410 REPORT—1885. 
up a shore into a multitude of bays, with a repletion of material on one side and 
deep water on the other, and would have had a better substitute in a sea-wall that 
allowed the shingle to pass freely backwards and forwards along its face. Such was 
the experience with the frontage of Romney Marsh, defended by Dymchurch sea- 
wall, 3; miles in length, where the old system of groynes, which cut up the frontage 
into an interminable number of bays, was abandoned about forty years back in 
favour of the present stone slope (‘ Proc. Inst. C.E.’ vol. vi., plan and sections). 
The system of groynes at Brighton, for some isolated points, appeared to have 
answered well when the supply arriving at that town of shingle from the westward 
was uninterfered with, but a change occurs when the system was continued to Hove, 
or West Brighton, in thickening quantities. The material arriving was a constantly 
diminishing one, from the fact that the Shoreham Gas Works, erected under an Act 
of Parliament on the ‘live’ beach between the harbour and the sea, were found to 
stand upon a somewhat unstable base, with a fickle sea defence, unless supplemented 
by artificial works. Groynes on an extended scale were erected, which treated West 
Brighton in the same ungenerous spirit entertained in former days for Rottingdean, 
for the sake of and advantage of Kemp Town. The encroachment of the sea to the 
leeward side of the groynes, on the esplanade lawns, has necessitated the erection 
of an esplanade wall. 
B.—The South-Eastern Coast of England. 
By Colonel E. C. Sim, R.E. (Retired). 
To the Commander Royal Engineers, Brighton. 
55 Lower Belgrave Street, London. Dec. 4, 1884. 
Sir,—With reference to War Office Memo. Oct. 23, 1884, and the Minute of the 
Commander Royal Engineers, 8.E. District, thereon, dated Oct. 25, 1884, and enclo- 
sure returned herewith, I have the honour to state that as I have been employed 
as C.R.E. at three stations in the Chatham and 8.E. Districts during the last 
five years, which stations have allmore or less been connected with foreshore ques- 
tions, in which I have taken great interest, as affecting War Department property and 
rights, I trust I may be allowed (although on the Retired List) to make a few remarks 
about ‘The rate of erosion of the sea coasts of England and Wales, and the influence 
of the artificial abstraction of shingle and other material in that action,’ as mentioned 
in the circular of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. 
With reference to the coast-line from Sheerness to Shellness Point in the Isle of 
Sheppey, with which I was well acquainted from 1879 to 1882, it would appear that 
the high land of Warden Point, which is nearly the only cliff in Sheppey, is gradually 
being undermined by the action of springs and the sea; the débris being more or — 
less conveyed by the tide towards Sheerness, and the limestone-nodules, or lumps from 
the débris, are collected afterwards by the fishermen and others on the beach, and sold 
for lime and cement. ‘The coast-line near Leysdown station is being denuded of 
shingle likewise, and a stone apron erected some years ago near the coastguard 
station has been washed up and practically destroyed in 1880. The movement of the 
shingle is from east to west along the estuary of the Thames; and if it were not 
caught by the Garrison Point Fort, which is protected by strong wooden groynes put 
down when the fort was erected, my opinion is that the whole of Sheerness would 
be submerged. The point acting as a breakwater and large groynes ‘backs up’ the 
shingle along the whole front of the fortifications, which are also protected by 
groynes, and so on to Sheerness Marine Town and Cheyney Rock, W. D. property; 
after which, in my time, the foreshore was so exposed by the absence of groynes and 
want of care and attention, that it seemed likely the whole of the adjoining lands 
would be submerged at high tides, the sea-wall or dyke also being ineffective. I am 
unable to give any exact description of the formation of the cliffs in Sheppey. I 
believe they are of London Clay (with nodules of impure limestone or septaria), and are 
from 60 to 80 feet in height. The foreshore of shingle in front of Sheerness and Mile 
Town extends for perhaps 80 yards at low water. While on this subject, I may as 
well mention that the southern or right bank of tle Medway at Sheerness, from the 
Royal Dockyard to Queenborough, had also to be protected against the inroads of the 
sea or river by groynes and dykes, or walls. The ‘wash’ near Queenborough Pier 
