Hampton-on-Sea
Encyclopedia
Hampton-on-Sea was a drowned and abandoned village in what is now the Hampton area of Herne Bay, Kent
. It grew from a tiny fishing hamlet in 1864 at the hands of an oyster fishery
company, was developed from 1879 by land agents, abandoned in 1916 and finally drowned due to coastal erosion
by 1921. All that now remains is the stub of the original pier, the Hampton Inn, and the rocky arc of Hampton-on-Sea's ruined coastal defence
visible at low tide. The site is notable for sharing its history with the eccentric Edmund Reid. Reid was previously the Metropolitan Police
head of CID
who handled the Jack the Ripper case. In retirement he chose to champion the plight of the beleaguered residents of the settlement.
is the coastal west end of Herne Bay, Kent
. The site of Hampton-on-Sea is now underwater due to coastal erosion
, but it was on the west side of the northern end of Hampton Pier Avenue, between the 1959 sea defences and the remains of the sea wall which are exposed at low water in Hampton bay. When Hampton-on-Sea existed and until 1934, the Hampton-on-Sea site was under the jurisdiction of Blean Rural District Council, the boundary with Herne Bay Council running north-south along the line of the present-day Hampton Pier Avenue. In 1934, the area was transferred to Herne Bay Urban District Council,Easdown 2008 p.43 and in 1974 to Canterbury City Council
.
s had thrived in the Thames Estuary
since the Romans
promoted them; they were sold in city streets and eaten raw.Easdown 2008 p.5 The Herne Bay, Hampton and Reculver Oyster Fishery Company was incorporated with £10,000 capital in £10 shares on 25 July 1864 with Frank Buckland as chairman and Mr Cholmondeley Pennell as deputy. 1860-1864 had been a boom year for oyster farming
, especially in nearby Whitstable
, and the Government supported the trade in 1866 by passing an Act to promote cultivation. The company's proposals included five oyster smacks
or yawl
s, a pier with storehouses, housing for workers and five freshwater breeding ponds
. In spite of objections from local business competition, the company acquired an Act of Parliament and land at Hampton. According to the Act of 25 July 1864, the company had sole rights to dredge for oysters for seven miles (11 km) from Swalecliffe to Reculver and up to three miles (5 km) - but mainly one and a half miles - from shore. The total area under its jurisdiction was nine square miles, of which a third was foreshore, and it employed thirty-three regular men; sometimes up to a hundred. In 1865 and 1866 their chairman Cholmondeley Pennell applied unsuccessfully for extensions to these rights. Before selling the oysters dredged from the Estuary, the company obtained brood oysters from Essex, France, Holland and Portugal. The smacks took the oysters twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays to Billingsgate
.
The company was successful at first, although stressed by underfunding and the cost of the pier, and by 1866 an enquiry commission stated: "The Company have already cleared about five square miles, and culched about one square mile of their grounds, and have laid down on parts of their beds many millions of oysters". However, as the company was still relatively new, they had not yet developed their oysters to quite the same market value as the long-established Whitstable ones. A sideline for the Hampton fishermen was cement stones, because they were found on the Hampton fishing grounds. These were boulders the size of a man's head, sold to manufacturers of Roman cement. There was a dispute with the rival Whitstable Oyster Company, and Whitstable was fined £1 per oyster taken from Hampton's grounds, while Hampton was accused of not fully exploiting its breeding ponds and of importing foreign oysters for resale.Easdown 2008 p.7 In 1869, local inshore fishermen complained that their traditional territory was now defended on the company's behalf by HMS Buzzard and that the company employed outsiders for long hours and low pay. In the 1870s the oyster trade went into decline and suffered over-fishing, and in 1876 the Government set up a select committee to enquire into scarcity and price. The result was the 1877 Act which prevented sale of dredged oysters in June to August, and freshwater pond oysters between May and August. In the following three severe winters, oysters died in the shallow Estuary waters and the company went into liquidation. The business passed into the hands of hotel owner Major Davis who closed it down when his operation went to Faversham. Company assets were sold on 20 July 1881 and it officially wound up in 1884.Easdown 2008 p.9
map of 1878, it had been completed by then. At the southern end, the tramway curved westward, running beside Westbrook, and reached the railway line just east of the point where Westbrook crosses it, and to the west of where Hampton Close is today: see 1878 map, pictured. One Judah Downs won £900 in a dispute over land crossed by the tramway, and the company later bought him out as well.Easdown 2008 p.6 After the company went into liquidation, the tramway was removed in the 1880s. For much of the 20th century it was possible to see where the tramway reached the railway line.
, built foundations for reading rooms
and planned tennis courts, a miniature golf
course, an archery
green and a recreation ground. He organised a sports day with free teas
and fairground
entertainments, but too many visitors arrived and he ran out of teas. With builder Thomas Richard Geelong Hoe he planned a housing estate, and a Hampton-on-Sea nameboard was put up at Herne Bay railway station
in expectation of this, but then he died in 1880. The company was eventually dissolved in 1905.Easdown 2008 p.10
Frederick Francis Ramuz, Mayor of Southend and land agent, bought the property cheaply. The Hampton Pier Inn (today the Hampton Inn) became the Land Company's base for its administration of the 750 acres (3 km²) of land it had bought altogether in Herne Bay. Planned street names which no longer exist were Swalecliffe Gardens, Hampton Grand Parade, Marine Drive, Canterbury Gardens, Hampton Gardens, Eddington Gardens next to Hampton Farmhouse and Herncliffe Gardens incorporating the oyster fishery's Hampton Terrace. The company proposed a genteel resort with large brick bungalow
s and villa
s, a temperance hotel plus church, and shops plus tavern. Freeman's idea for a recreation ground was resurrected for good measure.
Ramuz divided the "Grand Parade Estate at Hampton-on-Sea" into 124 development plots for the first auction on 17 September 1888 "to suit all classes" and set up a sales marquee onsite. Cheap, refundable train fares and a free lunch were promised to prospective purchasers.Easdown 2008 p.10-21Herne Bay Press, September 1888 All the plots were sold within one and a half hours after the buyers, mostly from London, were serenaded by the Buffs 3rd Battalion band during their free lunch. Plots facing the sea made £18, and those at the back £8 to £9, with the old farmhouse making £100 and the tavern plot £39: all moneys were payable in instalments. The Land Company made £2,000.Herne Bay Press, 22 September 1888
By the date of the second marquee-auction of 126 more plots, the Land Company had built roads and was repairing the pier. Plots were advertised more energetically than before and promoted on the basis of Herne Bay's smallness, cheapness, ripeness for speculation and its proximity to the railway line. Sales were aimed at landlords wanting to buy cheaply and rent at profit, because at that time house-ownership was uncommon and tenancy was the norm. Prospective purchasers were promised trams and buses to take tenants to the railway station, or even an extra railway station close to the estate. The empty and rural nature of this spot was translated into promises of botanising
, shooting, bathing, sailing and angling. Although no cheap train was provided on this occasion, plots sold at £8 to £32, making the Land Company £1,370.Herne Bay Press, October 1888 During 1889 sales were promoted by newspaper advertisements rather than auctions, and the pier's repairs were said to be ongoing. According to these advertisements there were croquet
lawns and tennis courts plus a spring
.Herne Bay Press, 1889
A third sale of 144 plots took place on 7 July 1890 making £2,450 for the Land Company, and events included a regatta with a coastguards' race and pair-oared rowing race, plus a traditional duck hunt in which a man acts as duck. The fourth and final auction of 124 plots on 28 July 1890 promised yet another special train from London and the opportunity to buy the shop plots and more villa plots. Four shop plots went for £54, villa plots for £3 to £7, and we are not told the sum earned by the company. Some plots remained unsold, and these were advertised throughout 1891.Herne Bay Press, July 1890Herne Bay Press, 9 May 1891 Following the four auctions and three years of advertising, very few plots were developed, and the temperance hotel, church, shops and tavern were never built.
draught
of the smacks
. It curved slightly westwards to allow the company's oyster smacks and European oyster trading boats to berth on the lee side in a north-easterly wind. Its purpose was threefold: a landing stage for oysters and materials, a shelter for the oyster smacks and a breakwater for fishing grounds. The Lord Mayor of London
Thomas Gabriel arrived in a special train to open it on 15 September 1866. After the collapse of the oyster fishery, the pier was said to be under repair by land agent Frederick Francis Ramuz in October 1888.Herne Bay Press, 13 October 1888 Thereafter, the pier became derelict. In the great storm of 28–29 November 1897 it was badly damaged, and then partially demolished in 1898 to halt erosion and save the houses of Hampton-on-Sea.Daily Mail, 5 December 1898 In 1901, the Council bought it and at a cost of £2,000 rebuilt the stub in 1903-1904 as it is today, at 350 feet (106.7 m) long. The remaining piles and ruins of the old pier were a shipping hazard and had to be buoyed with large warning notices.
and flooding which eventually drowned this development was the original Hampton Pier. The ebb and flow
of tidal streams
is powerful in the shallow Thames Estuary
, where its tidal waters are caught in the vortex of the tidal push from Atlantic
waters via both the north and south of the British Isles. Off Herne Bay, the running ebb current moves at 10.15 knots, and the flow at 9.14 knots (17.9 km/h). Where strong currents meet and divide, or are disrupted by uneven coastal features, there are eddies
. After Hampton Pier was first built, the flow running west along Herne Bay beach dropped its sand and pebbles on the east side of the pier instead of replenishing beach material in front of the new development. Subsequently, after being forced into a loop around the pier-end it was possibly forced into a shoreward eddy by deep-water currents. That means that at a certain point in the flow-tide it could have continued briefly westward past Hampton-on-Sea, then turned inshore and looped back strongly eastwards along the beach towards Hampton Pier Avenue, eroding land at Hampton-on-Sea and then turning north along Hampton Pier Avenue and the pier, carrying soil with it. It is said that the later shortening of the pier was not enough and that erosion will continue, so such an eddy may explain the need for today's shore defences along the north end of Hampton Pier Avenue. An additional possibility is related to the strong ebb flow's history of removing the headlands of Herne Bay's original bay before the 19th century. This current moving east, being baulked and turned north suddenly by the new sea defences of Hampton Pier Avenue and Hampion Pier, might easily erode the little Hampton-on-Sea bay in default of the Hampton Pier headland. Both the above theories allow for scoured coastal material to be removed to deeper waters to the north of Hampton-on-Sea by the ebb tide and by the occasional eddy, besides being dropped at Long Rock by an alternate normal east-west flow tide. When there are exceptional conditions on top of these tidal streams, for example a low pressure system causing higher water level coinciding with strong north-westerly winds, coastal flooding can occur.
but seaweed often blocked it, making it overflow and become stagnant. The land between the houses and the often-foetid Hampton Brook was low-lying enough to be subject to flood during a combination of spring tide, prolonged rainfall and onshore wind. Either the digging or the filling-in of the oyster company's fishpools
created soft, unstable land.Easdown 2008 p.23-41
s were ineffectual against the onset of the sea. John Davis and W.H. Banks abandoned numbers One and Two Herncliffe Gardens in July 1899, while numbers Three to Twelve remained tenanted until at least 1902, and in 1899-1900 a sea wall was built to protect the houses. By 1901 number Three had been abandoned, though officially listed as occupied, and the high water mark had reached the corner of number One. By 1905 Hampton Grand Parade and half of Marine Drive had been eroded away, then a storm broke through the sea wall and scoured out the land from behind it. In spite of having had to buy back land from worried investors, the Land Company continued to advertise empty houses in Herncliffe Gardens for sale. By 1910 the two seaward-end houses had been demolished, and by the end of 1911 all twelve houses of Herncliffe Gardens terrace were abandoned and then demolished with the sea at the back doors. In 1916, Eddington Gardens was abandoned by its last resident, Edmund Reid. By the 1920s only Hampton Farmhouse and numbers One and Two Eddington Gardens were left of Hampton-on-Sea, and the latter two were demolished in 1921. It is at that point that Hampton-on-Sea is said to have been finally drowned. In 1934, the old farmhouse was the last to go.
in the Metropolitan police
, and his most famous case was the Whitechapel murders in 1888. He named his house Reid's Ranch, painted castellations and cannon on its side and soon became known as the eccentric champion of the beleaguered Hampton-on-Sea residents. His house contained a parrot and many photographs of his London cases. His garden contained a cannonball found on his property, a post from the end of the old pier and a flagpole with a union flag. From a wooden kiosk in his garden named the Hampton-on-Sea Hotel he sold soft drinks and postcards featuring himself and the fast-vanishing remains of Hampton-on-Sea. Some of these were photographed by Fred C. Palmer
of Herne Bay
, who was the Herne Bay Press
photographer for all big events. The stagnant Hampton Brook became a butt of Reid's jokes and he renamed it Lavender Brook, sending sardonic letters to the Council about erosion, Hampton Brook, public facilities and the pier as shipping hazard. With two neighbours he built a bridge over the brook, but it was declared dangerous and demolished by the Council. The sea flowed closer to his property, and in 1915 he was the last remaining resident of Eddington Gardens and of Hampton-on-Sea. He abandoned his house in 1916, moved to Herne Bay, married in 1917 and died aged 71 on 5 December of the same year. He was buried in Herne Bay Cemetery in plot J62 on 8 December 1917.
of Herne Bay. Houses eventually filled Hampton Hill to the east of Hampton Pier Avenue, and Studd Hill to the south of the Hampton-on-Sea site. From 1929 to 1966 there was a boating lake in place of the landward oyster pond; it is now a playground. Besides the stub of Hampton Pier and the Hampton Inn, the curved shape of the Land Company's 1900 sea wall, visible at low tide, is all that is left of Hampton-on-Sea. From the 1990s to 2005 this object, known as The Rocks, was considered a shipping hazard, mainly with respect to the jetskiers who ignored and vandalised safety notices about jetskiing near The Rocks. Some chunks of it were removed by contractors until local objections prevented further loss of this landmark which now shelters rockpools
, mussel
s and feeding birds. The coast was conserved in 1959 to 1960 with a new sea defence, and in the same years the landscaping that followed a cliff drainage scheme running down from the Studd Hill estate replaced sea poppies
and summer crickets
with lawn.
Where Herncliffe Gardens and Eddington Gardens stood, there is now the 1959 sea wall, beach and undersea mud. Knowledge of what had existed there persisted mostly in the mythology of local children, until in the 1990s an information board featuring a picture of Reid was erected beside the Pier.Easdown 2008 p.41-49 A Council
Oyster Bay Trail cycle route, planned in 2009, is named after the area's history. Today there is an established walking route along the 1959 coastal defence; it is part of the Saxon Shore Way
. The committee for Herne Bay Festival 2008 agreed a cross-marketing strategy with Whitstable Oyster Festival, thus recognising the history of dredging off Herne Bay by the oyster fisheries working from Hampton-on-Sea in the 19th century. There is still a very small fleet of day fishing boats operating offshore of the Hampton area, and landing on the beach at Herne Bay.
Coastal erosion at Hampton-on-Sea has been estimated at two metres per annum between the construction of the old Hampton Pier in 1865 to 1959 when the Council built the sea wall. The direction and rate of influential currents is unknown, but it is calculated that 180 cubic metres of coastal sediment per annum is scoured by the sea from the Hampton-on-Sea coast and deposited two kilometres to the west at Long Rock, Swalecliffe
. This area with a defensive frontage
of 220 metres is now known as the Hampton Flood Basin
and Hampton Brook, now officially Westbrook, is still prone to floodlocking, as occurred in 2001. Although the 1959 sea wall and groyne
s were updated in 1983, and Hampton Pier Avenue's rock armour revetment
was upgraded in 1994, it is thought that eventually the sea defences would need to be raised. Nevertheless, although sea-damage was done by the great 1953 and 1978 storms, the upgraded defences protected this coast from the severe 1996 storm. Costs of increasing flood defences here are estimated at £1-7 million, especially as the work has to be modified because this area is a SSSI
and SPA
. Cost and limitations meant that a short-term solution of £635,000 capital works was recommended by the Council
Steering Group on 29 June 2009 to be implemented from winter 2011 to spring 2011. The recommendation was to hold the line with replacement and improvement of six timber groynes, importing a new beach of 12,000 cubic metres partly taken from Long Rock, raising and extending the rear wall and closing off openings with floodgates. Beach replenishment and groyne replanking would continue at intervals.
1955 children's novel Half Term Trail is set partly in Hampton-on-Sea under the fictional name of West Bay, and it features Pleasant Cottage (later called Hampton Bungalow; then Stillwaters) in Swalecliffe Avenue under the name of Dilly Dally cottage. Hampton's cliffs before the erection of the 1959 defences are described thus:
Herne Bay, Kent
Herne Bay is a seaside town in Kent, South East England, with a population of 35,188. On the south coast of the Thames Estuary, it is north of Canterbury and east of Whitstable. It neighbours the ancient villages of Herne and Reculver and is part of the City of Canterbury local government district...
. It grew from a tiny fishing hamlet in 1864 at the hands of an oyster fishery
Oyster farming
Oyster farming is an aquaculture practice in which oysters are raised for human consumption. Oyster farming most likely developed in tandem with pearl farming, a similar practice in which oysters are farmed for the purpose of developing pearls...
company, was developed from 1879 by land agents, abandoned in 1916 and finally drowned due to coastal erosion
Erosion
Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...
by 1921. All that now remains is the stub of the original pier, the Hampton Inn, and the rocky arc of Hampton-on-Sea's ruined coastal defence
Coastal management
In some jurisdictions the terms sea defense and coastal protection are used to mean, respectively, defense against flooding and erosion...
visible at low tide. The site is notable for sharing its history with the eccentric Edmund Reid. Reid was previously the Metropolitan Police
Metropolitan Police Service
The Metropolitan Police Service is the territorial police force responsible for Greater London, excluding the "square mile" of the City of London which is the responsibility of the City of London Police...
head of CID
Criminal Investigation Department
The Crime Investigation Department is the branch of all Territorial police forces within the British Police and many other Commonwealth police forces, to which plain clothes detectives belong. It is thus distinct from the Uniformed Branch and the Special Branch.The Metropolitan Police Service CID,...
who handled the Jack the Ripper case. In retirement he chose to champion the plight of the beleaguered residents of the settlement.
Location
Today Hampton, Herne BayHampton, Herne Bay
Hampton, Herne Bay is the coastal west end of Herne Bay, Kent. Formerly the site of the village of Hampton-on-Sea, the settlement is now underwater due to coastal erosion, but it was on the west side of the northern end of Hampton Pier Avenue, between the 1959 sea defences and the remains of the...
is the coastal west end of Herne Bay, Kent
Herne Bay, Kent
Herne Bay is a seaside town in Kent, South East England, with a population of 35,188. On the south coast of the Thames Estuary, it is north of Canterbury and east of Whitstable. It neighbours the ancient villages of Herne and Reculver and is part of the City of Canterbury local government district...
. The site of Hampton-on-Sea is now underwater due to coastal erosion
Erosion
Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...
, but it was on the west side of the northern end of Hampton Pier Avenue, between the 1959 sea defences and the remains of the sea wall which are exposed at low water in Hampton bay. When Hampton-on-Sea existed and until 1934, the Hampton-on-Sea site was under the jurisdiction of Blean Rural District Council, the boundary with Herne Bay Council running north-south along the line of the present-day Hampton Pier Avenue. In 1934, the area was transferred to Herne Bay Urban District Council,Easdown 2008 p.43 and in 1974 to Canterbury City Council
City of Canterbury
The City of Canterbury is a local government district with city status in Kent, England. The main settlement in the district is Canterbury, the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury.-History:...
.
Background
On the sea-bed, offshore of this site, are remains of prehistoric and Roman activity. Hampton means "home farm", and before the development there were two farmhouses, a beerhouse, a few cottages containing the Mount and Quick fishing families, and the West Brook which was also known as Hampton Brook. The settlement had a reputation for a wild life, and Hill Farmhouse was said to have cellars or caves underneath for smuggling. Some cottages were built of old boats and wreckage; Hampton Farmhouse was then 300 yards from the sea and dated back to the 17th century.Easdown 2008 p.4 A low sea cliff made of soil edged the coast west of Hampton Pier, and coastal erosion was already an acknowledged problem for the farmers by 1836.Easdown 2008 p.3Ridout's Guide to Herne Bay, 1882 Altogether the coastline at this site receded by 175 metres (574.1 ft) in the years between the completion of Hampton Pier in 1865, and the start of construction of modern coastal defences in 1958. Sea floodings have been officially recorded on this coastline since the great storm of 1897.Oyster fisheries
OysterOyster
The word oyster is used as a common name for a number of distinct groups of bivalve molluscs which live in marine or brackish habitats. The valves are highly calcified....
s had thrived in the Thames Estuary
Thames Estuary
The Thames Mouth is the estuary in which the River Thames meets the waters of the North Sea.It is not easy to define the limits of the estuary, although physically the head of Sea Reach, near Canvey Island on the Essex shore is probably the western boundary...
since the Romans
Roman Britain
Roman Britain was the part of the island of Great Britain controlled by the Roman Empire from AD 43 until ca. AD 410.The Romans referred to the imperial province as Britannia, which eventually comprised all of the island of Great Britain south of the fluid frontier with Caledonia...
promoted them; they were sold in city streets and eaten raw.Easdown 2008 p.5 The Herne Bay, Hampton and Reculver Oyster Fishery Company was incorporated with £10,000 capital in £10 shares on 25 July 1864 with Frank Buckland as chairman and Mr Cholmondeley Pennell as deputy. 1860-1864 had been a boom year for oyster farming
Oyster farming
Oyster farming is an aquaculture practice in which oysters are raised for human consumption. Oyster farming most likely developed in tandem with pearl farming, a similar practice in which oysters are farmed for the purpose of developing pearls...
, especially in nearby Whitstable
Whitstable
Whitstable is a seaside town in Northeast Kent, Southeast England. It is approximately north of the city of Canterbury and approximately west of the seaside town of Herne Bay. It is part of the City of Canterbury district and has a population of about 30,000.Whitstable is famous for its oysters,...
, and the Government supported the trade in 1866 by passing an Act to promote cultivation. The company's proposals included five oyster smacks
Smack (ship)
A smack was a traditional fishing boat used off the coast of England and the Atlantic coast of America for most of the 19th century, and even in small numbers up to the Second World War. It was originally a cutter rigged sailing boat until about 1865, when the smacks became so large that cutter...
or yawl
Yawl
A yawl is a two-masted sailing craft similar to a sloop or cutter but with an additional mast located well aft of the main mast, often right on the transom, specifically aft of the rudder post. A yawl (from Dutch Jol) is a two-masted sailing craft similar to a sloop or cutter but with an...
s, a pier with storehouses, housing for workers and five freshwater breeding ponds
Fish pond
A fish pond, or fishpond, is a controlled pond, artificial lake, or reservoir that is stocked with fish and is used in aquaculture for fish farming, or is used for recreational fishing or for ornamental purposes...
. In spite of objections from local business competition, the company acquired an Act of Parliament and land at Hampton. According to the Act of 25 July 1864, the company had sole rights to dredge for oysters for seven miles (11 km) from Swalecliffe to Reculver and up to three miles (5 km) - but mainly one and a half miles - from shore. The total area under its jurisdiction was nine square miles, of which a third was foreshore, and it employed thirty-three regular men; sometimes up to a hundred. In 1865 and 1866 their chairman Cholmondeley Pennell applied unsuccessfully for extensions to these rights. Before selling the oysters dredged from the Estuary, the company obtained brood oysters from Essex, France, Holland and Portugal. The smacks took the oysters twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays to Billingsgate
Billingsgate
Billingsgate is a small ward in the south-east of the City of London, lying on the north bank of the River Thames between London Bridge and Tower Bridge...
.
The company was successful at first, although stressed by underfunding and the cost of the pier, and by 1866 an enquiry commission stated: "The Company have already cleared about five square miles, and culched about one square mile of their grounds, and have laid down on parts of their beds many millions of oysters". However, as the company was still relatively new, they had not yet developed their oysters to quite the same market value as the long-established Whitstable ones. A sideline for the Hampton fishermen was cement stones, because they were found on the Hampton fishing grounds. These were boulders the size of a man's head, sold to manufacturers of Roman cement. There was a dispute with the rival Whitstable Oyster Company, and Whitstable was fined £1 per oyster taken from Hampton's grounds, while Hampton was accused of not fully exploiting its breeding ponds and of importing foreign oysters for resale.Easdown 2008 p.7 In 1869, local inshore fishermen complained that their traditional territory was now defended on the company's behalf by HMS Buzzard and that the company employed outsiders for long hours and low pay. In the 1870s the oyster trade went into decline and suffered over-fishing, and in 1876 the Government set up a select committee to enquire into scarcity and price. The result was the 1877 Act which prevented sale of dredged oysters in June to August, and freshwater pond oysters between May and August. In the following three severe winters, oysters died in the shallow Estuary waters and the company went into liquidation. The business passed into the hands of hotel owner Major Davis who closed it down when his operation went to Faversham. Company assets were sold on 20 July 1881 and it officially wound up in 1884.Easdown 2008 p.9
Tramway
The tramway began and ended with the oyster fishery from 1864 to 1884. So that cargo could begin its journey to Kent and London on a horse-tram, the tramway was built due south from the pier to the railway which had been built in 1861. This track, which was later to become Hampton Pier Avenue, was straightened at its northern end and raised above risk of flood for the tram. By 1866 the tracks were still not laid along the pier itself, but according to the OSOrdnance Survey
Ordnance Survey , an executive agency and non-ministerial government department of the Government of the United Kingdom, is the national mapping agency for Great Britain, producing maps of Great Britain , and one of the world's largest producers of maps.The name reflects its creation together with...
map of 1878, it had been completed by then. At the southern end, the tramway curved westward, running beside Westbrook, and reached the railway line just east of the point where Westbrook crosses it, and to the west of where Hampton Close is today: see 1878 map, pictured. One Judah Downs won £900 in a dispute over land crossed by the tramway, and the company later bought him out as well.Easdown 2008 p.6 After the company went into liquidation, the tramway was removed in the 1880s. For much of the 20th century it was possible to see where the tramway reached the railway line.
Resort
Thomas Kyffin Freeman, owner of the Herne Bay Argus, formed the Hampton-on-Sea Estate Association Limited in 1879 with £60,000 capital in £10 shares, but only sold 398 shares. He built a bandstandBandstand
A bandstand is a circular or semicircular structure set in a park, garden, pier, or indoor space, designed to accommodate musical bands performing concerts...
, built foundations for reading rooms
Library
In a traditional sense, a library is a large collection of books, and can refer to the place in which the collection is housed. Today, the term can refer to any collection, including digital sources, resources, and services...
and planned tennis courts, a miniature golf
Miniature golf
Miniature golf, or minigolf, is a miniature version of the sport of golf. While the international sports organization World Minigolf Sport Federation prefers to use the name "minigolf", the general public in different countries has also many other names for the game: miniature golf, mini-golf,...
course, an archery
Archery
Archery is the art, practice, or skill of propelling arrows with the use of a bow, from Latin arcus. Archery has historically been used for hunting and combat; in modern times, however, its main use is that of a recreational activity...
green and a recreation ground. He organised a sports day with free teas
Tea (meal)
Tea can refer to any of several different meals or mealtimes, depending on a country's customs and its history of drinking tea. However, in those countries where the term's use is common, the influences are generally those of the former British Empire...
and fairground
Funfair
A funfair or simply "fair" is a small to medium sized travelling show primarily composed of stalls and other amusements. Larger fairs such as the permanent fairs of cities and seaside resorts might be called a fairground, although technically this should refer to the land where a fair is...
entertainments, but too many visitors arrived and he ran out of teas. With builder Thomas Richard Geelong Hoe he planned a housing estate, and a Hampton-on-Sea nameboard was put up at Herne Bay railway station
Herne Bay railway station
Herne Bay is a railway station on the Chatham Main Line in North Kent serving the town of Herne Bay. Train services are provided by Southeastern.- History :...
in expectation of this, but then he died in 1880. The company was eventually dissolved in 1905.Easdown 2008 p.10
Frederick Francis Ramuz, Mayor of Southend and land agent, bought the property cheaply. The Hampton Pier Inn (today the Hampton Inn) became the Land Company's base for its administration of the 750 acres (3 km²) of land it had bought altogether in Herne Bay. Planned street names which no longer exist were Swalecliffe Gardens, Hampton Grand Parade, Marine Drive, Canterbury Gardens, Hampton Gardens, Eddington Gardens next to Hampton Farmhouse and Herncliffe Gardens incorporating the oyster fishery's Hampton Terrace. The company proposed a genteel resort with large brick bungalow
Bungalow
A bungalow is a type of house, with varying meanings across the world. Common features to many of these definitions include being detached, low-rise , and the use of verandahs...
s and villa
Villa
A villa was originally an ancient Roman upper-class country house. Since its origins in the Roman villa, the idea and function of a villa have evolved considerably. After the fall of the Roman Republic, villas became small farming compounds, which were increasingly fortified in Late Antiquity,...
s, a temperance hotel plus church, and shops plus tavern. Freeman's idea for a recreation ground was resurrected for good measure.
Ramuz divided the "Grand Parade Estate at Hampton-on-Sea" into 124 development plots for the first auction on 17 September 1888 "to suit all classes" and set up a sales marquee onsite. Cheap, refundable train fares and a free lunch were promised to prospective purchasers.Easdown 2008 p.10-21Herne Bay Press, September 1888 All the plots were sold within one and a half hours after the buyers, mostly from London, were serenaded by the Buffs 3rd Battalion band during their free lunch. Plots facing the sea made £18, and those at the back £8 to £9, with the old farmhouse making £100 and the tavern plot £39: all moneys were payable in instalments. The Land Company made £2,000.Herne Bay Press, 22 September 1888
By the date of the second marquee-auction of 126 more plots, the Land Company had built roads and was repairing the pier. Plots were advertised more energetically than before and promoted on the basis of Herne Bay's smallness, cheapness, ripeness for speculation and its proximity to the railway line. Sales were aimed at landlords wanting to buy cheaply and rent at profit, because at that time house-ownership was uncommon and tenancy was the norm. Prospective purchasers were promised trams and buses to take tenants to the railway station, or even an extra railway station close to the estate. The empty and rural nature of this spot was translated into promises of botanising
Botany
Botany, plant science, or plant biology is a branch of biology that involves the scientific study of plant life. Traditionally, botany also included the study of fungi, algae and viruses...
, shooting, bathing, sailing and angling. Although no cheap train was provided on this occasion, plots sold at £8 to £32, making the Land Company £1,370.Herne Bay Press, October 1888 During 1889 sales were promoted by newspaper advertisements rather than auctions, and the pier's repairs were said to be ongoing. According to these advertisements there were croquet
Croquet
Croquet is a lawn game, played both as a recreational pastime and as a competitive sport. It involves hitting plastic or wooden balls with a mallet through hoops embedded into the grass playing court.-History:...
lawns and tennis courts plus a spring
Spring (hydrosphere)
A spring—also known as a rising or resurgence—is a component of the hydrosphere. Specifically, it is any natural situation where water flows to the surface of the earth from underground...
.Herne Bay Press, 1889
A third sale of 144 plots took place on 7 July 1890 making £2,450 for the Land Company, and events included a regatta with a coastguards' race and pair-oared rowing race, plus a traditional duck hunt in which a man acts as duck. The fourth and final auction of 124 plots on 28 July 1890 promised yet another special train from London and the opportunity to buy the shop plots and more villa plots. Four shop plots went for £54, villa plots for £3 to £7, and we are not told the sum earned by the company. Some plots remained unsold, and these were advertised throughout 1891.Herne Bay Press, July 1890Herne Bay Press, 9 May 1891 Following the four auctions and three years of advertising, very few plots were developed, and the temperance hotel, church, shops and tavern were never built.
Hampton pier
Hampton pier was built of wood and concrete by the oyster company in 1865 at cost of £28,000; it was 1050 feet (320 m) long so that the landing stage was in deep enough water to allow for the two-fathomFathom
A fathom is a unit of length in the imperial and the U.S. customary systems, used especially for measuring the depth of water.There are 2 yards in an imperial or U.S. fathom...
draught
Draft (hull)
The draft of a ship's hull is the vertical distance between the waterline and the bottom of the hull , with the thickness of the hull included; in the case of not being included the draft outline would be obtained...
of the smacks
Smack (ship)
A smack was a traditional fishing boat used off the coast of England and the Atlantic coast of America for most of the 19th century, and even in small numbers up to the Second World War. It was originally a cutter rigged sailing boat until about 1865, when the smacks became so large that cutter...
. It curved slightly westwards to allow the company's oyster smacks and European oyster trading boats to berth on the lee side in a north-easterly wind. Its purpose was threefold: a landing stage for oysters and materials, a shelter for the oyster smacks and a breakwater for fishing grounds. The Lord Mayor of London
Lord Mayor of London
The Right Honourable Lord Mayor of London is the legal title for the Mayor of the City of London Corporation. The Lord Mayor of London is to be distinguished from the Mayor of London; the former is an officer only of the City of London, while the Mayor of London is the Mayor of Greater London and...
Thomas Gabriel arrived in a special train to open it on 15 September 1866. After the collapse of the oyster fishery, the pier was said to be under repair by land agent Frederick Francis Ramuz in October 1888.Herne Bay Press, 13 October 1888 Thereafter, the pier became derelict. In the great storm of 28–29 November 1897 it was badly damaged, and then partially demolished in 1898 to halt erosion and save the houses of Hampton-on-Sea.Daily Mail, 5 December 1898 In 1901, the Council bought it and at a cost of £2,000 rebuilt the stub in 1903-1904 as it is today, at 350 feet (106.7 m) long. The remaining piles and ruins of the old pier were a shipping hazard and had to be buoyed with large warning notices.
Tidal causes
The cause of the erosionErosion
Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...
and flooding which eventually drowned this development was the original Hampton Pier. The ebb and flow
Tide
Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the combined effects of the gravitational forces exerted by the moon and the sun and the rotation of the Earth....
of tidal streams
Oceanography
Oceanography , also called oceanology or marine science, is the branch of Earth science that studies the ocean...
is powerful in the shallow Thames Estuary
Thames Estuary
The Thames Mouth is the estuary in which the River Thames meets the waters of the North Sea.It is not easy to define the limits of the estuary, although physically the head of Sea Reach, near Canvey Island on the Essex shore is probably the western boundary...
, where its tidal waters are caught in the vortex of the tidal push from Atlantic
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions. With a total area of about , it covers approximately 20% of the Earth's surface and about 26% of its water surface area...
waters via both the north and south of the British Isles. Off Herne Bay, the running ebb current moves at 10.15 knots, and the flow at 9.14 knots (17.9 km/h). Where strong currents meet and divide, or are disrupted by uneven coastal features, there are eddies
Eddy (fluid dynamics)
In fluid dynamics, an eddy is the swirling of a fluid and the reverse current created when the fluid flows past an obstacle. The moving fluid creates a space devoid of downstream-flowing fluid on the downstream side of the object...
. After Hampton Pier was first built, the flow running west along Herne Bay beach dropped its sand and pebbles on the east side of the pier instead of replenishing beach material in front of the new development. Subsequently, after being forced into a loop around the pier-end it was possibly forced into a shoreward eddy by deep-water currents. That means that at a certain point in the flow-tide it could have continued briefly westward past Hampton-on-Sea, then turned inshore and looped back strongly eastwards along the beach towards Hampton Pier Avenue, eroding land at Hampton-on-Sea and then turning north along Hampton Pier Avenue and the pier, carrying soil with it. It is said that the later shortening of the pier was not enough and that erosion will continue, so such an eddy may explain the need for today's shore defences along the north end of Hampton Pier Avenue. An additional possibility is related to the strong ebb flow's history of removing the headlands of Herne Bay's original bay before the 19th century. This current moving east, being baulked and turned north suddenly by the new sea defences of Hampton Pier Avenue and Hampion Pier, might easily erode the little Hampton-on-Sea bay in default of the Hampton Pier headland. Both the above theories allow for scoured coastal material to be removed to deeper waters to the north of Hampton-on-Sea by the ebb tide and by the occasional eddy, besides being dropped at Long Rock by an alternate normal east-west flow tide. When there are exceptional conditions on top of these tidal streams, for example a low pressure system causing higher water level coinciding with strong north-westerly winds, coastal flooding can occur.
Causes on land
Hampton Brook, now Westbrook, reached the sea through a stone culvertCulvert
A culvert is a device used to channel water. It may be used to allow water to pass underneath a road, railway, or embankment. Culverts can be made of many different materials; steel, polyvinyl chloride and concrete are the most common...
but seaweed often blocked it, making it overflow and become stagnant. The land between the houses and the often-foetid Hampton Brook was low-lying enough to be subject to flood during a combination of spring tide, prolonged rainfall and onshore wind. Either the digging or the filling-in of the oyster company's fishpools
Fish farming
Fish farming is the principal form of aquaculture, while other methods may fall under mariculture. Fish farming involves raising fish commercially in tanks or enclosures, usually for food. A facility that releases young fish into the wild for recreational fishing or to supplement a species'...
created soft, unstable land.Easdown 2008 p.23-41
Buildings, sea wall and flooding
Hampton Terrace was built for the oyster company's workers in 1866, and it later became part of Herncliffe Gardens which no longer exists. The Hampton Oyster Inn, today the Hampton Inn, was built by a brewer opposite the pier entrance. Only eight plots bought from the Land Company were developed: Hampton Terrace in Herncliffe Gardens was extended by three villas; four villas were built in Eddington Gardens alongside the old Hampton Farmhouse; lastly Pleasant Cottage, later called Hampton Bungalow, was built in Swalecliffe Avenue in the late 1890s. Of the roads and plots created by the Land Company, only Swalecliffe Avenue and Hampton Pier Avenue survive today.Easdown 2008 p.49 Wave damage in the great storm of 28–29 November 1897 damaged the three Herncliffe Garden houses, and brought coastal erosion closer to the properties. In 1899, a wall of faggots and four 250 feet (76.2 m) groyneGroyne
A groyne is a rigid hydraulic structure built from an ocean shore or from a bank that interrupts water flow and limits the movement of sediment. In the ocean, groynes create beaches, or avoid having them washed away by longshore drift. In a river, groynes prevent erosion and ice-jamming, which...
s were ineffectual against the onset of the sea. John Davis and W.H. Banks abandoned numbers One and Two Herncliffe Gardens in July 1899, while numbers Three to Twelve remained tenanted until at least 1902, and in 1899-1900 a sea wall was built to protect the houses. By 1901 number Three had been abandoned, though officially listed as occupied, and the high water mark had reached the corner of number One. By 1905 Hampton Grand Parade and half of Marine Drive had been eroded away, then a storm broke through the sea wall and scoured out the land from behind it. In spite of having had to buy back land from worried investors, the Land Company continued to advertise empty houses in Herncliffe Gardens for sale. By 1910 the two seaward-end houses had been demolished, and by the end of 1911 all twelve houses of Herncliffe Gardens terrace were abandoned and then demolished with the sea at the back doors. In 1916, Eddington Gardens was abandoned by its last resident, Edmund Reid. By the 1920s only Hampton Farmhouse and numbers One and Two Eddington Gardens were left of Hampton-on-Sea, and the latter two were demolished in 1921. It is at that point that Hampton-on-Sea is said to have been finally drowned. In 1934, the old farmhouse was the last to go.
Edmund Reid
(b.1846; d. Herne Bay 5 December 1917) In 1903, Edmund James Reid moved into number Four, Eddington Gardens: the house at the landward end of the terrace, previously advertised for £300. At that point the sea was still about two hundred yards away. He had retired in 1896 or 1898, having been head of CIDCriminal Investigation Department
The Crime Investigation Department is the branch of all Territorial police forces within the British Police and many other Commonwealth police forces, to which plain clothes detectives belong. It is thus distinct from the Uniformed Branch and the Special Branch.The Metropolitan Police Service CID,...
in the Metropolitan police
Metropolitan police
Metropolitan Police is a generic title for the municipal police force for a major metropolitan area, and it may be part of the official title of the force...
, and his most famous case was the Whitechapel murders in 1888. He named his house Reid's Ranch, painted castellations and cannon on its side and soon became known as the eccentric champion of the beleaguered Hampton-on-Sea residents. His house contained a parrot and many photographs of his London cases. His garden contained a cannonball found on his property, a post from the end of the old pier and a flagpole with a union flag. From a wooden kiosk in his garden named the Hampton-on-Sea Hotel he sold soft drinks and postcards featuring himself and the fast-vanishing remains of Hampton-on-Sea. Some of these were photographed by Fred C. Palmer
Frederick Christian Palmer
Frederick Christian Palmer , known professionally as Fred C. Palmer, was the main public photographer of Herne Bay, Kent in the early years of the 20th century, working from Tower Studio...
of Herne Bay
Herne Bay, Kent
Herne Bay is a seaside town in Kent, South East England, with a population of 35,188. On the south coast of the Thames Estuary, it is north of Canterbury and east of Whitstable. It neighbours the ancient villages of Herne and Reculver and is part of the City of Canterbury local government district...
, who was the Herne Bay Press
Kentish Gazette
The Kentish Gazette is a weekly newspaper serving the city of Canterbury, Kent. It is owned by the KM Group and is published on Thursdays.-History:The newspaper claims to be the second oldest surviving newspaper in the United Kingdom....
photographer for all big events. The stagnant Hampton Brook became a butt of Reid's jokes and he renamed it Lavender Brook, sending sardonic letters to the Council about erosion, Hampton Brook, public facilities and the pier as shipping hazard. With two neighbours he built a bridge over the brook, but it was declared dangerous and demolished by the Council. The sea flowed closer to his property, and in 1915 he was the last remaining resident of Eddington Gardens and of Hampton-on-Sea. He abandoned his house in 1916, moved to Herne Bay, married in 1917 and died aged 71 on 5 December of the same year. He was buried in Herne Bay Cemetery in plot J62 on 8 December 1917.
Aftermath
By the 1920s and 30s on the higher land of Hampton, the first houses on Hampton Pier Avenue and Swalecliffe Avenue were being built; this time as a suburbSuburb
The word suburb mostly refers to a residential area, either existing as part of a city or as a separate residential community within commuting distance of a city . Some suburbs have a degree of administrative autonomy, and most have lower population density than inner city neighborhoods...
of Herne Bay. Houses eventually filled Hampton Hill to the east of Hampton Pier Avenue, and Studd Hill to the south of the Hampton-on-Sea site. From 1929 to 1966 there was a boating lake in place of the landward oyster pond; it is now a playground. Besides the stub of Hampton Pier and the Hampton Inn, the curved shape of the Land Company's 1900 sea wall, visible at low tide, is all that is left of Hampton-on-Sea. From the 1990s to 2005 this object, known as The Rocks, was considered a shipping hazard, mainly with respect to the jetskiers who ignored and vandalised safety notices about jetskiing near The Rocks. Some chunks of it were removed by contractors until local objections prevented further loss of this landmark which now shelters rockpools
Tide pool
Tide pools are rocky pools by oceans that are filled with seawater. Many of these pools exist as separate entities only at low tide.Tide pools are habitats of uniquely adaptable animals that have engaged the special attention of naturalists and marine biologists, as well as philosophical...
, mussel
Mussel
The common name mussel is used for members of several families of clams or bivalvia mollusca, from saltwater and freshwater habitats. These groups have in common a shell whose outline is elongated and asymmetrical compared with other edible clams, which are often more or less rounded or oval.The...
s and feeding birds. The coast was conserved in 1959 to 1960 with a new sea defence, and in the same years the landscaping that followed a cliff drainage scheme running down from the Studd Hill estate replaced sea poppies
Glaucium flavum
Glaucium flavum is a summer flowering plant in the Papaveraceae family, which is native to Northern Africa, Macaronesia, temperate zones in Western Asia and the Caucasus, as well as Europe. Habitat: the plant grows on the seashore and is never found inland...
and summer crickets
Cricket (insect)
Crickets, family Gryllidae , are insects somewhat related to grasshoppers, and more closely related to katydids or bush crickets . They have somewhat flattened bodies and long antennae. There are about 900 species of crickets...
with lawn.
Where Herncliffe Gardens and Eddington Gardens stood, there is now the 1959 sea wall, beach and undersea mud. Knowledge of what had existed there persisted mostly in the mythology of local children, until in the 1990s an information board featuring a picture of Reid was erected beside the Pier.Easdown 2008 p.41-49 A Council
City of Canterbury
The City of Canterbury is a local government district with city status in Kent, England. The main settlement in the district is Canterbury, the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury.-History:...
Oyster Bay Trail cycle route, planned in 2009, is named after the area's history. Today there is an established walking route along the 1959 coastal defence; it is part of the Saxon Shore Way
Saxon Shore Way
The Saxon Shore Way is a long-distance footpath in England, starting at Gravesend, Kent and traces the coast as it was in Roman times as far as Hastings, East Sussex, in total.-History:...
. The committee for Herne Bay Festival 2008 agreed a cross-marketing strategy with Whitstable Oyster Festival, thus recognising the history of dredging off Herne Bay by the oyster fisheries working from Hampton-on-Sea in the 19th century. There is still a very small fleet of day fishing boats operating offshore of the Hampton area, and landing on the beach at Herne Bay.
Coastal erosion at Hampton-on-Sea has been estimated at two metres per annum between the construction of the old Hampton Pier in 1865 to 1959 when the Council built the sea wall. The direction and rate of influential currents is unknown, but it is calculated that 180 cubic metres of coastal sediment per annum is scoured by the sea from the Hampton-on-Sea coast and deposited two kilometres to the west at Long Rock, Swalecliffe
Swalecliffe
Swalecliffe is a village between Whitstable and Herne Bay and is opposite its neighbouring village Chestfield. The village has fewer than 400 residents, and is located in the South East of England.In Swalecliffe, you can find:...
. This area with a defensive frontage
Coastal management
In some jurisdictions the terms sea defense and coastal protection are used to mean, respectively, defense against flooding and erosion...
of 220 metres is now known as the Hampton Flood Basin
Balancing lake
A balancing lake is a term used in the U.K. describing an element of an urban drainage system used to control flooding by temporarily storing flood waters...
and Hampton Brook, now officially Westbrook, is still prone to floodlocking, as occurred in 2001. Although the 1959 sea wall and groyne
Groyne
A groyne is a rigid hydraulic structure built from an ocean shore or from a bank that interrupts water flow and limits the movement of sediment. In the ocean, groynes create beaches, or avoid having them washed away by longshore drift. In a river, groynes prevent erosion and ice-jamming, which...
s were updated in 1983, and Hampton Pier Avenue's rock armour revetment
Revetment
Revetments, or revêtements , have a variety of meanings in architecture, engineering and art history. In stream restoration, river engineering or coastal management, they are sloping structures placed on banks or cliffs in such a way as to absorb the energy of incoming water...
was upgraded in 1994, it is thought that eventually the sea defences would need to be raised. Nevertheless, although sea-damage was done by the great 1953 and 1978 storms, the upgraded defences protected this coast from the severe 1996 storm. Costs of increasing flood defences here are estimated at £1-7 million, especially as the work has to be modified because this area is a SSSI
Site of Special Scientific Interest
A Site of Special Scientific Interest is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom. SSSIs are the basic building block of site-based nature conservation legislation and most other legal nature/geological conservation designations in Great Britain are based upon...
and SPA
Special Protection Area
A Special Protection Area or SPA is a designation under the European Union Directive on the Conservation of Wild Birds.Under the Directive, Member States of the European Union have a duty to safeguard the habitats of migratory birds and certain particularly threatened birds.Together with Special...
. Cost and limitations meant that a short-term solution of £635,000 capital works was recommended by the Council
City of Canterbury
The City of Canterbury is a local government district with city status in Kent, England. The main settlement in the district is Canterbury, the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury.-History:...
Steering Group on 29 June 2009 to be implemented from winter 2011 to spring 2011. The recommendation was to hold the line with replacement and improvement of six timber groynes, importing a new beach of 12,000 cubic metres partly taken from Long Rock, raising and extending the rear wall and closing off openings with floodgates. Beach replenishment and groyne replanking would continue at intervals.
Cultural references
Will Scott'sWilliam Matthew Scott
William Matthew Scott , pen name Will Scott, was a British author of stories and books for adults and children, published from 1920 to 1965. Towards the end of his life he was best known for The Cherrys series, written for children and published between 1952 and 1965...
1955 children's novel Half Term Trail is set partly in Hampton-on-Sea under the fictional name of West Bay, and it features Pleasant Cottage (later called Hampton Bungalow; then Stillwaters) in Swalecliffe Avenue under the name of Dilly Dally cottage. Hampton's cliffs before the erection of the 1959 defences are described thus:
"The first cliffs in West Bay are hardly cliffs at all. It's where the stream runs out across the beach, and you can stand on the sands and look over the edge of the cliffs without even standing on your toes. Farther along the cliffs are higher and crumbly and falling into the sea all the time, which was one reason why nobody wanted to buy Dilly Dally. A few more years and it would be in the sea along with the cliff."
See also
- Coastal managementCoastal managementIn some jurisdictions the terms sea defense and coastal protection are used to mean, respectively, defense against flooding and erosion...
- Coastal erosionCoastal erosionCoastal erosion is the wearing away of land and the removal of beach or dune sediments by wave action, tidal currents, wave currents, or drainage...
- Beach evolutionBeach evolutionThe shoreline is where the land meets the sea and it is continually changing. Over the long term, the water is eroding the land. Beaches represent a special case, in that they exist where sand accumulated from the same processes that strip away rocky and sedmientary material. I.e., they can grow as...
- Abandoned villageAbandoned villageAn abandoned village is a village that has, for some reason, been deserted. In many countries, and throughout history, thousands of villages were deserted for a variety of causes...
- List of lost settlements in the United Kingdom
External links
- List of documents relating to Hampton, held by Canterbury Cathedral Archives (access date: 20 February 2011)
- Abandoned Communities ..... Hampton-on-Sea by researcher Stephen Fisk, 2010
- Hampton Inn, Herne Bay
- Maritime: Herne Bay History - Hampton
- CCC Engineering Services: Swalecliffe to Hampton flood and coastal erosion strategy plan: Consultation draft summary report, November 2009 (pdf file)
- Coast protection scheme 1994: Hampton Pier Avenue
- Abandoned communities website
- Youtube: Whitstable oyster dredging, sampling, and packing: original 1920 film