From the North Foreland to Penzance

by Clive Holland

The entrance to Poole Harbour, which lies at the extreme western limit of Bournemouth Bay, is one which yachtsmen have learned to approach with caution, lest they should take the ground on Hook Sand. But whatever the difficulties of navigating the tortuous channel which leads up to Poole Quay, past pretty Brownsea (to which custom has added the superfluous word “Island,” the determination “ea” or “ey” meaning island) and its imposing castle dating in part from the time of Henry VIII, maybe there is such a charm about what has been called “the Lake Land of Dorset,” that few lovers of the picturesque will pass the Haven mouth and leave it unentered.

Brownsea is, indeed, a beautiful out-of-the-world spot, with its ancient castle, once a block house of some strength, standing on guard, as it were, at the entrance to the main channel of the harbour. In the little village down by the quay, one finds a curious blending of Italian names and English dwellings, just as one finds also in the walled-in gardens of the castle relics of Italy, in the shape of medieval well-heads, etc., set amid typically English surroundings.

The castle was burnt out some years ago, and afterwards partially rebuilt, but in it is preserved a considerable amount of the old building.

On the island there is a delightful little church standing on a knoll in the centre of a woodland glade, and amid the plantations in early summer one finds a wealth of rhododendron blossoms of all kinds, scarcely to be equalled anywhere else on the south coast. The island itself is shaped like a horseshoe, and has openings towards the east, with high ground running round the edge. The views from this high pine-clad ridge, which forms so prominent a feature of the island, are extremely beautiful, and tradition states that the great Turner himself when on a visit there said that he had seen few more exquisite effects of light and shade and form in landscape than are to be found in the panorama from the western side of the ridge overlooking the beautiful Channel and the Purbeck Hills. Indeed, sunshine or storm, sunset or sunrise, it would not be easy anywhere along the coast to find more exquisite views than are to be seen in the silvery waterways of Poole Harbour, the wide stretches of moorland which environ it, and the Dorset highlands which form so impressive a background. It would indeed be difficult for an artist to find no pictures in the misty beauties of the gleaming marshland; the purple and russet of the swelling heaths, streaked here and there with patches of golden gorse; the sand dunes, gleaming yellow and jade green all around; and the wild black heath stretching ridge on ridge from the indented shores until it reaches the steep slope of Nine Barrow Down, or merges with the distant view, where the famous Agglestone lies solitary and desolate.

There is little doubt that Poole Harbour, which was probably centuries ago much more navigable than it is now, might have been made, and indeed might still be made, a place of some considerable utility as a naval station for a torpedo flotilla, and might even regain something of its prestige as a commercial port. Shut in to the south-west by the high chalk ridges of the Studland Hills, and sheltered on the east and north-east by the wooded slopes of Canford Cliffs and Parkstone, the harbour appears, when viewed from the highland, rather like a huge inland lake than a sheet of water connected directly with the sea. Not quite half the distance on the way to Wareham by the main channel, and on the northern shore of the harbour, stands the old-time and picturesque town of Poole.

Concerning the origin of Poole there is still considerable difference of opinion, but most authorities are agreed that it is less ancient than has been formerly claimed for it. It would appear to be certain, from the fact that none of the older chroniclers or chronicles—William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, Asser, and the Saxon Chronicle amongst the number—contain any mention of Poole, though referring frequently to other Dorset towns—Wareham, Wimborne, Dorchester, and Swanage, for example—that the place did not exist as a town in even Roman times. Roman remains have, however, at different times been unearthed in the neighbourhood, and there seems little doubt that the Roman by-road from Badbury Rings, now called the “Old Bound Road,” probably led down to the waterside near one of the present-day quays.

Additional evidence that no hamlet or town of any importance existed where Poole now stands, even in the year 991 A.D., is afforded by the fact that, although the chronicler records an inroad of the Danes of that year in the following terms, “The army (of the Danes) went again eastward into Fromemouth, and everywhere they went up as far as they would into Dorset,” there is no mention of their having ravaged any town on their way to Wareham. Even the great, and, on the whole, singularly complete, Domesday Book does not contain any mention of Poole, although nearly every town of which there is now a trace in Dorset appears therein.

Indeed, from the evidence we have briefly mentioned, it would appear that Wareham, for even a considerable period anterior to the Norman Conquest, was the port in this harbour, and for the existence of Poole there was not then any great reason. At all events, we know that it was from Wareham that Duke Robert of Gloucester, a natural son of Henry I, set sail in 1142, and how King Stephen, the enemy of Queen Maud, of whose cause Earl Robert was an adherent, came to Wareham in his absence and burned the town and captured the castle.

It would appear that Poole took its rise somewhere about this time (the middle part of the twelfth century), owing chiefly to the destruction of, and frequent attacks made upon, Wareham by the contending factions in those times of civil war. Probably the merchants and shipowners of Wareham established themselves at Poole, which was a point considerably nearer the sea, in consequence of the fact that the fortifications of Wareham, whilst evidently not strong enough to protect their interests, served the unfortunate purpose of attracting attack. But whatever may have been the reason for the foundation of Poole there seems little doubt that towards the end of the first half of the thirteenth century it was a town and port of considerable note and size, whilst Wareham had undoubtedly rapidly declined. It is possible, of course, that even in Stephen’s reign there was a collection of houses near where the commercial part of present-day Poole stands.

Soon after the foundation of the town, under the circumstances we have described, it had grown to be an important piece of the Manor of Canford, with some considerable, if as yet a somewhat fluctuating, foreign trade. The inhabitants would appear, from historical data which have come down to us, to have been often troubled by the imposition of taxes and burdens by the Manor, and in consequence there was the loss of security which militated against the increase in the number of foreign vessels trading to the port. To rectify this the merchant inhabitants doubtless made up their minds to obtain some charter of self-government, such as was possessed by several other towns in the county. The difficulty in the way was persuading the Lord of the Manor to grant it. The latter happened at that period to be William Longsword, son of the famous Earl of Salisbury and grandson of Fair Rosamund, who appears to have been amenable to a monetary consideration for rights which he might be supposed to be unwilling to give con amore. It was the necessity of raising money to enable him to take part in the Crusades of St Louis that made William Longsword ultimately concede the rights which the inhabitants of Poole were so anxious to obtain. He was one of the most famous of the Crusaders who fought against the Saracens in Egypt and in Palestine.