Page 26 - Kentculture Creative Magazine

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WE LOVE HYTHE LIFE food festival
August Bank Holiday Weekend, Sunday 28th & 29th Hythe Cricket Club 10am - 7pm
Wide variety of Artisan Food Stalls Local Delicacies
Craft Beer Tent
Pimms Tent
Homemade Sodas
Food & Recipe Demo’s
Mixologist Master Classes for Perfect Cocktails Chocolate Making Classes ( kids & adults) Childrens Entertainment
LIVE Music ALL Day
kentculture folkestonecreative.co.uk Summer 2016
Message in a
BOTTLE An Archeological Opportunity
D
DEVELOPMENT IN HYTHE
REVEAL HIDDEN HISTORY
espite the dismay expressed at the loss of the mental health home in Hythe by Shepway Green Party
regarding it’s closure. The development of “The Paddocks” at 13 Prospect Road Hythe Kent, has been approved. Erection is due to take place of a three storey residential development.
Miss Twyman’s stable block was but a few metres away in the 1950’s on the corner of Theatre Street, and as the name The Paddocks suggests the site may well
reveal some of Hythe’s past history.
There was stabling for 36 horses in Hythe in 1686. Also there was a gun battery on a platform in front of the town, facing the sea. It had four guns in 1684 and six guns in 1799. These all within a few metres of The Paddocks in the vicinity of the carpark in front of Aldi.
Most of the visible features of Hythe date from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The town is seen as historically significant because of its well-
documented history rather than because of well-known archaeological deposits.
Sandtun, Hythe’s lost village, is mentioned in a charter of AD 773 King Egbert of Kent granted land at Sandtun (West Hythe) to Dunn, abbot of Lyminge. Mention of
saltworks are made here, and archaeological excavation revealed important artefacts regarding early trade with the continent. By the late medieval period Hythe had some 74 seamen and fishermen. Significant finds have been discovered from time to time, but this may well be an oppotunity to discover more of Hythe’s rich history.
The ancient town of Hythe grew up on high land beside a natural harbour formed by a broad creek which has long been silted up, so that the old town of Hythe is now about 1km inland and there are modern residential developments to the south built over the former harbour.
Eighteenth Century occupants of the building were members of the Shipden family who also had a business in the nearby Theatre Street. >>>
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