of New Romney and always claimed urban status, not least by its fine two- sided seal which shows both a ship and the church. A grant of Edward II (1307-26) gave the ‘barons’ (leading townsmen) of Lydd and Dengemarsh the same liberties and privileges as those of New Romney and the other Cinque Ports (Barber et al. 2008, 28, n.84). Lydd was a growing town from the early thirteenth century with an economy based on both farming and fishing. It flourished until the later sixteenth century, when depopulation and the effects of a capitalist conversion from mixed farming to livestock for export had serious effects (Sweetinburgh 2009, 155-58; Draper 1998, 116-22).

Lydd was a member or ‘limb’ of New Romney, one of the five Head Ports of the Cinque Ports confederation (Fig. 5). The Cinque Ports provided ship service for the monarch in return for early urban privileges, together with other members of the confederation, that is their limbs or members, which were smaller ports usually nearby (Draper 2016, 69-72, 76-89). The Ancient Towns of Rye and Winchelsea (both in Sussex) which lay to the west of Lydd and Dungeness were also part of the Cinque Ports confederation (Fig. 5). The ship service required of the Cinque Ports confederation can be summarised as a total of fifty-seven ships for a fortnight a year. The ships had twenty mariners and a steersman. These were too small to be warships and may have been used for scouting in the Channel or to transport perhaps sixty soldiers and their horses (Murray 1935, 12-13, appendix I; Rodger 1998, 25, 124; Rodger 1996, 644; Draper and Meddens 2009, 13-14, 37-40).[pg61][pg62]

[fg]jpg|Fig. 4 Settlements of the eleventh century evidenced from Domesday, church architecture and archaeology, superimposed on a palaeogeographic reconstruction of Romney Marsh and Dungeness Foreland c.ad 700-800 (after Long et al. 2007).|Image[/fg]

Together with Denge Marsh, Lydd provided one ship towards the Cinque Port ship service of New Romney’s five ships. It also paid one penny out of every five pence which New Romney spent on its Cinque Port obligation to pay the wages/expenses of sending its MP to Parliament, a substantial amount in the fifteenth century (Finn 1911, xvii, 160, 260).

Lydd was summoned to provide its ship service when a large English force of 10,000 men was raised in 1436 to relieve the siege of the castle of Guînes, Pas- de-Calais. Lydd received a letter from the common clerk of New Romney ‘for the rescue of the castle’ and it paid ‘9d. for a dinner for one man crossing the Ness to proclaim that letter to the fishermen there’. In view of the large force, with many needing to be transported, it is likely more than one vessel from Lydd was required. However, Lydd paid 5s. to one of its townsmen to ride to the Lieutenant of Dover, the deputy of the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, ‘to excuse the town of Lydd from that voyage’ (Finn 1911, 69-70).

Lydd town was not on the coast although it was a large parish with a long coastline. Because of the changing coastline the harbour facilities at Denge Marsh which served Lydd moved over time (Coatts 2005, 15-20). In the late medieval and early modern periods, the Wainway channel formed Lydd’s harbour and probably extended from the Camber to near the northern side of the town. Access to the sea for local supplies and sailing was via the Wainway (Wagon Way), for example shingles (wooden tiles) for the repair of the church were brought in several times in the fifteenth century and again in 1524-5 (Finn 1911, 335, 339, 340, 367, 409). Later the Wainway channel was reduced in length through silting or the deposit of shingle and only used for shipping goods up the channel as far as a place called Wainway gate. The goods were then transported to Lydd by cart. By the later sixteenth century this arrangement was no longer possible (Barber et al. 2008, 27, n. 40).

[fg]jpg|Fig. 5 Map of Cinque Ports, Ancient Towns and their limbs or members (from Draper and Meddens 2009, with permission).|Image[/fg]

[pg63]

Vessels now entered the Wainway via the Camber (see Fig. 2). This was a major harbour, a sheltered anchorage between New Winchelsea and Rye on the west side of Dungeness. Camber is known in 1330 and was shown on a chart by Andrea Bianco in 1436. Camber, along with Sandwich, were the places where Cinque Ports fleets gathered in the fifteenth century as part of large English fleets. The anchorage was actively in use in wartime - for example in 1423 when vessels from Southampton, Dorset, Devon, and Cornwall were ordered to be assembled there. It became increasingly silted in the early sixteenth century with fresh and salt marsh in parts of it, although large ships could anchor in parts of a channel, still called the Camber, in c.1572 and sail towards Rye, passing the end of the Wainway. A defensive tower built on a spit of shingle in the Camber in c.1500 became the site of Henry VIII’s Camber castle (Draper 2009, 37-40).

Piracy and wrecking on coast of Denge Marsh

Piracy and the deliberate wrecking of ships were a feature of the southern Cinque Ports, especially in wartime, and those around Romney and Rye are well documented and published. One example is given here from the period of the hugely valuable import of Gascon wine to Winchelsea, because it specifically mentions the coast of Denge Marsh which is relatively unusual - usually the home ports of the pirates or wreckers are named. Laurence de Seynt Jak was master of the ship called Our Lady of Fount Arabye and made a petition to Edward II and his council in c.1315. Seynt Jak stated that he and his fellows, merchants of Gascony, were on their way to Gascony carrying goods of the value of £2,200, encountered a storm and were wrecked upon the coast of Denge Marsh. Then men of Winchelsea, Rye and Romney came and by force and arms stole their goods. In response, the attorney of the merchants, one Bernard Franssa, purchased a writ of Edward II to Robert de Kendal, constable of Dover Castle and keeper of the Cinque Ports, to enquire about this, but Kendal was unable to do so as the men of the Ports disputed his right to do so. The merchants requested that the king and his council give evidence whether the king and his ministers had the authority with a warrant to enquire of such malefactors, and order that the merchants have their goods restored, and whether the men of the Cinque Ports were able to be inquisitors of the trespasses that they themselves had made. This was Seynt Jak’s second attempt to get justice, and Robert de Kendal was ordered to see it rapidly done.[fn12] Piracy against Flemish shipping in the Channel continued to be rife until the end of the fourteenth century, with the pirates taking advantage of political and trade disputes between France, England, and Flanders, and continued beyond (Barron 1995, 4-6, 20). It is important to note that Denge Marsh and Denge Nesse were part of the Cinque Port confederation as a part of the town of Lydd. All members of the confederation, and all manors in the locality, jealously guarded the right of wreck within their jurisdictions or liberties. These jurisdictions were well known by the thirteenth century by oral tradition, by charters, by perambulations and in the case of New Romney by a map of 1683 (Draper and Meddens 2009, 4, fig. 22, 34).[fn13][pg64]

In 1462 the major and aggressive lessee of Denge Marsh, Andrew Bate, caused bounds to be recorded as noted in the Lydd chamberlains’ accounts.[fn14] Bate tried to encroach on Town lands from the lands he leased on Dungeness, that is the Ripe between Lydd and the seashore, and thus caused the definition of the bounds to be made. The town ‘paid for our bounds upon the Ripe, 10s’, which was a large amount (Finn 1911, 35, also 275, 279, 283). Bate also put heavy tolls on the Westernmen (that is fishermen from the West Country) who came to fish at Dungeness (Finn 1911, xx-xxi). In 1467-68 one William Rolfe offered Battle Abbey more for the lease of Denge Marsh than Bate had done. Also, Rolfe offered ‘all manner of franchises and liberties to be reserved to the lord, as in wrecks, fishings, waifs, strays and the profits of the Cabons, [fishing cabins] etc’ (Finn 1911, 323). It is notable that the right to wrecks appears first, and therefore most important, in this list of manorial rights, and was to remain the property of the lord. This dispute with Lydd over the boundaries and nature of the liberty continued in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, for example Lydd recorded that early in Elizabeth I’s reign (1558-1603) ‘The Bourough [sic] of Lydd is a circuit, known by bounds and marks’, and the location and bounds of Denge Marsh were given too.[fn15] There was a dispute in the early seventeenth century as to whether a place called Orlestone formed part of New Romney or lay within Lydd’s liberties.[fn16] In 1664, a perambulation recorded the bounds of marshes called Denge Marsh, marshlands called Jenes Gutt alias Jurie Gutt, in Walland Marsh and White Kempe, and the parish of Brookland, in a tithe dispute.[fn17]

The conflicts caused by the division of powers and rights between the townsmen of Lydd, the tenants of Denge Marsh, and their manorial lords, as in the other Cinque Port towns, was also a significant factor in ensuring that boundaries were known and recorded. Lydd regarded any wreck on the coast of Denge Marsh as falling within the jurisdiction and liberty of Lydd and the customary right of its inhabitants by the Ports’ charter of 1278, although on occasion this valuable right was granted to manorial lords. Thus, documented wrecks around Dungeness must be sought in Lydd records.

Rights, customs, and profits of wreck from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries

Rights, customs, and profits of wreck were created early and were especially important when establishing and maintaining rule over the kingdom after the Conquest. Denge Marsh and its hinterland were a very significant locality at this time, surrounded by the sites of the battle of Hastings, the earliest post-Conquest Abbey (Battle Abbey, established 1067), and of some of the earliest ports/towns in England including Romney and Old Winchelsea. Indeed, Dungeness was mentioned in 1052 in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as one of the places visited by Earl Godwine when he was amassing ships in his dispute with King Edward the Confessor, and Gardiner argued that Godwine took ships from Dungeness, as he also did from the harbour of Romney (Gardiner 1996, 18, citing Hollister 1962, 120; Draper 2016, 86).

Fishing from the long stretch of coastline which was part of Denge Marsh manor (and all the coast around) helped maintain a vital food supply. Vessels carrying monarchs, their men, their households, and their valuable goods sailed to and from [pg65]the ports, particularly Romney, whose importance is measured by the fact that it was partly in the lordship of the Archbishop of Canterbury and partly that of Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, and Earl of Kent.

Wrecks were valuable since the right to their cargoes could be given along with land. The significance of Denge Marsh is demonstrated by its royal associations. Denge Marsh was originally part of the royal manor of Wye and was given to the major abbey of Battle by William I with the right of wreck (Searle 1980, 79). Disputes over wrecks, as follows, were therefore between the most important men of the kingdom and were significant in establishing common law.

The Chronicle of Battle Abbey demonstrates this happening in relation to Denge Marsh at an early period with the importance of the laws established remaining significant in the sixteenth century. The chronicle opens up the important and valuable aspects of wreck which underlay disputes and discussions of incidents over the next four centuries (at least), although some aspects were modified by royal decisions and legal cases: that there was a royal right to wreck which could be granted away; individuals and institutions understood that there was local and maritime custom relating to wreck; time was allotted by custom to the owners of a wrecked vessel to have it repaired; a wreck could be perceived to come under different jurisdictions which affected actions taken in relation to it and its contents; the definition of a legal wreck became linked to life - even that of one surviving man or animal, and there were survivors’ rights to a wreck; and lastly, and despite all this, force could be used to implement or overcome legal rights of wreck.

This is clear from the Chronicle, royal action, and the comments of a late sixteenth-century Kent lawyer. In c.1102

There happened a wreck in Dengemarsh, a member of Wye… A ship laden with royal ornaments and works, and much shattered by the waves, was cast ashore at that place; and as it could not be repaired within the time allotted by custom, the king’s collectors came to seize the vessel with its treasures for the crown. This Master Gausfrid [proc- urator of the Abbey] and his men opposed, upon which a complaint was laid before the king. But he, willing to observe the custom of the country, and cautious of doing anything that might injure his Abbey, waived his own claims, and commanded the shipwrecked commodities to be given up to the Abbey. Master Gausfrid, therefore, disposed of them as he thought best, giving the royal vestments to the servants, while he applied the rest of the cargo to the use of the Abbey’ (Lower 1851, 52-5).

Again, in c.1140 ‘a storm happened, and a vessel belonging to the port of Romney (within the jurisdiction of the archbishop of Canterbury) laden with various commodities, was wrecked upon the land of the Abbey of Battel [sic] in Denge- marsh, the crew with difficulty saving their lives… The tenants of Dengemarsh, therefore, according to maritime custom, and the royal privileges of Battel Abbey, made a forcible seizure of the wreck’ (Lower 1851, 72-75).

The Chronicle continues with account of court cases between kings, archbishop and abbot, and statements of law about the custom and profits of wreck, and reviews of edicts of Kings Stephen and Henry I (the latter’s ruling confirmed by Edward I in 1274-5). Specifically, it became law that ‘if any live thing, as a man or a dog, escape from the vessel, such vessel shall not be accounted a legal wreck’ (Lower 1851, 72-5). This meant, in brief, that rather than the lord of the soil having the [pg66]wreck, any survivors should have it. This remained relevant even in 1570 when the county historian William Lambarde noted approvingly that this remained the case. Once it was established that a wreck had occurred, the issue was who had the right to such goods as the salvors rescued or which came ashore. By the fourteenth century the right had generally been granted away by the monarch to towns including the Cinque Ports or manorial lords or acquired by the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. Over the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the Ports negotiated individual agreements with the Warden, who received either a third or half of wrecked goods. However, in 1574 the Portsmen made an agreement with the Warden that if a vessel of any of the Portsmen was wrecked, the salvors and the town concerned had full rights. In the case of vessel of a non-Portsman, the Warden took a half of the goods (Murray 1935, 125-6).

Watches in wartime

The first chamberlains’ book documented watches against the French landing at Dungeness during the last years of the Hundred Years War and later in the fifteenth century. A strict watch was kept, not only at the Nesse, for example, in 1470, but also at Goryswall and Wayesend (below). Ships were used, too, to keep the sea, and specifically against the French in the North Sea (Finn 1911, 169, 417).

Lydd possessed a gun which was dragged on planks called ‘hame slidys’ to the Nesse or the Goote (gut, that is drainage outfall) in times of feared French invasion (Finn 1911, 170). The chamberlains paid 4d. for the meat and drink of two carpenters who mended the guns on the Monday the French came on land at the Nesse in the autumn of 1429 (Finn 1911, 178). The gun was clearly fired from the shore not from a ship. The gun was a Serpentine, a common type of small cannon; gunstones and gunpowder were bought for it, for example in 1484-85, and two bags of leather for the powder (Finn 1911, xvii, 175, 315).

Other Lydd records and late sixteenth-century quarter sessions records also document such watches. For example, there was a watch dispute at Dungeness in c. 1587, and on 16 August 1599, the Lord Warden wrote to the Seven Hundreds and Lydd commanding that watch be kept at Denge Marsh to guard against the threat of invasion by a large Spanish fleet ‘which is in readiness’.[fn18] On 18 July 1597 there was a presentment of the Seven Hundreds (the civil administrative unit in which Denge Marsh lay) for failure to carry out beacon watch duties in Denge Marsh, and similarly around Easter 1600. It was recorded at that time that anciently (before/by 1403-04) men of the Seven Hundreds ‘have been accustomed to keep sea watch in time of war on the coast at Denge Marsh, with twelve men each day and night’.[fn19]

The nature of shipping around Lydd in the fifteenth century

The first Lydd chamberlains’ account book gives the best view of shipping in the area in the fifteenth century. This includes the types of vessels (usually called ships (naves), occasionally boat/navicula), their names, the number of men in them, and the number of sailors required to move vessels around, for example, to the Camber. There are also mentions of the loss of a ship and the salvage of tackle. There are records too of where a ship was obtained or hired from for Lydd’s ship’s service, [pg67]the nature of that service, how the ship was provisioned and how those who sailed it were equipped. There are thus glimpses of Lydd’s role in political, military, and royal activities. There is also an indication of the nature of a boat, as opposed to a ship, which came into Lydd, and of the fishing equipment which some fishing boats carried, and places with which Lydd ships traded. Later chamberlains’ accounts do not contain such details.[fn20] The names of the vessels are tabulated in Table 1 and discussed below.

Ship with boats bound to it bought by Lydd: in 1429-31, a ship bought by the town is first recorded in the accounts as being at Redyng (Reading Street), a shipbuilding site on the banks of the Rother, near Small Hythe, where in 1488 one of two large carracks commissioned by Henry VII was built (Draper 2021, 295). The ship bought by Lydd was later at Appledore, further down the Rother, and ultimately at the Camber. Two large payments of 35s. and 40s. (and one of 15d.) were paid to one Broker and the owners of the ship and his partners in full payment for the ship: possibly these were the shipbuilders or previous owners. A sum of £6 6s. 5d. was also recorded for the ship. Another 13d. was paid for the expenses of the shipowner when he went to Lydd ‘to have warranty for the ship’. Another 7d. was later paid to Thomas Buntyng for ‘binding the boats to the ship’ thus giving a picture of its nature. The ship was intended for the voyage of the king although this is only mentioned as an aside in the accounts when 3d. was paid for bread and beer when the jurats met to choose the men for that voyage. It was provisioned with bread, candles, casks, flesh, fish, and butter (Finn 1911, 29). The voyage was perhaps Lydd’s part in the king’s French coronation for ‘in April 1430, the royal entourage, more than 300 strong, crossed the channel with a large army; the king [aged 10] was accompanied by senior nobles, and the cost was prodigious’ (ODNB HVI).

Ship hired apparently from Winchelsea: in 1436, a journey was made to Rome for which Lydd hired a ship with a boat. The journey was made on behalf of the town by the common clerk, William Leycroft, and might have been a pilgrimage or a visit to the papal court. Leycroft set off took his journey on 6 January, apparently a rough time to sail. To cover his salary for half a year 13s. 4d. were paid. The ship went first to Romney then to the harbour, presumably the Wainway, 20d. being paid to four men [to] bring it there from Romney. Provisions were bought, apparently sufficient for one man, although presumably Leycroft would sail with other people: meat, two barrels of beer, salt, bread, butter, cheese, fish, a tablecloth, dishes, and a bowl.

Ship called the Nicholas: an entry in the accounts clearly related to ship service and giving notice of the number of sailors required in a ship records ‘Itm paid William Groce for carrying letter to the Lieutenant [of the Cinque Port Warden] of Dover for the excuse made by the Jurats for the fishermen whom he wanted to have had, 40 men, in the ship called the Nicholas, 10d’.

Stephen Howghe’s boat (navicula): in 1443 Lydd was paying for a boat for the transport of stones to repair the church, ‘Itm paid to Stephen Howghe’s boat (navicula) as far as Farley [Fairlight, on the coast to the west towards Hastings], [pg68]and for his labour, 2s. 6d. Item paid to Richard Hughelot mariner, for the same, 20d’. In 1443 stones were being obtained from various places for the repair of Lydd church, most presumably by cart, but as here some by boat, and presumably coming up the Wainway since there was ‘paid to Lawrence Lante for his work about the stone coming from Fairlight, 8d’.

TABLE 1. VESSEL DETAILS GIVEN IN LYDD’S CHAMBERLAINS’ FIFTEENTH-CENTURY ACCOUNT BOOKS

Ship of Sir Thomas Kyryell (Kyriell): this ship was to be hired by the town in 1443-44. It was lying at Winchelsea, that is close to the Camber anchorage, and two men went to it. Thomas Kyriell was paid 13s 4d for rigging it ‘for part of the gear’. Although Kyriell was a career soldier he had earlier been appointed on1 December 1436 ‘to go abroad on the king’s business’, presumably the relief of the castle of Guînes, above, to take up two ships and a vessel called ‘passager’ in the port of Wynchelse to convey him and his company, and to impress mariners to navigate them at the king’s wages’.[fn21] Kyriell was a career soldier and because of his military credentials had been appointed Lieutenant, that is, captain, of Calais in 1439-42 (Grummitt 2008, 1, 10n, 67-8). Later in life Kyriell was MP for Kent, and also Lieutenant of Sir Humphrey Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, as Constable of Dover castle and Warden of the Cinque Ports, 1456-60. As such he held the Admiralty Court, for example, at Lydd, in summer 1455 when a man was paid 4d to make a proclamation ‘at the sea-side’ about this court (Finn 1911, 167). Kyriell was executed after the battle of St Albans of 17 February 1461 which the Yorkists lost (Draper 2023, 68-92).[pg69]

Ships called the Trinity and The Ruge Cule of Brittany: in autumn 1444 Lydd hired a ship called the Trinity from Sandwich, then the most flourishing Cinque Port with a valuable import and export trade, ‘for the voyage to bring over the Lady Margaret, who will be Queen of England, into England’ (Finn 1911, 97-8). Margaret was the daughter of René, Duke of Anjou and the marriage was an attempt to promote friendship with France (ODNB Henry VI). A proxy marriage between Margaret and the Duke of Suffolk took place on 24 May 1444, at Tours, and Suffolk returned to France in November 1444 with a substantial and protracted expedition to fetch Margaret, with a splendid pageant, costing more than £5573. The actual marriage took place on 22 May 1445 at Titchfield abbey and her coronation in Westminster Abbey on 30 May 1445 (ODNB Margaret of Anjou).

The jurats of Lydd apparently changed their minds and hired the Ruge Cule instead of the Trinity. The payments relating to the Trinity and the Ruge Cule are not clearly separated or precisely dated in the accounts (Finn 1911, 94-101). In September 1444 a payment of 29s. 4d. of ‘old debt’ was made to one John Serlis at Sandwich for the Trinity which had been hired there and 36s. 8d. to Richard Hughelot, mariner, and purser of the Trinity. However, seven other entries relating to the hiring of the Trinity were crossed through in the account, presumably because they were disallowed at audit, or the chamberlains felt they could not justify paying them.

The Ruge Cule of Brittany: in the summer of 1444, apparently, men went to Appledore for the ship called the Ruge Cule of Brittany, hired instead for the voyage of Lady Margaret.[fn22] Ten pence were paid for the men’s breakfast there. Appledore was a small market town on the Rother c. 7 miles (11km) inland from New Romney, with a jetty of the thirteenth century (Burke 2004, 3). There were three payments to the owner of the Ruge Cule for either buying or hiring the ship, and including cheese for it, totalling the very large amount of £24 14s. 5d. Eight sailors and four rowers were recruited at 4d. each, and later two more rowers at same cost. The ship was equipped with more food including fresh herrings, a bullock (roasted) and bread which had been impounded by the sergeant of Dengemarsh, also three quarters of mutton, beer, flour, etc. A man was paid 14d for repairing one pipe, that is a cask for ale, cider, wine, or food. He was also paid for one day’s journey to the Camber to repair the ship, and for the making of three barrel-heads for the ship, and for four hoops, 14d., presumably also for barrels. Obviously because of its intended purpose, this was an extremely smart and well-equipped ship, which cost the town a lot. To cover part of the cost of the ship the town raised six scots (local taxes on the townspeople) which raised a total of £17 9s. 10d. They then raised a seventh scot on 30 May 1445 (Finn 1911, 95, 102). Scots were again raised in 1447-49 which various men failed to pay, including William Eden. For this the jurats took and held fishing equipment, one shotnetryge [shotnet rig], in the common house of Lydd (Finn 1911, 137). Shotnets are mentioned as nets in many Lydd wills or ‘with their apparatus’ which, as they were used as a line of nets, may be the rig. It is the lead weights that have survived, and these are what archaeologists have found on Dungeness (pers. comm. Dr Sheila Sweetinburgh).

Ship of Hull: in 1444-45 the tackle of a ship of Hull had been salvaged and all the salvors agreed to make a grant of 33s. 4d. towards the lead of the roof of the new [pg70]church tower. The tower was important to sailors since it was very tall and could therefore act as a sea-mark.

Ship of Portugal: money was paid in relation to this from the seventh scot of May 1445. Later various men were ‘paid to be at Lydd to make accords between the masters of botys [boats] of this town and the Portyngalens, 7s. 4d’ (Finn 1911, 170). These were Portuguese who in the fifteenth century carried out much trade in vessels with the South-West and other parts of England, including grain, oil, and wax, together with men of Spain, Galicia and Brittany and Almaigne [modern Germany] (Middle English Dictionary Michigan online).

‘A carrack’: a brief mention of a carrack in 1448 is as follows ‘Itm paid for the like [that is carrying up to Dover castle for the return of a letter] of a letter coming [from the Archbishop] for a carrack…20d’. There is also a mention of a proclamation for the goods of such a ship but no further details, ‘Itm paid for a cry for the goods of the kareke, 1d’.

Ships of the Earl of Warwick to be arrested: the men of the Cinque Ports always aimed to be on the right side in political struggles because of their relationship to the monarchy and the fact that attempts to overthrow the monarch usually involved the entry of the contenders into south-eastern ports (Draper and Meddens 2009, 40; Mercer 2010, 252-58). The chamberlains’ accounts have brief mentions of Lydd’s ‘weak diplomacy’ in sending men to fight the Earl of Warwick, Richard Neville, the so-called Kingmaker, but then paying troops to help King Edward IV, whose overthrow Warwick was attempting and temporarily achieved (Finn 1911, xviii). The reference to the ships of the Earl being arrested is part of this.

Ship lost at Weyhisend [Wayesend]: in 1471-2 the following was recorded without more detail, ‘Itm in expenses at my Lord Arundell his man bringing a letter for a ship lost at Weyhistend [Wayesend], 8d’. Arundell was William Fitz-Alan, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports in 1471-78 (Finn 1911, 266, 269). Weyhistend [Wayesend], a location not now known, was mapped by Philip Symonson in 1596 as lying on the coast to the south-east of the Wainway Channel and Broomhill church, which is now ruined.

Bote called the Antony: in 1472 ‘6s 8d [was] paid to Edward Alweye for his bote’, and 12d to one Gilbarde to speak with the Master of the Antony. Also noted was ‘Itm paid for one Cry [proclamation] to have men in the Antony 1d’. William Gylbarde was one of two common collectors of the scot and also common sergeant (Finn 1911, 315, 317). This payment was clearly related to ship service in some way. What is of interest is that the vessel was called a boat not a ship and therefore smaller.

Ship of Sandwich hired in 1475: a ship was hired from Sandwich for a voyage of the King, that is as part of his fleet, and moneys were paid for equipment, including sail cloth at 6d, and food etc. Twenty-one men and a boy were chosen but only nineteen men and youths were paid to serve in it by Lydd, each man 3s 5d, and the boy 2d for 15 days. This was the standard Cinque Ports service; if they had served more days [pg71]the monarch would have paid. The materials bought were loaded either at ‘the Nesse’ or the Camber. As this was a voyage to transport the King, Lydd paid for clothing, presumably for the townsmen/sailors who might encounter the King: gowns for at least two men, and ‘Jakettes’ (jackets) for an unspecified number of men, costing 36s for the cloth and 3s 10d for the making. Jakettes were stylish wear or associated with ceremony as when the Earl of Warwick came to London with 600 men in red jackets (Middle English Dictionary, from The Brut, c.1500). In July 1475 an English army crossed to France but saw no significant military action (ODNB Edward IV); Lydd must have hired this ship to take part in transporting the army. This was part of military activity which had been contemplated by Edward IV against France since 1468. He was eventually bought off by a substantial pension from Louis XI, and an agreement that Edward’s daughter should marry the Dauphin Charles.

Ship called The George: this ship was brought back from Romney in 1479-80, with few details such as ‘Itm paid in the expenses to the men of the Town of Romney, and other men of the Marsh at Lydd, at the fetching home of The George, 4s 10d’, suggesting it belonged to Lydd.

The Hayne of Lydd: this reference is in a memorandum apparently added later at the end of the accounts book: ‘the Bailiffs and Jurats agree with Robert Cokeram and Robert Alewey who own The Hayne of Lydd that it should be thoroughly prepared for service of the King [Henry VII] and begin on Monday 3 September Henry VII (1491) viz. every week’.

Overview of shipping in 16th century

In Henry VIII’s reign (1509-47), Lydd as well as New Romney and the other members of the Cinque Port confederation continued to provide shipping across the Channel for various kinds of passengers including pilgrims, merchants, alien craftsmen, soldiers and their horses (Draper 2009, 32, 49, 70).[fn23] Alien craftsmen from modern Germany, Italy, France, Spain and the Low Countries were listed in tax and other records in Sandwich, Appledore, Romney Marsh, Rye and Winchelsea between 1436 and 1538 (Draper 2009, 82-3). Lydd accounts had referred to ‘our’ aliens in an appreciative or protective manner several times in the fifteenth century.[fn24] Sir Richard Guldeforde was one of the later pre-Reformation pilgrims, crossing from Rye to Venice and onto Jerusalem in 1506 (Lutton 2009). Most of the vessels providing transport are known, or likely to have been, vessels owned by townsmen of the Ports or fishermen thereof. The size, nature, and types of vessels using the southerly members of the confederation, particularly Rye, are known, for example, seven Rye vessels were listed in 1492, ranging from a fishing boat to a carvel (Draper 2009, 38-44; Vidler 1934, 44). In the 1560s to 1580s there was strong local demand for the building of ships with, for instance, arrangements for the building or leasing of ships between Rye and London men particularly noticeable in the late 1570s and 1580s (Draper 2009, 104).

Providing shipping passages across the Channel continued in the reigns of Mary I (1553-54), Philip and Mary (1554-58), Elizabeth I (1558-1603) and James I and VI of Scotland (1603-25). Several letters to New Romney survive from the Privy Council, [pg72]Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports or his Lieutenant ordering stays of shipping or the arrests of intended voyagers from Romney or Lydd, demonstrating that their vessels were expected to be involved. In times of religious or political suspicion or war the Cinque Ports were ordered to stop all passages across the channel for a period of days, although efforts were made to keep passage open. Sometimes specific individuals were sought in the Ports such as one Francis Crayne, a young man from Plymouth, who had landed at the Nesse apparently in an attempt at secrecy.[fn25]

The focus of communications with the southerly members of the Cinque Ports confederation reflected the short channel crossings and the availability of vessels. Religious ‘strangers’, that is Walloons and Huguenots, including weaving and fishing households, arrived in Kent and Sussex Cinque Ports from 1562 from the Low Countries and France, often from Dieppe to Rye. They were probably fetched and carried in local vessels, including those used for fishing. Men from both communities were involved in piracy on Spanish vessels in the Channel in the early 1570s (Backhouse 1995, 36; Draper 2009, 163). Between the 1540s and 1590s Rye became the major southern-eastern port, far surpassing Lydd, and contributed vessels to general warfare and privateering with royal encouragement (Draper 2009 134-136, 168). However, these vessels were probably relatively small in contrast to the ships of the 1590s onwards which were seized by English privateers including in the Channel. These ships were carrying Brazilian sugar produced by enslaved people, and particularly during the Anglo-Spanish war of 1585-1604 (Davies and Finnegan 2023).[fn26] Various entries in the Calendar of State Papers confirm this change in the nature of shipping and the import trade early in Charles I’s reign. The entries largely concern import of Brazilian sugar from Brazil or goods from the East Indies. A sailing ship, ‘a wrack of sugar’, was apparently wrecked at Broomhill, west of Lydd, in c.1590; also, in 1563 a London-based sailing ship had run ashore near the Camber.[fn27]

State papers from the reigns of Henry VIII to James I contain numerous references to disputes over right of wreck, with two specifically related to Lydd. The first of February 1534, relates how the goods of a ship of 100 or 120 tuns burden called La barge de Croisset, wrecked near the Camber, had ended up in the hands of the bailiffs of Lydd and Winchelsea and men of Rye. All these men refused to return the goods to the crew saying they were for the Lord Warden who would answer for them, one of the crew having already been killed and others wounded by Englishmen. Croisset was a hamlet on the Seine near Rouen, Normandy and the ship was laden with corn, Rouen cloth and more. Two factors of the two owners petitioned Henry VIII to order the Lord Warden to restore their merchandise on them paying a reasonable sum for salvage.[fn28] This wreck of 1534 was too early to be identified with the Dungeness wreck.

The second reference, from November 1619, asked ‘whether the right to some bars of silver, taken up from a wreck ... that if the Judges think it unlawful, the counsel of the town of Lydd may be heard’ (Calendar of State Papers Domestic: James I, 1619-23, volume 111).

Other specific wrecks

Some other possibilities for the identity of the Tudor shipwreck were identified [pg73]among the records examined for this article, with perhaps the first most likely, if any.

A short letter dated 4 November 1570 from Lord Cobham, Warden of Cinque Ports, to the Jurats of Lydd, has survived.[fn29] It has the message that the bearers have come to claim part of the goods wrecked at the Nesse. There are no further details of the ship itself. The bearers were carrying bills of lading, thus the Warden would have known what goods the wrecked ship had carried, having consigned the goods to the vessel himself; else he knew who consigned the goods and was requiring their return as Admiral of the Ports.[fn30] Even in the fifteenth century loading lists, that is bills of lading, had been used in Admiralty inquisitions and courts in the Ports, which were held by the Warden, as evidence of ownership in deciding rights in relation to salvaged goods (Murray 1935, 126).

There are several records of the Lord Warden making agreements with the jurats of Lydd that he would receive one-third of wrecked goods. For example, in 1560 the Brotherhood (a Cinque Port confederation court) noted that ‘the Lord Warden shall enjoy the third part of all wrecks and findals saving that ‘Wee shalbe free of Wreck of oure owne Goodes’ (Hull 1966, 281-82).[fn31] Thus the Portsmen were clear that this one-third entitlement applied only to the wrecks of ships which did not belong to men of the Ports. If Lord Warden Cobham was claiming right of wreck of 1570 as Warden, or on behalf of the owner of the consigned goods, the ship must have belonged to non-Portsmen or even possibly to the Warden himself.

The ship Pelican of Pomra (the Pomeranian part of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany) looked like a possibility for identification with the Tudor shipwreck. There survives a letter from Lord Henry Cobham, Lord Warden, of 21 October 1600 requiring a certificate of furniture and goods taken up from the Pelican of Stralsounde in Pomerlande which was cast upon the beach near Lydd on 14 October [1600], and a draft reply. There were also depositions concerning goods salvaged from the Pelican.[fn32] However further investigations showed it was wrecked not off Lydd but in the bay of Romney (Draper and Meddens 2009, 34, fig.22) and furthermore that before its crew went home it was stated that the Pelican ‘is now mended’.[fn33]

Conclusions

The Dungeness shipwreck has stimulated the interpretation of the history and development of shipbuilding, and of trade and commerce in the Cinque Ports of Romney Marsh and their connections with the world beyond. These have already been studied for the Head Port of New Romney and the Ancient Towns of Rye and Winchelsea, and this latest study of Lydd and Dungeness provides a useful comparison. The chamberlains’ accounts give a view of ships, boats and provisioning and sailors. Dungeness proved to be one of the worst places for wrecks along the south-eastern coast of Kent although occasionally wrecks took place at other coastal locations, notably in the bay of Romney. Neither Lydd records nor others contain formal comprehensive lists of wrecks but rather incidental scattered mentions. Nevertheless, a picture can be built up of their occurrence and of salvage, and they give suggestions as to the possible identity of the Dungeness wreck.[pg74]

Bibliography

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Notes

[fn]1|https://www.cemexuknews.co.uk/future-in-action/remains-of-old-ship-found-at-denge-quarry/ [accessed 08.08.2023].[/fn]

[fn]2|Series 10.1, Roman Towns and Tudor Shipwrecks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeness_Tudor_ship [accessed 08.08.2023].[/fn]

[fn]3|As the Denge Quarry Shipwreck Timbers Assessment Archaeological Context August 2022, 1.4.1, 1.4.8, showed from the work of Long et al. 2006.[/fn]

[fn]4|Denge Quarry Shipwreck Timbers Assessment Archaeological Context, 1.3.8, 1.3.12, drawing on Roberts and Plater (2005), Plater et al. (2009).[/fn]

[fn]5|Domesday Book: Kent, 2, 25, 43; 5, 177, 178, 179, Morris and Morgan (1976) discussed in Draper 2016, 84-87, n.85. DB also has an entry for Ripe (above), part of the lands of the Canons of St Martins, Dover. This states only that the 100 acres there ‘meet their tax where they did before 1066’. Adjacent entries state that Robert of Romney also was involved in holding property locally from the Canons including a fishery and salt-house, Domesday Book: Kent, pp. 17, 19, 20.[pg76][/fn]

[fn]6|Domesday Book: Kent, 5, 177, 178, 179, Morris and Morgan (1976).[/fn]

[fn]7|Kent History and Library Centre [KHLC], Maidstone, Ly 2/1/1 (14428-84) printed by Finn (1911).[/fn]

[fn]8|Both available on https://canterbury.academia.edu/GillianDraper.[/fn]

[fn]9|HMC Fifth Report, 526.[/fn]

[fn]10|KHLC Ly 15/3/5.[/fn]

[fn]11|The description of Romney Marsh Walland Marsh Denge Marsh & Guldeford Marsh ... By Math. Poker, 1617. Rep, 1845 by James Cole, East Sussex and Brighton and Hove Record Office, RYE/132/13. Part reproduced in Barber et al. 2008, fig. 3, foll. 318.[/fn]

[fn]12|TNA SC 8/2/99.[/fn]

[fn]13|The liberty of Winchelsea clearly defined its separation from that of Rye in a charter of 1247, Draper 2009, 25, fig.2.5, 41.[/fn]

[fn]14|The catalogue of New Romney records does not mention any wrecks.[/fn]

[fn]15|HMC Fifth Report, 531.[/fn]

[fn]16|KHLC Ly 4/7/3/2,3 (1609x1620).[/fn]

[fn]17|TNA E 134/16Chas2/Mich39.[/fn]

[fn]18|KHLC Ly 4/4/8.[/fn]

[fn]19|KHLC QM/SI/1597/12/3; Q/SR1 Easter 1600 No. 7.[/fn]

[fn]20|KHLC Ly 2/1/2-8. The most detailed catalogue of the Cinque Ports records, of which Lydd’s are very extensive, is in paper in the Appendix of their catalogues at KHLC. Class marks of these records have been updated in recent years but the Appendix contains a guide to this.[/fn]

[fn]21|Calendar of Patent Rolls 1436-41, 15 HVI, 85.[/fn]

[fn]22|KHLC Q/SR/1/m.4d.[/fn]

[fn]23|For example, KHLC NR CPW/166.[/fn]

[fn]24|KHLC Ly 2/1/1.[/fn]

[fn]25|KHLC NR CPW/167-190 (catalogue).[/fn]

[fn]26|https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/early-sugar-consumption-in-england/ [/fn]

[fn]27|http://rmrt.org.uk/category/publications/gazetteer/)[accessed 19.08.2023].[/fn]

[fn]28|‘Henry VIII: February 1534, 21-25’, in Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, Volume 7, 1534, ed. James Gairdner (London, 1883), pp. 85-91. British History Online http://www. british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol7/pp85-91 [accessed 23 July 2023].[/fn]

[fn]29|KHLC Ly/4/4/1. The Warden was William Brooke, 10th Baron Cobham 1558-97.[/fn]

[fn]30|A bill of lading was an official detailed receipt given by the master of a merchant vessel to the person consigning the goods, by which he makes himself responsible for their safe delivery to the consignee (OED).[/fn]

[fn]31|Findals were goods found in the liberty of each town, whether on sea or land (Hull 1966, 194).[/fn]

[fn]32|KHLC NR/CPl/44/1, 2.[/fn]

[fn]33|KHLC NR/ JW/ 123/ 2.[/fn][pg77]