Part 37 (1/2)
[Ill.u.s.tration: _Pevensey Castle._]
Pevensey, which is now divided from the channel by marshy fields with nothing to break the flatness but Martello towers (thirteen may be counted from the walls), was, like Bramber Castle in the west, now also an inland stronghold, once washed and surrounded by the sea. The sea probably covered all the ground as far inland as Hailsham--Pevensey, Horseye, Rickney and the other ”eyes” on the level, being then islands, as their termination suggests.
There is now no doubt but that Pevensey was the Anderida of the Romans, a city on the borders of the great forest of Anderida that covered the Weald of Suss.e.x--Andreas Weald as it was called by the Saxons. But before the Romans a British stronghold existed here. This, after the Romans left, was attacked by the Saxons, who slew every Briton that they found therein. The Saxons in their turn being discomfited, the Normans built a new castle within the old walls, with Robert de Moreton, half brother of the Conqueror, for its lord. Thus the castle as it now stands is in its outer walls Roman, in its inner, Norman.
[Sidenote: WILLIAM'S LANDING]
Unlike certain other Suss.e.x fortresses, Pevensey has seen work. Of its Roman career we know nothing, except that the inhabitants seem to have dropped a large number of coins, many of which have been dug up. The Saxons, as we have seen, ma.s.sacred the Britons at Anderida very thoroughly. Later, in 1042, Swane, son of Earl G.o.dwin, swooped on Pevensey's port in the Danish manner and carried off a number of s.h.i.+ps.
In 1049 Earl G.o.dwin, and another son, Harold, made a second foray, carried off more s.h.i.+ps, and fired the town. On September 28, 1066, Pevensey saw a more momentous landing, destined to be fatal to this marauding Harold; for on that day William, Duke of Normandy, soon to become William the Conqueror, alighted from his vessel, accompanied by several hundred Frenchmen in black chain armour. A representation of the landing is one of the designs in the Bayeux tapestry. The embroiderers take no count of William's fall as he stepped ash.o.r.e, on ground now grazed upon by cattle, an accident deemed unlucky until his ready wit explained, as he rose with sanded fingers, ”See, I have seized the land with my hands.”
Pevensey's later history included sieges by William Rufus in 1088, when Odo, Bishop of Bayeux, supporter of Robert, was the defender; by Stephen in 1144, the fortress being held by Maude, who gave in eventually to famine; by Simon de Montfort and the Barons in 1265; and by the supporters of Richard of York in 1399, when Lady Pelham defended it for the Rose of Lancaster. A little later Edmund, Duke of York, was imprisoned in it, and was so satisfied with his gaoler that he bequeathed him __20. Queen Joan of Navarre, wife of Henry IV., was also a prisoner here for nine years. In the year before the Armada, Pevensey Castle was ordered to be either rebuilt as a fortress or razed to the ground; but fortunately neither instruction was carried out.
The present owner of Pevensey Castle is the Duke of Devons.h.i.+re, who by virtue of the possession is ent.i.tled to call himself Dominus Aquilae, or Lord of the Eagle.
[Sidenote: LETTER-WRITING]
Pevensey has another and gentler claim to notice. Many essayists have said pleasant and ingenious things about the art of letter-writing; but none of them mentions the part played by Pevensey in the English development of that agreeable accomplishment. Yet the earliest specimen of English letter-writing that exists was penned in Pevensey Castle. The writer was Joan Crownall, Lady Pelham, wife of Sir John Pelham, who, as I have said, defended the castle, in her Lord's absence, against the Yorkists, and this is the letter, penned (I write in 1903) five hundred and four years ago. (It has no postscript.)
My dear Lord,--I recommend me to your high Lords.h.i.+p, with heart and body and all my poor might. And with all this I thank you as my dear Lord, dearest and best beloved of all earthly lords. I say for me, and thank you, my dear Lord, with all this that I said before of [for] your comfortable letter that you sent me from Pontefract, that came to me on Mary Magdalen's day: for by my troth I was never so glad as when I heard by your letter that ye were strong enough with the grace of G.o.d for to keep you from the malice of your enemies. And, dear Lord, if it like to your high Lords.h.i.+p that as soon as ye might that I might hear of your gracious speed, which G.o.d Almighty continue and increase. And, my dear Lord, if it like you to know _my_ fare, I am here laid by in manner of a siege with the county of Suss.e.x, Surrey, and a great parcel of Kent, so that I may not [go] out nor no victuals get me, but with much hard.
Wherefore, my dear, if it like you by the advice of your wise counsel for to set remedy of the salvation of your Castle and withstand the malice of the s.h.i.+res aforesaid. And also that ye be fully informed of the great malice-workers in these s.h.i.+res which have so despitefully wrought to you, and to your Castle, to your men and to your tenants; for this country have they wasted for a great while.
”Farewell, my dear Lord! the Holy Trinity keep you from your enemies, and soon send me good tidings of you. Written at Pevensey, in the Castle, on St. Jacob's day last past.
”By your own poor ”J. PELHAM.”
”To my true Lord.”
[Sidenote: ANDREW BORDE AGAIN]
In the town of Pevensey once lived Andrew Borde (who entered this world at Cuckfield): a thorn in the side of munic.i.p.al dignity. The Dogberryish dictum ”I am still but a man, although Mayor of Pevensey,” remains a local joke, and tradition has kept alive the prowess of the Pevensey jury which brought a verdict of manslaughter against one who was charged with stealing breeches; both jokes of Andrew's. Borde's house, whither, it is said, Edward VI. once came on a visit to the jester, still stands.
The oak room in which Andrew welcomed the youthful king is shown at a cost of threepence per head, and you may buy pictorial postcards and German wooden toys in the wit's front parlour.
Before leaving Pevensey I must say a word of Westham, the village which adjoins it. Westham and Pevensey are practically one, the castle intervening. Westham has a vicar whose interest in his office might well be imitated by some of the other vicars of the county. His n.o.ble church, one of the finest in Suss.e.x, with a tower of superb strength and dignity, is kept open, and just within is a table on which are a number of copies of a little penny history of Westham which he has prepared, and for the payment of which he is so eccentric as to trust to the stranger's honesty.
The tower, which the vicar tells us is six hundred years old, he asks us to admire for its ”utter carelessness and scorn of smoothness and finish, or any of the tricks of modern buildings.” Westham church was one of the first that the Conqueror built, and remains of the original Norman structure are still serviceable. The vicar suggests that it may very possibly have stood a siege. In the jamb of the south door of the Norman wall is a sundial, without which, one might say, no church is completely perfect. In the tower dwell unmolested a colony of owls, six of whom once attended a ”reading-in” service and, seated side by side on a beam, listened with unwavering attention to the Thirty-Nine Articles.
They were absent on my visit, but a small starling, swift and elusive as a spirit, flitted hither and thither quite happily.
[Ill.u.s.tration: _Westham._]
[Sidenote: ALES CRESSEL]
In the churchyard is the grave of one Ales Cressel (oddest of names), and among the epitaphs is this upon a Mr. Henty:--
Learn from this mistic sage to live or die.
Well did he love at evening's social hour The Sacred Volume's treasure to apply.