It has always been noted for its manufacture of hemp ropes, cords, and sail cloth; and so highly were these articles of Bridport production esteemed, that the greater proportion of the canvas and cordage used for the rigging and sails of the English Navy from early times, as well as that of the ships which so bravely attacked and gloriously defeated the Spanish Armada, were of local manufacture.
There is an ancient and historic joke at the historian Leland’s expense, in connexion with the industry of the town. In olden times not only was hemp largely manufactured into rope and canvas in the town, but the raw material itself was grown in some considerable quantity in the immediate neighbourhood, which gave rise to the quaint saying of Fuller that when a man was unfortunate enough as to be hanged, “he was stabbed with a Bridport dagger.” This having reached Leland’s ears during his tour of the southern counties, and being understood by him in the literal sense of the word, he solemnly afterwards stated that “At Bridport be made good daggers,” which error has probably caused as much amusement and discussion as any mistake of the kind ever made by an historian of standing.
Although Bridport in ancient times was a place of some note, it has never played any very important part in the history of the west country; but it suffered, as did most other towns in Dorset, from at least two visitations of the Plague, the most serious of which, in 1670, we are told “did not spare any man, but caused many deathes in the town and the villiages near by, so that of the dead many remain unburried.”
During the Civil War Bridport formed one of the pawns in the mighty game which was being played by the contending Royalist and Parliamentarian forces for the possession of the west of England.
Forty years later, too, the town was again to see an armed force approach it, when on the fine Sunday morning of June 14, 1685, after a night march from Lyme, the Duke of Monmouth arrived before the place to attack the Dorset militia which “lay in the town to the number of about 1200, with a hundred or more horse.”
The Duke’s forces were about 500 all told, and advancing with some amount of discretion and stealth, under cover of the morning mist, and meeting no outposts nor resistance they succeeded in entering the town by way of the Allington Bridge, where they surprised a considerable number of the King’s troops, who, after standing to face one volley, turned tail and fled to join their comrades who were encamped in a field on the opposite side of the town. Then the streets became the scene of sharp skirmishing between the rival forces. The townsfolk taking little or no part in the conflict, but according to one account, “though much alarmed (they), kept well within their doors, scarcely daring, indeed, to thrust their heads out of the windows lest they might fall victims alike to their curiosity and the bullets of the King’s or Monmouth’s men.”
It was in the cross streets and in the main street near the Bull Inn that the hottest skirmishing took place. Ultimately, the Duke’s followers, under the command of Lord Grey and Colonel Wade, advanced to the attack of the western bridge at the far end of the street by which they had entered the town. Here the Dorset militia had been rallied by their officers and stood so firm that after receiving a volley or two from them the Duke’s men were commanded to retreat by Colonel Venner, who himself galloped away along the road back to Lyme after Lord Grey, who had already fled, leaving Colonel Wade to extricate his small force as best he could. The Colonel was a good soldier, and not only succeeded in withdrawing his forces in good order, but actually carried with him a number of prisoners who had been captured when he succeeded in entering the town. The Dorset militia for some reason allowed Monmouth’s men to retreat unpursued. On their way back to Lyme Colonel Wade and his followers were met by the Duke of Monmouth himself, with a reinforcement of troops. This skirmish, which resulted in a score or so of killed and wounded, has always been esteemed a most unfortunate affair for the Duke’s cause. Out of it none of Monmouth’s officers emerged with credit save Colonel Wade; although it would appear that his raw troops behaved with considerable steadiness and bravery.
As happened in the case of so many other towns, Bridport was, however, soon to pay dearly for that Sunday morning visit of “King Monmouth’s” followers; for a few months later Judge Jeffreys arrived on the business of the “Bloody Assize,” and soon a gallows tree was erected in the marketplace, and a round dozen of the townsfolk were hanging to it. As happened at other places, if one may believe the records remaining behind, not a few of the unfortunate victims were entirely innocent of offence.
In the church, which is a fine building, chiefly Perpendicular in style, with early English transepts and Perpendicular inserted windows, is a brass erected to the memory of “Edward Coker, Gent., second son of Captain Robert Coker, of Mapowder, slain at the Bull Inn in Bridport, June 14, An. Do. 1685, by one Venner, who was an officer under the late Duke of Monmouth in that rebellion.”
Bridport, from the time of that stirring Sunday morning of two-and-a-quarter centuries ago, has had an uneventful history. Even the great wars with France, which had so great an influence on most south and south-western coast towns, seem to have affected it and disturbed its serenity but little, and nowadays it is chiefly noted for its old-world atmosphere and stolid indifference to the more modern methods of trade and business life. To antiquarians this little town, set amid the green of the hillside, presents a few attractions in the form of old houses and buildings, which are chiefly situated in South Street, where there is a fine Tudor House. And there are the remains of the once rich St John’s Hospital at the rear of the houses on the side of the eastern bridge, where the final skirmish in 1685 took place.