History of Brighthelmston; or, Brighton as I View it and Others Knew It / With a Chronological Table of Local Events

Transcribed from the 1862 E. Lewis edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
By JOHN ACKERSON ERREDGE,
( Author of “ The Students’ Hand Book ,” &c. )
BRIGHTON: PRINTED BY E. LEWIS, “OBSERVER” OFFICE, 52a, NORTH STREET.
1862.
The publication of the History of Brighton had proceeded, with the most gratifying success, through ten monthly numbers, when it was suddenly interrupted by the lamented decease of the Author—Mr. J. A. Erredge. Death came upon him, not stealthily, but in its most awful form. It surprised him literally at the desk. Whilst talking cheerfully to the publisher, the hand of Death was laid upon him, and he fell dead to the ground;—the ink of these pages was still wet whilst the Author was extended on the floor a corpse. So terrible an occurrence for a brief space delayed the publication of the work, but fortunately for the family of the author, the MS. was nearly completed, and his sons were enabled, from the materials left by their lamented father, to compile the few last pages and send the two concluding numbers through the press. The History of Brighton is now completed, and whatever shortcomings may be detected in the two concluding numbers, which had not the advantage of being corrected by the Author, will no doubt be pardoned by a generous public.
By whatever name Brighton was then known, there is no doubt it was a place of some note in the time of the Romans, as it was peculiarly favourable to all the purposes of the fisher and the hunter. Romish coins are still frequently found in its vicinity, and in the year 1750, near the town, an urn was dug up, which contained a thousand denarii of different impresses from Antoninus Pius to the Emperor Philip; and since that time there have been found in some of the burghs or barrows to the east of the town, ashes and fragments of human bones, enclosed in urns of Roman manufacture. In preparing the ground for enclosing of the Old Stein, in 1818, several Roman coins were turned up by the workmen, on one of which, round the impression of the head, was the inscription, “IMP. ALEXANDER PIUS, A. V. C,” and on the reverse, “MARS ULTOR,” with the initials S. C. between the figure of Mars. The date, however, was illegible. In forming the Race Course to the south of the Stand,—since restored to its original state,—several urns of Roman fabrication were dug up; and since then, to the east of the town, ashes and fragments of human bones have been found enclosed in Roman urns.