In the fine church are some interesting brasses, notably the remarkable example to Christian, wife of Matthew Phelip. He was that hard warlike Mayor of London who led the citizens to the battle of Barnet. She “departed from this vale of misery” in 1471. The brass to Peter Halle and his wife Elizabeth, 1420, show them lovingly, hand in hand.
“Here lies a piece of Christ, a star in dust,
A vein of gold, a china dish that must
Be used in Heaven, when God shall feed the just.”
Nicholas Ridley, who, as Bishop of London, suffered martyrdom in 1555 at Oxford, was appointed vicar here in 1538. Leaving, he exclaimed, “Farewell, Herne, thou worshipful and wealthy parish, the first cure whereunto I was called to minister God’s word. Thou hast heard of my mouth ofttime the word of God preached, not after the Popish trade, but after God’s gospel. Oh that the fruit had answered to the seed! But I bless God for all that godly virtue and zeal of God’s word which the Lord by preaching of His word did kindle manifestly both in the heart and the life of that godly woman, my Lady Fiennes.” A brass to that excellent lady, dated 1539, is among those to be seen here.
HERNE: THE “SMUGGLER’S LOOK-OUT.”
The name of Herne, which really derives from the Anglo-Saxon hierne, a corner, has by some been thought to derive from the herons that once abounded in this marshy district; and the modern town of Herne Bay has boldly taken a heron into the arms it has assumed. The village still keeps some curious old houses; among them a white-painted corner house opposite the church, with a tiny triangular window under the eaves, said to have been a smuggler’s look-out and signalling station. A still more remarkable building is that on the hill above the church, called, from its ground-plan, the “Box Iron.” Extensive cellars exist beneath it, and under the road, with a trap-door on the adjacent green. This building, now very dilapidated, is supposed to have been a smugglers’ warehouse.
To Reculver from Herne Bay is a pleasant three miles’ walk, with pastures on the right and the open sea on left. The cyclist and the road-user in general must, however, go inland, by Beltinge and Hillborough. Reculver stands at a dead-end. Having seen the historic place, you cannot go forward, but must retrace a part of the way. It is a strange, uncanny-looking corner, both by reason of its end-of-the-world appearance and on account of those twin towers of Reculver church which, crested as they are by skeleton iron steeples and vast weather-vanes, have possibly given rise to the vulgar error of the plural form, “Reculvers.” The place-name, a corruption of the Roman Regulbium, no doubt seemed so strange that the ignorant thought it was a description of these towers. Here in ancient times the Wantsum channel, dividing the Isle of Thanet from the mainland, opened to the sea, and here the Romans had a fortified port, corresponding with Rutupiæ, at the southern extremity of the channel, hard by Sandwich. Encroachment of the sea has left but little of the Roman station here, and the church-towers, now the peculiar care of the Trinity House, stand on the very edge of the tide, instead of half a mile from the shore. This spot, traditionally that to which the converted King Ethelbert retired and died, has always been a prominent sea-mark to mariners, who must keep well inshore here if they would avoid the shoal called Margate Hook. An old legend tells how the Abbess of Davington, near Faversham, being narrowly saved from shipwreck here, while her sister was drowned, built the twin-towered church alike in gratitude for her own safety, to her sister’s memory, and for the welfare of all who should in future voyage past. Ingoldsby tells the story, with a vast difference, in his own peculiar vein, in “The Brothers of Birchington,” Robert and Richard, whom he names as the none-too-pious founders.
Reculver church, as its remaining towers show, was a fine example of Early English or Late Norman architecture, and could easily have been preserved; but the wanton hands and material minds of 1809 decreed its destruction, lest the sea should do it instead! It would not have passed the wit of man to preserve it, as the towers themselves have been preserved. Substantial stone-and-cement aprons have been constructed here by the Trinity House, and long protective wooden groynes run out to defend the towers against further assault. Grim and minatory they look in certain lights, as impressive in their way as the giant statue of Memnon in Egypt.
RECULVER.