STOKE.
The only way to reach the Isle of Grain is to return through Allhallows and proceed to Lower Stoke, a hamlet at the cross-roads, occupying as it were a strategic position midway between a number of extremely small, so-called “villages.” They have nothing in the nature of a shop, and thus the “General Stores” at Lower Stoke fulfils the enviable position of a central emporium. At Lower Stoke, turning left, we come along a marsh road, bordered with deep ditches, across a narrow bridge, into the Isle of Grain, with the railway to Port Victoria running companionably alongside. Port Victoria is glimpsed a mile or so away on the right: all you see of it, across the marshes, being the big funnels of the steamships, some huge oil-tanks, and the great lonely bulk of an hotel. There is no special feature in the Isle of Grain, whose name, by the way, has nothing to do with corn or wheat. It is cognate with the word “groin,” and means a projecting piece of land. Near the shore, overlooking the mouth of the Thames, Southend, and Nore Lightship on one hand, and the Medway and Sheerness on the other, is the village of Grain and the recently restored church, for a number of years little better than a ruin. Here, too, is Fort Grain, with the newly-built naval seaplane station.
Retracing the road to Lower Stoke and turning to left at the cross-roads, we come through Stoke village, with its Early English church and scattered houses set amidst vast flat fields. On the left stretch Stoke saltings, accessible only by water, and frequented only by wild-fowling sportsmen, who thread the oozy channels in their flat-bottomed punts. Along these many salt marshes on either side of the Medway the wild-fowl abound. At a spot oddly called “Beluncle,” where the single-track railway to Port Victoria crosses the road, the vast new sheds and other evidences of the Kingsnorth Medway Airship Base have recently arisen in the open fields. You will seek in vain for “Kingsnorth” on maps, for it is an entirely new name.
ST. JAMES GRAIN.
Reaching Hoo St. Werburgh, we find a considerable village and an old church with weatherbeaten tower and an interesting interior containing, sculptured on one of its pillars, an example of those ancient grotesques which puzzle the modern wayfarer, and seem to him purposeless. They generally, however, represent the Divine gifts either of sight, hearing, or speech, and their grotesque character is often accidental, rather than a matter of intention. This particular example, a monkish head, with left hand approaching the mouth, appears to typify the Gift of Speech; but to a casual observer it might very well be an attempt to portray the horror of some unfortunate person who had accidentally taken poison.
From Hoo St. Werburgh, across Hoo Common and past the hamlet of Wainscot, we come to the turning for Upnor Castle, which lies to the left; paradoxically enough, it would seem, down a village street of the narrowest, steepest, and most rugged description. Surely, thinks the stranger, one should ascend to Upnor. But “Upnor,” which means “up-shore,” refers, not to a height, but to the upper reaches of the Medway estuary.
The castle is a rambling, grey-walled fortress with a series of rugged, cylindrical towers facing the waters of the Medway and looking over to the Chatham Dockyard Extension. Upnor was built in the time of Queen Elizabeth, as a defence of Chatham and Rochester, and seems to have justified itself in the reign of Charles the Second, during that inglorious war of 1667, when the insolent Dutch with sixty vessels took the fort at Sheerness, sailed up the Medway, burning and destroying, and later ascending the Thames to Tilbury Fort, humbled the ancient pride of the Mistress of the Seas. A chain was stretched across the Medway, from Hoo Ness to Folly Point, to bar the passage of the enemy to Chatham, and the men-o’-war Matthias, Monmouth, and Royal Charles stood by, to help repulse De Ruyter’s forces. But the feeblest attempts were made: the Dutch broke the chain, burnt the ships, and continued up-river, capturing the Royal Charles, which was taken by two boats, under the command of one Captain Tobiaz, without any attempt at defence. Next morning, with the purpose of burning the large men-o’-war at anchor above Upnor, the Dutch sent up two of their fighting ships, with six fire-vessels, under cover of a heavy cannonade. Here Upnor Castle was of some service, and considerably hampered the enemy’s operations; but the fireships succeeded in burning the Royal James, Loyal London, and Royal Oak. And then, half-hearted themselves, the invaders retreated. It was well for us they were so cautious, for they might have done what they would. The observers of that time were not indifferent to this indignity. Evelyn, in his diary, styles it “as dreadful a spectacle as Englishmen ever saw, and a dishonour never to be wiped off”; and Pepys, Secretary to the Admiralty, was divided in three parts about it. He shared the general shame of the nation; he feared, as an official who might be held personally responsible, and thought dolefully of either being committed to the Tower, or else having his throat cut by a furious mob; and he dreaded, as a citizen, the dangers of an invasion affecting his property and ready cash.
Opposite Upnor the naval activities of the dockyard are very noticeable. There you see battleships and cruisers dry-docked and refitting. When last I was here the waterside loungers readily told me their names. As to the correct rendering of one there was considerable variation, for while one would have it, “Airy-ale-house,” giving a pleasant mental picture of a hedgerow tavern of the type which would have pleased Piscator and Venator, others preferred to style her the “You’re-a-lias,” and some made it “You-rile-us,” which gives a distinctly threatening nemo me impune lacessit kind of braggadocio turn to her proper title, Euryalus. There are other versions of the name—“Airy,” or “Hairy Alice,” for example—which prove the risks of classic nomenclature.