21 



Conqueror ; if so, the brave old Castle may take 

 for its motto the grand word ** Invicta." 



References to Ebbsfleet, Lymiuge, Otford, and 

 Kiogwould followed. 



Rochester. 



This long-sufferine City seems to have enjoyed 

 peace and quietness until the coming of the 

 Danes ; then its troubles began. 



839. The entry for the year 839 in the Chronicle 

 is short but significant : "This year there was 

 great slaughter at London, and at Canterbury, 

 and at. Rochester." 



885. In the time of Alfred the same enemy 

 appeared again, for the Danish army which bad 

 been plundering in the Scheldt and the Somme 

 came over and landed in Kent. Dividing into 

 two ■' the one part went eastward, the other part 

 to Rochester, and besieged the City, and wrought 

 another fortress about themselves. And, notwith- 

 standing this, the townsmen def--nded the City 

 till King Alfred came out with his forces. Then 

 went the army to their ships and abandoned their 

 fortress ; and they were there deprived of their 

 horses, and soon after that, in that same manner, 

 departed over sea." 



986. In this year, "owing to some internal sedi- 

 tion, the cause of which is not explained, JEhelred, 

 then a yruth of seventeen, besieged the town of 

 RochestfT, and, being unable to take it, ravajfnd 

 and alienated some of the lands of the Bishopric." 



999. The Chronicler makes this lamentable 

 entry for the year 999, when the whole country 

 was groaning under the consequences of 

 .ZEthelred's ' unreadiness.* " This year the army 

 again came about into Thames, and went then up 

 along the Medway, and to Rochester. And then 

 the Kentish forces came there to meet them, and 

 they t hern stoutly joined battle: but alas! that 

 they too quickly yielded and fled, for they bad not 

 the support which they should have had. And 

 the Danish men had possession of the place of 

 carnage ; and then they took horse and rode 

 wheresoever they themsalves would, and full nigh 

 all the West Kentish men they ruined and plun- 

 dered. Then the King, with his Witan, decreed 

 that, with a ship force and also with a land force 

 they should be attacked. But when the ships 

 were ready, then the miserable crew delayed from 

 day to day, and distressed the poor people who 

 lay in the ships : and ever as it should have been 

 forwarded, so wa3 it later from one time to 

 another ; and ever they let their enemies' forces 

 increase, and ever the people retired from the sea, 

 and they ever went forth after them. And then 

 in the end these expeditions both by sea and land 

 effected nothing, except the people's distress and 

 waste of money and the emboldening of their foes." 



1088. The fortress of Rochester played an 

 important part in the great rebellion of 1088. 

 The obiect of the rebellion was to take the crown 

 of England from Rufus and place it on the bead 

 of his elder brother Robert Duke of Normandy, 

 and its leading spirit was Odo. Bishop of Bayeuz 

 and Earl of Kent, half-brother of William the 

 Conqueror. He had fortified himself and his 

 fellow rebels in the Castle «f Rochester. Roche&tnr 

 therefore was tbe centre of the rebellion, and the 

 Red King called upon his loyal subjects to follow 

 his banner to attack the Kentish fortress and 

 Bieze thb hated Odo. 



The army assembled at London, ajd from thence 

 William led it forth. But, although the capture 

 of Rochester was the great object of the expedi- 

 tion, it was deemed more politic to subdue the 

 other rebel strongholds of Tunbridge and Pevensey 

 first. Tunbridge Castle, therefore, was stormed 

 and taken, and the King would at once have 

 marched upon Rochester when the news came 

 that the rebel Bishop had left, and was shelteiing 

 in the castle of Pevensey. There he was taken 

 prisoner and conduLted by the King's troops to 

 Rochester having sworn that he would cause the 

 castle to surrender. Then, however, he was 

 captured by his own garrison, and again defied 

 the power of the King. The castle was accord- 

 ingly besieged, and not until its defenders were 

 reduced to the last straits did they give up the 

 strife and crave for peace. 



Odo begged to be allowed to leave the cistle 

 with military honours, which the Red King scorn- 

 fully refused. "With sad and downcast looks," 

 says the English historian of the Nurman Con- 

 quest, " he and his companions came forth from 

 the stronghold which could shelter them no longer. 

 The trumpets sounded merril^v to greet them. 

 But other sounds more fearful than the voice of 

 the trumpet sounded in the ears of Odo as he came 

 forth. Men saw passing before them, a second 

 time hurled down from his high estate— and this 

 time not by the bidding of a N<irman King, but 

 by the arms of the English people— the i«an who 

 stood forth in English eyes as the embodiment of 

 all that was blackest and basest in the foreign 

 dominion. Odo might keep his eyes fixed on tbe 

 gfround, but the eyes of the nation which he had 

 wronged were full upon him. The English 

 followers of Rufus pressed close to him, crying out 

 with shouts which all cnuld hear, ' Halters, bring 

 halters ; bang up the traitor Bishop and his ac- 

 complices on the gibbet.' . . . But the King's 

 word had been passed, and the thirst for vengeance 

 of the wrathful English had to be biulked. Odo 

 and those who had shared with him in the defence 

 of Rochester went away unhurt ;but they had to 

 leave England, and to lose all their English lands 

 and honours, at least for a season. But Odo left 

 England andalltbat he had in England for ever." 



1215. The last attack on Rochester of which I 

 can find any record was made by King John during 

 the civil war which followed shortly after the sign- 

 ing of the Great Chaita. It is thus described in 

 Hume: "The King was, from the first, master of 

 the field ; and immediately laid siege to the castle 

 of Rochester, which was obstinately defended by 

 William de Albiney, at the head of a hundred and 

 forty knights with their retainer.-;, but was at last 

 reduced byfamine. OnNovember 30, John, irritated 

 with the resistance, intended to have hanged the 

 governor and all the garrison ; but, on the repre- 

 sentation of William de Maulcon, who suggested 

 to him the danger of reprisals, he was content to 

 sacrifice, in this barbarous manner, the inferior 

 prisoners only. The captivity of William de 

 Albiney, the best ofiicer among the confederated 

 barons, was an irreparable loss to their cause ; and 

 no regular opposition was thenceforth made to the 

 progress of the royal arms." 



The paper concluded with references to Komney 

 Marsh, Sandwich, Sevenoaks, Sheppey, Thanet, 

 and Tonbridge. 



