Review: The Honour and Safety of the Realm: The Elizabethan and later harbour works at Dover Western Docks, Kent

The Honour and Safety of the Realm: The Elizabethan and later harbour works at Dover Western Docks, Kent. By Andrew Margetts, Giles Dawkes, Alice Dowsett and Damian Goodburn (Portslade: SpoilHeap Publications, 2024), 135pp., 98 illustrations, 16 tables. £25. ISBN 978 1 912331 38 3.

This slim but well-illustrated report constitutes the twenty-ninth volume of the SpoilHeap Monograph series produced by Archaeology South-East and details an important excavation project undertaken by ASE in Dover’s historic Western Docks between 2015 and 2018. From the photographs and field evidence presented it is readily apparent that the work was archaeologically challenging and in terms of site methodology, considerably far removed from any standard, dry land excavation. The field team must be congratulated on their achievements under such difficult conditions.

A range of archaeological and geoarchaeological investigations were conducted on behalf of Dover Harbour Board over a period of years, occasioned by the planned construction of a new navigation channel to be cut through the existing Promenade to connect Wellington Dock with the Outer Harbour. Such major excavations provided a rare and exciting opportunity to examine deeply buried and normally inaccessible harbour structures and deposits. The present monograph describes the results of this work, skilfully integrating the excavation evidence with palaeoenvironmental data and surviving cartographic and documentary information, to produce an important account of the evolution of Dover’s inner harbour during the post-medieval and modern periods. Selected illustrations from a dozen of Dover’s impressive collection of historic harbour maps and plans, dating to between the sixteenth- and nineteenth century, supplement the text and illustrate the extent of a number of structures traced in the excavations. Consideration of the available documentary evidence compliments and extends previous work by Biddle and Summerson, largely concerned with failed harbour works of earlier sixteenth century date further to the south-west. Geoarchaeological input from Martin Bates helps tie recorded sediments into the broader sequence of coastal evolution at Dover: two Pleistocene mammoth teeth are of some interest but must be derived from earlier, destroyed prehistoric deposits.

Remains encountered on site included sediments probably dating to the medieval period, high medieval to post-medieval mudflats and part of the nationally important Elizabethan harbour works attributed to Thomas Digges. Later structures included piling works designed by the famous military engineer Bernard de Gomme, an 18th-century timber groyne, evidence of the 19th- and 20th-century promenade with housing and dockyards, as well as features related to World War II. Of special interest was the section recorded through the ‘long wall of the Pent’, planned by Thomas Digges and built in 1583 by men from Romney Marsh under the supervision [pg379]of Richard Barrie, Lieutenant of Dover Castle. This substantial harbour installation is well known from contemporary records but has never previously been examined archaeologically. Ground investigation established that the wall here consisted of a 2m high embankment of compacted chalk, clay and shingle, strengthened by wattlework.

Dating of the recorded remains has been supported by a series of helpful chronometric dates obtained from radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence and dendrochronology, allowing structures discovered in the ground to be closely equated with recorded historic harbour works. Finds of cultural material from the excavations were relatively sparse but small collections of pottery, clay tobacco pipe and decorated delftware wall tiles are illustrated, supplementing the relatively limited quantity of post-medieval finds previously published from Dover.

Overall, this volume provides a valuable contribution towards the history and archaeology of Dover Harbour – a subject presently somewhat under-researched and for which there remains vast scope for further study. In terms of fieldwork, however, there are unlikely to be many future opportunities to undertake significant excavations at such great depths into the harbour deposits exposed by this project. The present report is thus likely to stand as a key study for many years to come, its value quite possibly being enhanced as and when any future archaeological work provides further contextual details concerning development of the early harbour.