Reviews

REVIEWS Kent Hearth Tax Assessment Lady Day 1664. Edited by Duncan Harrington; with Introduction by Sarah Pearson, and computer editing by Susan Rose. 15.5 x 25.3cm, cxii + 687 pp.; 6 plates, 13 maps, 5 tables, l figure. British Records Series Volume 116, Kent Records Series Volume xxrx, Kent Archaeological Society, Maidstone, 2000. Cased, members £32.50, non-members £40.00. ISBN O 906746 45 0. This long, scholarly and well-produced volume is the second of the series of Hearth Tax volumes being published by the Roehampton Hearth Tax Centre and the British Records Society with county record societies. It provides an edition of one of the most important manuscripts relating to the economic and social history of seventeenth- century Kent. The text throws light on population size and distribution, the spread of wealth and size of houses. It is also a mine of information for the family historian. The choice of contributors is apt. Harrington is an authority on the Kent Hearth Taxes, his work including the recent Hearth Tax Returns for Faversham Hundred 1662-1674 (as joint editor). Sarah Pearson, an expert on the history of English vernacular building, is the author of The Medieval Houses of Kent: an Historical Analysis. Throughout the duration of the Hearth Tax between 1662 and 1689 it was a principal national levy. It was raised on the number of hearths occupied by each household in every parish or borough; one shilling was charged twice yearly on each hearth, paid by the head of the household to local collectors. Working hearths such as kitchen ovens and furnaces, brewhouses and bakehouses were not taxed. Those renting property worth less than one pound annually or not paying parish rates were exempt. The total text covers Kent with the exception of the Cinque Ports and the Liberty of Romney Marsh. The principal manuscript is CKS Q/RTh, duplicated in PRO E 179/249/37 A. The Tenterden assessment (CKS Te/JQad6) and that for the City and County of Canterbury (E l79/249/32) are among the appendices. The total text (excluding Canterbury) of about 27,000 names lists householders with the number of hearths in each borough or parish, grouped as 'chargeable' 425 REVIEWS or 'not chargeable' (with occasional reference to empty houses). Normally these lists are probably complete or virtually complete, though in a few cases exemptions are missing. The percentage of non• chargeable householders in a few places is 45 or 50 per cent or more, the average for the country being 32 per cent, suggesting that the aim of the assessors was to include everyone, whether or not they paid. While the Kent Hearth Tax assessment of Michaelmas 1671 (E 179/129/746) includes Canterbury and the Cinque Ports, the lists are less complete, the names of those 'discharged' being fewer and sometimes omitted totally. The choice of the 1664 assessment for editing in this volume is thus understandable. A useful general introduction, to be included in all Hearth Tax volumes, is written by Nesta Evans, dealing with the relevant laws and their administration. This is followed by a substantial chapter (xxiii· xcix) on 'Context and Analysis' by Sarah Pearson; in it a section entitled 'Historical Background' deals with the administrative boundaries used in the assessment. A study of the distribution of population includes a splendid coloured map showing the spread of households across the county and a table analysing the number of hearths in urban households. Wealth and population usually but not always went together; there was a striking 'north-south swathe' across the centre of the county, reflecting urbanisation in the north and cloth manufacture in the south. An analysis follows of the distribution of households according to the number of hearths (from more than 20 down to one), illustrated with coloured maps, ending with the spread of exempt houses and of the 497 empties, the latter being found especially in the dockyard towns and other developing centres of the north-west. The Hearth Tax data concerning the number and percentage of hearths per household is analysed in huge detail in Tables 2 and 3. Pearson includes a study of fireplaces and chimneys in timber and brick houses based on other sources, particularly surviving manor houses and farmhouses, which is linked as far as possible to the Hearth Tax. Three case studies relating to rural parishes (Charing, East Peckham and Goodnestone-next-Wingham) offer much fascinating detail about contemporary houses and hearths, with probate inventories being fully used; they go a little way to being miniature local histories. Next, in the towns, Pearson is able to contrast medieval and early seventeenth-century dwellings with the new types of town houses of the later seventeenth century erected in Deal, Deptford and elsewhere, showing that in the latter nearly all rooms had fireplaces, even those occupied by families of modest means. This study of an aspect of vernacular building provides a valuable background to the Hearth Tax assessment. 426 REVIEWS Harrington's 'Introduction to the Manuscript' includes a discussion of the unique Ashford Liberty return of 1662 (illustrated in the frontispiece and printed in Appendix VI), in which entries were either signed by the householder or they made their mark. This is, of course, in addition to a description of the Quarter Sessions manuscript (Q/RTh) and its Exchequer duplicate (E 1 79/249/37 A), probably written by the clerk of the peace, Christopher Dering, the collection of the tax by the sheriff of Kent, the sheriff of Canterbury and the Warden of the Cinque Ports, and including interesting detail on Christian names and surnames. The long text, derived from a clearly written manuscript, is printed in two columns. As usual in Hearth Tax assessments, it consists of just the names of the householders, without their occupations. There are occasional additions of titles or descriptions, such as 'Mr', 'Esq', 'gent', 'widd[ow]', 'Sir', 'borsholder', 'junior', 'cler[k]' and 'the Lord'. The detailed appendices end with the long and exhaustive Appendix VII, identifying the hundred and parish in which each administrative unit used in the assessment lies. A long personal name index, a place name index and a subject index proved a suitable conclusion to the book. The long introductions far from exhaust the interest of the text. Readers seeking well-known people will find that the City grandee Sir John Banks had a mansion at Aylesford with 25 hearths (p.170), and the topographer Richard Killburn a substantial house in West Borough with 12 hearths (p.229). The numerous gentry and few resident peers may be traced, such as Sir Roger Boteler baronet of Teston (p.124 ), Thomas Brewer Esquire of the neighbouring West Farleigh (p.125), and John [Tufton] Earl of Thanet, the occupier of no less that 51 hearths (p.301 ). The commonest surnames are still very numerous today, with Smith leading the field, and Jones being almost as frequent as Johnson. The geographical spread of these names can be easily seen; thus among more common names Denn(e) is concentrated in the lathe of St Augustine, and Jeffrey and Mercer were especially frequent round Tonbridge (pp.141-50). Hopefully the text will form the start of many future local studies relating to the Restoration period. CHRISTOPHER CHALKLIN Kent in the 20th Century. Edited by Nigel Yates, with the assistance of Alan Armstrong, Ian Coulson and Alison Cresswell. 160 x 240mm, xxiv + 4 l 8pp., 56 illustrations, 5 maps, 11 figures, and 45 tables. Kent History Project 6, Boydell Press, Woodbridge, for Kent County Council, 2001. Cased £35. ISBN O 85115 587 I. 427 REVIEWS All too often local historians have avoided studying the twentieth century. This is a shame for there is a rich agenda and voluminous and growing archival sources available for research into the history of the past one hundred years. Volume six in the Kent History Project amply illustrates both these points. Now that we have entered the twentyfirst century hopefully the immediate past will become less forbidding historical terrain. First let it be said that it is admirable to have a volume which deals with the last century in a full and generous way. The nine authors offer in ten thematic chapters a sound framework for anyone wishing to gain an introduction to the history of the County, and indeed numerous leads for possible research topics. Many of the chapters represent the fruit of recent and on-going research by the authors. The Editor's succinct introduction is followed by Michael Rawcliffe' s chapter on population. Almost inevitably this is heavily statistical, relying upon census reports. This basic data makes possible an analysis of the County's changing demography - the impact of the two World Wars, suburban growth, the change in the nature of the family and of households, the ageing population, and migration into the County. A longer chapter might have added further social analysis although this is picked up by other contributors to the book writing on housing, and health and social welfare. In his chapter on the economy of the County, Alan Booth plots the changing patterns of employment in the relatively small primary producing sector, mainly coal and cement, and the expanding service industries. Vertical integration, usually by take-overs, and also new locations characterised the brewing, paper making and milling industries. Local breweries gradually disappeared as did small rural paper works, replaced by large mills, many sited on deep water locations, dependent upon imported timber and wood pulp. Alan Armstrong's following chapter embraces both agriculture and rural society, an area which he has made his own, and, in any case there has been considerably more research on agrarian life than on the social background of workers in the manufacturing and service sectors within the County during the twentieth century. Armstrong stresses that agriculture has undergone a real 'revolution' since 1945 with mechanisation, the application of science to production, enlarged fields, a greatly reduced labour force, new crops and processes, all resulting in radical changes to rural life. Land also changed hands but we are told little about who owned what now or in the past. The chapter by Gerald Crompton dealing with transport is in many ways rather unbalanced. Great emphasis is placed on railways, and especially on the technology of electrification, while tramways which 428 REVIEWS served a large part of the urban population for at least the first three decades of the century are barely mentioned. Equally little mention is made of the metalling and construction of roads, the motor car, bus services, and the commercial truck, all of which have played a vital role in reshaping the economy and have had significant social consequences on how we live. Brian Atkinson provides a sparky and sometimes witty chapter on politics, which looks at both the national picture and also the cut and thrust of party political activity at County level. This rewarding chapter is the first time that much of the material has been presented in this form. Politics, of course, encompasses a much wider and more exciting agenda than just the women and men clustered under the umbrella of the major parties. Communists and fascists have played a role in the politics of the County but without lasting success. Michael Rawcliffe has also written the chapter on housing, an account of changing housing forms, quality of construction, planning, and suburban development. There are some very interesting examples of the random nature of housing provision before local and national government regulations superimposed order, not least at Biggin Hill valley with its casually built week-end shacks and timberframed houses served by rutted dirt tracks. More ordered was the overflow housing, for the LCC on the greenfield Downham estate, built in the late 1920s, mainly for people re-housed from the sl urns of Bermondsey. Three contrasting suburban developments of the l 920s- 30s, at Petts Wood, Orpington, West Wickham, and Bexley, illustrate the housing sprawl which, before Green Belt controls, radically altered the landscape of the area that was incorporated into the GLC in 1965. Fascinating detail of children's health, drawn from school medical reports, is offered by Paul Hastings and Nigel Yates in their chapter on health and social welfare. Rural slums, fatal typhoid outbreaks, and tuberculosis (responsible for JO per cent of Kent's death rate in 1911), and appalling insanitary conditions characterised many Kent towns well into the century. At the same time many villagers throughout the County relied on ponds for their water supply. Main drainage was often opposed by ratepayers on grounds of cost. What is particularly evident in this chapter is the great value of the local press as a source of information for those writing local history. Ian Coulson's robust chapter on 'popular education' ('popular' because it was of the people?) analyses the provision of schooling through the century. The majority of children in the County, until the 1960s and the advent of comprehensive secondary schools, left school at 15; and until the 1980s a significant proportion of sixteen 429 REVIEWS year olds left school without any formal qualifications. After the slow implementation of the Butler reforms of I 944, most children in the County went through an inadequate educational system, attending low status selective secondary modern schools (clearly all schools were selective!) which had a curriculum 'that was a patchwork where expectations were generally low' (p. 314). Robin Gill's carefully crafted and useful chapter on religion exemplifies the problems of writing about religious faith and practice in the County when so little research has been done on the topic. For church attendance, obviously only one measure of belief, the data is sparse: Mudie-Smith's 1903 survey of the metropole which covered Bromley; and then more recently, for each decade since I 979, Christian Research surveys of denominational affiliation. Sunday Schools, which catered nationally for more than six million children in 1911, were clearly significant but are only mentioned in passing; clearly this is a topic needing further research. The volume is rounded off with a chapter on leisure, by the Editor, and then two appendices, one detailing the structure and re-organisation of local government, the second, an essay on the General Strike of 1926 in Kent which contains some excellent detail on the National Unemployed Workers' Movement. As a first point of reference this useful book should be of considerable value to anyone trying to understand how the County and its people and institutions evolved over the past one hundred years. The format is clear, there are ample illustrations, and the generally well-written text is amplified by a range of useful tables and maps. And yet there are gaps in many of the chapters which clearly indicate those areas and topics on which research needs to be done. Some so ubiquitous that it is surprising that scholars have not already addressed them: the utilities central to our physical comfort and the conduct of daily life - gas and electricity supply, and the telephone; retailing and consumer services. And law and order, questions of policing, public liberties, and individual security. The other great issue, touched on in several of the chapters, but not separately addressed, is that process of great social change dating from the 1960s, particularly the growth of a new youth culture, and a new consumer market. This seems a long way from pails of drinking water taken from village ponds, but it presents an exciting multi-coloured tapestry overlain with all sorts of provocative ideas and agendas with which the historian needs to get to grips. DAVID KILLINGRAY 430 REVIEWS St Gregory's Priory, Northgate, Canterbury: Excavations 1988-1991. By M. and A. Hicks, The Archaeology of Canterbury, new series II, xxvi + 431 pp., 256 figures (13 in colour) Canterbury Archaeological Trust Ltd, 2001. £55. ISBN 1 870545 04 4. The Canterbury Archaeological Trust goes from strength to strength. Its first volume of the new series of 'The Archaeology of Canterbury' (on the cathedral nave excavations) had set very high standards in archaeological publication. They are well maintained in the second. Indeed this volume is a fitting testimony to the determination of the Trust's present management to see its excavations through to final publication. The initial year's excavations at St Gregory's in 1988 had encountered such complex and rich architectural deposits beneath the huge concrete foundations of the 1950 Post Office Sorting Office, that digging was extended for three further seasons, until the available funds were entirely exhausted. The potential disaster - that such a major excavation might not be able to be published for lack of funding - has here been triumphantly averted. The credit for this splendid achievement goes first to English Heritage for its 1995 grant for the postexcavation analysis of the finds, then to the dedication of Martin and Alison Hicks (who jointly directed of the whole project) and finally to the Trust's superb design, sub-editing and production team. Together they have combined to produce a volume that is joy to handle and to use. St Gregory's was founded by Archbishop Lanfranc as a small extramural urban church, manned by a 'gild' or fraternity of six priests and twelve secular clerks, in or about the year 1084. The intention was apparently that they should minister to Canterbury's sick and dying inhabitants in the neighbouring hospital of St John and especially to those from the urban poor. Historians have long known of this community's early but long-lasting dispute with St Augustine's over the possession of the true relics of Saints Eadburg and Mildrith. They have known, too, of the church's refoundation as an Augustinian priory in 1133 by Archbishop William Corbeil, and also something of the priory's landed endowments from the documents in the priory's cartulary printed by A. Woodcock in 1956. But until the Hickses began their excavations, this sort of urban charitable foundation had been relatively little studied either by archaeologists or by historians, whether on the Continent or in Britain. Moreover - despite the existence of some eighteenth- and nineteenth-century drawings of fragments of the buildings, which had survived the Dissolution of 1537 - almost nothing was known of the development of the church at St Gregory' s or of the domestic buildings. Indeed very little could be said of the way of life of the canons. 431 REVIEWS Martin and Alison Hicks's beautifully clear account leads the reader from the tiny two-cell church of Lanfranc' s foundation, through its modest extension following the arrival of the Augustinian prior and canons from Merton, and then to the massive rebuilding after the priory church had been gutted by fire in 1145. They give excellent archaeological and stratigraphical reasons for their detailed interpretations of each phase, especially when they are differing from earlier preliminary views. Each stage in St Gregory's development is clarified by Stella Gibson's superb colour reconstruction drawings. (They are indeed so beautifully redolent of communal life that one almost forgets that even in the ambitiously planned final version - laid out in the mid-twelfth century - the emphasis remained upon Augustinian austerity.) We are taken in turn through the chapter house, to the dormitory stairs, an undercroft, the cloister and its garth, a day-room, the refectory and its pulpit, the kitchen and cellarer's range, to the prior's lodge and finally to the gatehouse. In short the twelfth-century layout is shown to have been an urban version of the standard Benedictine plan of that era and the evidence for each room's function is clearly and impressively presented. Part 2 is devoted to the 'Finds' and will be of interest primarily to archaeological specialists seeking parallels for material from their own excavations. It is, however, notable for sections on the assemblage of worked stones (which has allowed, for example, the reconstruction of the blind arcading outside the chapter house), on the ornamented floor-tiles, on the use of decorated wall-plaster in the chapter house, and on the fragments of window glass recovered during the excavation. A lengthy account of the pottery establishes that during its first two centuries of its existence, the community primarily used local cooking pots and jugs from the Tyler Hill and Blean Forest kilns; but that imported higher-grade wares became particularly important in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The bone report provides a splendid example of how the diet of a religious community can be reconstructed across some four and a half centuries. The remarkably consistent proportions of beef, pork, lamb and poultry and wildfowl consumed and the huge quantities of fresh and cured fish (especially of herring) are noteworthy. The evidence collected and presented in such exemplary fashion here means that St Gregory's will stand as a type-site, to be used for comparisons with medieval monastic and secular institutions throughout England and beyond. The analysis of the ninety-one burials within the church or immediately outside its west front is consistent with the view that not only important members of the community but also lay patrons and their 432 REVIEWS families were interred here. The skeletal evidence shows that these were privileged individuals, who mostly enjoyed good health, but whose teeth suffered unusually from caries, suggesting that honey played an important part in their diet. It is particularly unfortunate that the funding for this superb volume did not permit a comparable analysis of the 1,251 burials excavated in the main St Gregory' s graveyard. There we would have expected burials not only of many canons, but primarily of Canterbury's poor; the contrasts in health and physique with those buried in or by the church would have been particularly instructive. It must be hoped that a future opportunity will be found to include an analysis of the St Gregory's cemetery material in a future volume devoted to burials in the city. The potential for understanding the medical and demographic history of the medieval town is enticing. Part 3 comprises an all too brief survey by Margaret Sparks of the documentary sources for the history of St Gregory's. To this are appended a very short summary of pre-historic, Roman and Anglo-Saxon utilisation of the site, a list of the plants and invertebrates represented, a full list of the excavation team, an exemplary bibliography and a helpful index. The standard of production is phenomenally high throughout. The principal authors, the specialist contributors and the Trust are all to be congratulated upon a superb volume, which will provide a model for the study of religious communities in the medieval town. It also stands as a fitting memorial to the expertise and the personality of Martin Hicks, who directed the excavations with panache, wrote a large part of the report and drew very many of its plans. His death, shortly before the completion of this wonderful book, has been a tragic loss for medieval archaeology, both in Kent and beyond. NICHOLAS P. BROOKS A Scholar and a Gentleman. Edward Hasted, The Historian of Kent. By Dr Shirley Burgoyne Black. 22.5 x 14.8cm, xiv + 469 pp. including two appendices, viz, notes, list of subscribers and index. Darenth Valley Publications, 33 Tudor Drive, Otford, Sevenoaks, Kent TN14 5QP (2001). ISBN O 9507334 6 2. Hard back KAS blue cloth. Obtainable from the publisher, price £25, incl. p+p. Shirley Black researched for over ten years to produce this highly readable biography of one who remains Kent's premier historian. She says that it was only in her later years she acquired an enthusiasm for the subject of Local History. We are all indebted that she did so. 433 REVIEWS Having inherited from his barrister father who died when he was eight, a modest and scattered estate which our authoress has diligently documented, in 1755 Hasted married Ann Dorman of a middle class yeoman farming family. He soon leased near to his childhood home at Hawley, a dilapidated thirteenth-century house, St John's Jerusalem, Sutton at Hone, in the village of his wife's family. The house had been a Commandery of the Knights of St John, whose associations, as Dr Black points out, are evidence of Hasted's deep affection for history. The costs of conversion of this into the Georgian residence (which survives) and his utter devotion to his History with its rashly low promised price sowed the seeds of his downfall. The origins of this single minded, all consuming dedication cannot be fully known now but Dr Black takes the charitable view that they were based upon pride in his family and in Kent and not upon social advancement nor certainly financial gain. Whilst his emphasis is on family descents and the ownership of land, there is considerable information on ecclesiastical matters, agricultural and natural history and, albeit anecdotal and unquantified, on industries, e.g. gunpowder manufacture at Dartford and Faversham, iron working at Lamberhurst. The thoroughness of Hasted' s work alone makes it still an invaluable source. Set against the then paucity of central archives, grants, willing postgraduate helpers, word processing, copying technologies and especially ease of travel and communication, we, with his biographer, can but marvel at the tenacity which saw his History through to two editions in his lifetime, to say nothing of his other tribulations. Dr Black strongly disagrees with the views expressed in John Boyle's In Quest of Hasted (1984) as to the major involvement of another person (see p. 389) in the composition of the second edition upon which he heaps scorn and criticizes the lack of originality and accuracy of the maps. Hasted, with his legal training (albeit never completed) his experience on the Bench and on other public and business matters, should have anticipated the financial quagmire he was walking towards. One can only say in mitigation that many of his neighbours at Sutton, e.g. the Lethieulliers, seemed likewise to be heavily in debt. He does not seem to have paid his mother her due allowance regularly. In 1785 when he had been married 30 years and had nine legitimate children he took a mistress, Mary Jane Town, of whom even he ultimately had nothing good to say despite her accompanying him to exile in France in 1790. In 1795, as a consequence of the Revolution, he wisely returned to England and imprisonment. 434 REVIEWS Despite all the harrowing trials, family deaths and personal illness and being reduced from the status of proud minor gentry to pathetic penury, with the aid of a few loyal friends' historical and financial help, he finished his work on the final, fourth volume of the folio first edition once forecast to be complete in two. Then, with much more than the purely commercial aid of W. Bristow of Canterbury, the second 12 volume octavo edition was published by the latter in 1797- 1801. After seven years, in 1802 he was released and found some comfort and solace in Corsham, Wiltshire as the master of an almshouse in the gift of the son of the Earl of Radnor (of Folkestone connections) who had originally supported the work. There he died peacefully in 1812. His gentle dissembling to cover up his financial difficulties is forgivable but we are sad for one so dedicated to the truth. His efforts to climb or at least maintain his position on the social ladder, e.g. by generous socializing at home, at the Royal Society and the Society of Antiquaries are not unusual for the time but plainly beyond his income. It is interesting that we never learn of his hunting or his reputation as a gourmet. Perhaps an excessive pride and snobbery, derived from his mother, was the source of his aversion to being 'in trade' in even his father's profession and which lead him to devote his life wholly to an intellectual, yet obviously unremunerative, vocation. Sad also that the family has died out in Kent. The cost of the four volume folio edition stitched, in cardboard covers was £3 15s.; now leather bound it is £2,500-3,000; the I 2 volume octavo likewise was £4 18s. and now £1 ,200-1,600 and of the reprint, hardbound in red cloth, £90 now £550. Plates of houses, plans, etc. (not all in the folio edition) could be purchased separately in blue paper wrappers (six in each) at a total of £2 I Os. because they could not be fitted unfolded into the second edition. Dr Black's assiduity and knowledge of her subject extend profoundly into the circumstances prevailing in Hasted's England, enabling her account to place his actions within the customs and laws of the time. It is also amply evidenced by the search for his ancestors, the accounts of his activities as a JP, his friends and their backgrounds. This work by our member is a major addition to the study of Kent. She has undertaken it entirely by herself including research, publication and financing, publicity and distribution. The number of misprints found by your reviewer is around eight, all minor. Thus so far not dissimilar to her subject and, one suspects, hero. PETER DRAPER 435 REVIEWS Cranbrook Voices from the 20th Century. Cranbrook and District Local History Society, 2000. 150 x 210mm, 11 lpp, 7 colour and 21 b/w illustrations. Paperback, £5. ISBN O 9539667 0 4. This little book is a local history written by local people for local people. Reading this book it is as though one has stumbled upon a group of local residents gathered together to remember their town. One can almost hear their voices in the text. There is almost no editorial comment as we, the readers, are invited to listen through the text as a group of town's people recall the life of their town beginning with that oft heard cry that people were friendlier in the past as everybody knew everybody else. We are taken by way of memories of how the physical environment of the town has changed through complaints about the increase in traffic noise on a trip through the memories of a country town. The book includes all of the of recollections one might expect to find in a work of this kind, with memories of work, school and play, as well as recollections of shopping before the coming of the all embracing supermarket and, of course, that most cataclysmic event in the lives of most Kent towns and villages the Second World War, which seems to have marked a divide in the lives of so many people and places in Britain in the twentieth century. As a London historian, the reviewer was particularly interested in the recollections of hop-picking and the hop-pickers. From the Londoners' point of view hop-picking was seen as the great East End holiday and a chance to earn some much needed extra money for Christmas but, as this book shows, from the point of view of many Cranbrook residents the hop-pickers represented an annual invasion of dirty thieving trouble makers who wreaked havoc throughout the town and surrounding country. There are one or two criticisms of the book. Firstly, for an outsider who has never visited the town it would have been nice if the book had included a map so that one might get some perspective of the places described in the text. Secondly, the final chapter, which is in effect a eulogy for a local town and county councillor by his son, was slightly out of place for outsiders with no link to the memory of this individual. Overall this is a very readable and enjoyable book, which, although written for a local audience, provides a window on the changing life of a Kent country town during the middle of the twentieth century and is well worth £5 of anybody's money. Contrast this with another recent local history reviewed below: 436 REVIEWS Sandwich Recollected, an Oral History 1914-1950. Sandwich Local History Society, 2000. 150 x 210mm, 17 b/w illustrations. Paperback. From first impressions one would have to say that this looks a much more professional product than Cranbrook Voices (see above); it has clearly been produced for a wider audience than just the local community and seems rather to be aimed at the visitor. The whole style of this book is different to that of Cranbrook Voices as it uses editorial comment to guide us through the history of the town as told by a group of some 24 local people. The book is arranged in a thematic way, each section being introduced by the editors who then link the quotes of the participants as they take us on a tour of their town. Throughout one gets the uneasy feeling that you are reading about not one but two towns which, although occupying the same space, were for much of the time covered by the book divided by class differences that meant that the two distinct groups of people lived side by side but never met. This is reflected in their experiences of the life of the town. Thus at the start of the book we have descriptions of a life of weekend house parties at one extreme and of queuing to receive church charity at the other. This impression is however alleviated as the book goes on to look at the life of the town with some interesting descriptions of the local employment and leisure activities. The reviewer particularly liked the description of the activities that surrounded market day. This well researched book bears the unmistakable hand of the professional historian in its presentation with its references to local directories and records, while the inclusion of local advertisements and a bus timetable all help to bring it to life. It also includes a section on the wartime memories of the participants, which were, as one might expect, full of colour. In the final section the editors include those memories which, although fascinating in themselves, did not fit into the book's overall thematic structure and so we get recollections of everything from local elections to the provision of medical services, but there still seems to be the ever present spectre of the class barrier separating one section of the town's society from the other. The one major criticism of this book is freely admitted in the preface; it is very repetitive. The editors reuse the same memories over and over again. Admittedly they use them to make different points throughout the text but there is a sense that the editors found themselves short of material and were desperately trying to stretch What they had to fill the space available. Readers thus find themselves having to wade through several almost identical descriptions like those of life at the Stour House or Sir John Manwood schools. 437 REVIEWS Generally, however, this is a good example of a local history produced for the benefit of visitors to, and those with an interest in, a typical large market town and is recommended to anyone who is planning to visit or has an interest in the town. WILLIAM GILES A Journey to Medieval Canterbury. By Andy Harmsworth and Canterbury Archaeological Trust. A4, 52 pp., illustrated throughout. Canterbury, 2001. Paperback £4.95 + 50p p+p, from CAT, 92a Broad Street, Canterbury, Kent CTl 2LU. ISBN 1 870545 12 5. This volume has been written primarily for 11-14 year olds, but its appeal is far wider as it successfully combines the work of the Canterbury Archaeological Trust with the demands of the National Curriculum. The numerous black and white illustrations, photographs, reconstructions of finds and buildings, and cartoons and other drawings, are all fully contextualised within a meticulous and highly accessible text. Romney Marsh, Survival on a Frontier. By Jill Eddison. 170 x 242mm, 160 pp., illustrated, 75 b/w figures, 31 colour plates. 2000. Paper back £14.99, Tempus Publishing Ltd., The Mill, Brimscombe Port, Stroud, Gloucs. GL5 2QG. ISBN O 7524 1486 0. Barry Cunliffe in his foreword to this further volume arising from the Romney Marsh Research Group says: 'Jill's intimate involvement with the research over the last 20 years, as a researcher in her own right and an enthuser of others, means that there is no one better to bring together the many strands into a cohesive story of a marshland landscape.' Community and Disunity: Kent and the English Civil Wars, 1640-1649. By Jacqueline Bales. A5, 46pp. 2001. Paperback, £4.99 + £1 p+p from Kent Dickson Books, Unit 9, The Shipyard, Upper Brents, Faversham, Kent ME13 7DZ. ISBN 1 904163 00 9. This short work, containing four lectures on the Civil War in Kent given by Jacqueline Eales between 1995 and 1999, presents some of her research extending from a starting point of Alan Everitt's Community of Kent and the Great Rebellion, 1640-1660 (1966). After an introduction which sets out the development of local Civil 438 REVIEWS War studies since Everitt and her own approach to the study of 'topics to which ... he gave little prominence', Dr Eales' first chapter presents an overview of the political and religious influences in Kent, drawing largely on evidence on Sir John Culpepper and Sir Edward Dering. The following two chapters look in detail at the outbreak of the Civil War in Tonbridge, and 'Thomas Wilson and the "Prophane Town" of Maidstone'. The final chapter is a reconsideration of 'The Most Hated Man in Kent?', Richard Culmer. These four short chapters provide the best of meticulous local research within a clear contextualisation of the English Civil War, and will be welcomed by all students of seventeenth-century Kentish studies. Faversham Millennium Video. The Faversham Society, 2001. £9.95 from the Society, Fleur de Lis Heritage Centre, 13 Preston Street, Faversham, Kent ME13 SNS. This celebration of Faversham in the millennium year 2000 is a visual treat demonstrating the rural and historical heritage of the best parts of Faversham and the surrounding areas, generally in their full summer glory. However, it does not seem quite sure whether it is a tourist taster, a potted history or a celebration of the contemporary people of Faversham. As the last of these it succeeds best in the latter part of the filming. The first part is a gallop through the history of the town with some strange omissions, mainly the less creditable aspects, such as the explosion at the gunpowder works in 1916 or the debacle over James II' s escape and capture in I 688. There is also an element of haphazard repetition throughout the two parts, which could have been more effectively melded together. Nevertheless, for anyone interested in visiting Faversham for the first time, there is much to whet the appetite, and there is something to touch everyone who has lived at some time in the town. The Slave Trade (Canterbury Sources 3). Compiled by Clare Gathercole, revised by David Shaw, with an Historical Introduction by David Turley. 167 x 242mm, 96pp., illustrated. Canterbury, 2001. Paperback, £12.00 +£1.50 p+p, from Canterbury Cathedral Library, The Precincts, Canterbury CT l 2EH. ISBN 0950 13924 6. A further useful annotated catalogue of sources in the Cathedral Archives and Library with indispensable introductions by David Turley and David Shaw. 439 REVIEWS Oare Parish and People. By Kenneth Melrose. Faversham papers No. 78. A4, 153 + vii pp, plus three maps. The Faversham Society, 2001. Paperback, £4.95. or £6.45 by post, from the Society, Fleur de Lis Heritage Centre, 13 Preston Street, Faversham, Kent ME13 8NS. ISBN O 900214 27 X, ISSN 0014-892X 3. This meticulous, fully-indexed collection of data covering aspects of Oare's history from Roman times to the twentieth century, will be an invaluable resource for local and family historians. Kent Churches. By John E. Vigar. 155 x 235mm. 160pp., illustrated, l map plus b/w illustrations throughout. Wimborne, 2001. Paperback £8.95, The Dovecote Press Ltd., Stanbridge, Wimborne, Dorset, BH21 4HD; email: dovecote@mcmail.com. ISBN 1 874336 92 X. A welcome new edition of the volume published in 1995 with fresh illustrations. Also received and deposited in the Society's Library: Origin and Use of Church Scratch-Dials. By T. W. Cole, facsimile or original published in 1935. AS, 15pp, two illustrations. Paperback. £3.00 post free in UK from Pierhead Publications Limited, PO Box 145, Herne Bay, Kent CT6 8GY, email: pierhead-books@hotmail.com. ISBN 0-9538977-1-0. Smarden 2000. Smarden Local History Society. AS, 42pp plus 17 colour and 4 b/w illustrations. Paperback. Copies available from the Secretary to the society, email: franatsmarden@aol.com. A Small Kentish Hamlet Through Four Centuries. By David Gurney. AS, 64 pp. 29 b/w illustrations and 39 maps. Paperback. £5.00 + 45p p+p from the author, Yopps Green Cottage, Yopps Green, Plaxtol, Sevenoaks, Kent TN15 0PY. Child of Court Street 1864-1971. By Peter Stevens. Faversham Papers No. 76. A4, 36 + xvi pp, b/w illustrations throughout. The Faversham Society, 2001. Paperback, £4.95. or £6.45, post free from the Society, Fleur de Lis Heritage Centre, 13 Preston Street, Faversham, Kent MEl3 SNS. ISBN O 900214 25 3. ISSN 0014-892X 3. Memories of Faversham and its Sailing Barges. By Robin Partis. Faversham Papers No. 77. A4, 46 + vii pp., 22 b/w illustrations and glossary. The Faversham Society, 2001. Paperback, £3.95. or £5.45 by post, from the Society, the Fleurde Lis Heritage Centre, 13 Preston Street, Faversham, Kent ME13 SNS. ISBN 0 900214 26 l. ISSN 0014-892X 3. 440