VISITORS HISTORIC BRITAIN
WEST SUSSEX
STONE AGE TO COLD WAR
VISITORS HISTORIC BRITAIN
WEST SUSSEX
STONE AGE TO COLD WAR
KEVIN NEWMAN
First published in Great Britain in 2018 by
Pen & Sword History
An imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd
Yorkshire Philadelphia
Copyright Kevin Newman, 2018
ISBN 978 1 52670 333 0
eISBN 978 1 52670 335 4
Mobi ISBN 978 1 52670 334 7
The right of Kevin Newman to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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To Laura with love.
Told you Id dedicate a book to you alone eventually. X
Heading west to Washington, north of the Downs
Sussex, when all was said and done, was not like other counties .
Flora Poste in Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons
Acknowledgements
Ive got a huge number of people to thank who have helped me with Visitors Historic Sussex, but thanks to Roni at P&S who originally commissioned the Visitors Historic series and gave me huge help and patience when the deadline went whooshing by (as Douglas Adams said). Especial thanks to Amy at P&S who has done such a staggeringly brilliant job on the books production. Other P&S people who the book wouldnt have happened without are Felicity and Emily. Thanks to Lee and Andy for their help with the Churchill Tank on Kithurst Hill and to Antony Edmonds for the Towers postcard. Speaking of The Towers, many thanks to Sister Mary Andrew for her time and diligence in vastly improving the section on the Convent and school. My gratitude to Clare Trelfa, Headmistress at The Towers also for her support. Thank you to Richard Martin at Parham House for his unique insights into the house, its collection and inhabitants and Martin Hayes at West Sussex Library Service for his advice on the the First World War chapter. Many thanks also to Ross McLaughlin at the Dome who provided further information on the wonderful Worthing building and eternal thanks to Laura, Seth and Ed for their patience whilst I was ignoring them and writing this.
Kevin Newman is a Brighton-born author, historian, tour guide around the city and history teacher. He has co-written history textbooks for Oxford University Press, educational film scripts and the Brilliant Brighton and Super Sussex supplements for the Argus newspaper. He has written Brighton and Hove In 50 Buildings , Secret Brighton , 50 Gems of Sussex and Lewes Pubs . His next book with Pen and Sword is Visitors Historic Britain: East Sussex . Following that, his subsequent work will be historical fiction about an 11-year-old boy who set up his own school in 1925. Kevin lives in West Sussex.
Introduction
Sussex is a wonderful place for visitors, whether you are visiting from elsewhere or a Sussex resident who wants to get out and about and visit lesser-known parts of their county. We start in this book with West Sussex, and the volume on East Sussex (including the separate Brighton and Hove) will follow shortly. Sussex is known primarily for the Norman Conquest and of course the misleadingly named Battle of Hastings, but there are numerous places to explore long before and in the millennium since that monumental event. Sussex is the place where the remains of the oldest human ever in Britain were discovered, and has places where dinosaurs, rhinos, bears and bison once roamed. Folk in Sussex were mining over 20ft down, a major achievement for Neolithic times nearly a millennium before Stonehenge was built. It has the site of Britains oldest ever discovered bronze sword in Racton, which you can now see in The Novium Museum in Chichester. Sussex has a Roman kings palace, the biggest example of a non-military building outside of Italy, rare Saxon churches, military establishments founded by King Alfred, Norman castles and the only original cathedral in the country visible from the sea. Sussex boasts medieval masterpieces, stately Tudor houses, gorgeous Georgian architecture, sea bathing settlements, glorious Victorian churches and reminders of its sometimes-vital role in both the World Wars and the Cold War. It has battlefields, lost harbours, springs and river courses. On rare occasions we even have canals and castles built as hunting lodges. As Dr Samuel Johnson said to Boswell during his visit to Cowdray House before its calamitous fire, I should like to stay here four-and-twenty hours. We see here how our ancestors lived. If you think you might agree with Johnson, read on and who knowsyou might even end up staying longer!
The Visitors Historic Britain series is an attempt to produce a literate but not overly academic guide to the different counties of the British Isles, that may or may not still be a United Kingdom by the time the series is complete! It attempts to create a modern interpretation of the guides to Sussex of the early to mid-twentieth century by writers such as E.V. Lucas and F.R. Banks who wrote Penguins guide to the county. In this light we assume you might like to switch your GPS or satnav off and use directions from someone who knows each county well. This will take you along perhaps longer, but more scenic routes. Written directions here are under the Sussex without satnav heading.
Cowdray House
Lucas and Banks (Penguin) were writers of their time and so the updated Lucas of 1950 or the Penguin guide were writing about the days when motoring was in its post-war infancy compared with today, and this guide reflects the needs of the twenty-first century traveller. Due to the movement needed across the county backwards and forwards and often across some distance to visit sites mentioned in chronological order, the directions are aimed at the motorist. We also mention where a site or nearby sites contain worthy visiting places of different eras, such as Bignor Roman Villa and the Neolithic Barkhale causewayed camp, up the hill from Bignor. Generally, a site is mentioned under the era it has a most interesting tale from, or when it was at its most significant, but then sometimes places with a long lifespan, such as Chichester sites can pop up several times. Generally all the sites we mention are open to the public, and well endeavour to get it right in any future reprints.
