Jbund under the old bed of the river Rother. 67 



and contracted higher up at a very early period, and also shown 

 that at the period when the vessel foundered, it must have been 

 of considerable breadth at Math am- wharf, which is ten miles 

 from the sea, I think this tempest YSiXhevJixvours^ than makes > 

 against the speculation for her antiquity. 



Many other general tempests and storms have been record* 

 ed by various writers, but we read of none that have particu- 

 larly affected this part of the country until the period before 

 cited, when, by a great convulsion of nature, Winchelsea was 

 swallowed up by the sea, and the whole face of the country 

 changed. This storm is mentioned by all the historians of 

 Kent. Stowe in his Chronicles thus states it: " In 1287, on 

 new-year's-day at night, as well through the vehemency of the 

 wind as violence of the sea, divers places in England adjoin- 

 ing the sea were flooded, so that an intolerable multitude of 

 men, women, and children were overwhelmed with the waters ;" 

 and Somner in his " Treatise on the Roman Ports and Forts^"* 

 says " About 1287, the sea raging with the violence of winds 

 overflowed and drowned Promhill (near Lydd, a town at that 

 time well frequented,^ the lands wherethe town stood are now call- 

 ed Broomhill), and made the Rother forsake its channel, which 

 before emptied itself into the sea at Romney, and stopped its 

 mouth, opening a new and nearer way to pass into the sea by 

 " Rhie,**' now called Rye ; and afterwards fell into the Apple- 

 dore waters, wheeling about, and running into that arm of the 

 sea or estuary insinuating into the lands by Rye.'' By Jeaks's 

 Charters also we learn, that Winchelsea was drowned in the 16th 

 of Edward the First. 



I have now arrived at a period beyond which, speculation 

 becoming more and more doubtful, I am backward in hazard- 

 ing an opinion ; and since history does not furnish us with the 

 aera of any violent or destructive storm on this coast, for very 

 many years prior or subsequent to the one above-mentioned, I 

 shall conclude this letter, leaving it for others to determine, 

 from the facts here stated, as to the probability of the vessel 

 having perished in or before that great tempest, or at a period 

 between that and the storm which took place in the reign of 

 Queen Elizabeth. 



^ 



