At Biddles Gate commences a very curious part of the wall, which, as far south as a little beyond Blue Anchor postern, is unlike anything known in England. The original wall, here about 30 feet high and 4 feet thick, with the soil nearly level within and without, seems to have served not only for the town wall, but for the wall of several dwelling-houses within it, the doors and windows of which are visible in the wall, though now closed up. These openings show the wall to have been Norman, and of a moderately early period. This wall was not found sufficiently strong for the purpose of defence, and a second wall, also 4 feet thick, was built against it on the outside. But this second wall was built like an aqueduct, as an arcade, upon tall and slender piers, about 2 feet 2 inches broad, from which, at 10 feet 6 inches high, spring arches mostly semicircular, but some pointed, and two very flat and probably much later, above which was the parapet. The arches are about 12 feet span. The result was to increase the rampart to a walk of 5 feet, with a parapet of 2 feet, and probably a rear wall of 1 foot. Of course, an arcade so placed afforded great shelter for those attacking the wall from without; but to obviate this, while the piers touched the wall, a space like that for a portcullis, a chase about 2 feet broad, was left between the arch and the wall, by means of which any one standing at the base of the wall could effectually be molested with missiles or a long pike. Eighteen arches of this arcade remain. The arrangement is a very curious one, and supposed to be singular. This masque or outer wall may be of late Norman date, but is possibly early English. The piers interfere much with the earlier doors and windows. The wall, where double, is 35 feet high. There are traces of some kind of building outside a part of the wall.
A hole broken through the wall into Blue Anchor-yard shows the rear of the wall, and a little further south is Blue Anchor Postern, an original archway in the wall, much cut about and enlarged, but of which the portcullis chase, worked from the battlements, as at Fishergate, York, still remains. From the postern a very steep, winding narrow lane leads up into the town, between lines of ancient houses, of which two, one on each side, next the gate, are Norman. Both are curious, but that on the south side especially so. It is the shell of a Norman house, of the age of the older part of the wall. It is called, locally, King John’s Palace, but is, in truth, an ordinary Norman private house, and a fairly perfect one. The principal room was on the first floor. The roof is gone, but the door and windows remain. These are coupled, small, round-headed, and divided by a short column, with a slightly sculptured capital. The space within the walls is 43 feet by 45 feet. There is a good Norman fireplace, with hood and flanking columns. In the south and part of the east wall is a mural gallery. The house on the northern side of the lane is 44 feet by 15 feet. There is a good view of the town wall, and a plan of the two houses, in Parker’s “Domestic Architecture of the Twelfth Century,” p. 34.
South of the postern the wall ceases to be double, and is all of one date, and about 6 feet thick. In this part is a flattish rectangular mural buttress tower, much blocked in with houses, but having its south hollow angle crossed by a squinch arch carrying a garderobe. Near this is a high pointed doorway, evidently an insertion, of 24 feet opening, leading into Collis-court, and about 60 feet further is the west gatehouse.
This is a perfect and plain rectangular gatehouse, 30 feet deep by 24 feet broad, without buttresses, flush with the wall outside, and of bold projection within. It is pierced by a high pointed vault, of 12 feet opening. The passage has been a good deal mutilated with a view to widening it. Near the centre was a good recessed doorway, the profile of the head of which is still traceable where it has been roughly cut from the wall. Between this and the inner face are two square portcullis grooves, and just within the inner entrance is a chase, 18 inches broad, over the head of the arch. In the vault, in front of the central door-case, are nine holes, about 4 inches square, three in the crown line, and three along each haunch. These latter converge towards the central line.
The gatehouse has a portcullis chamber on the first floor, and a second floor above this. An open stair against the south side leads to the battlement, from which a door, an insertion, opens into the portcullis chamber. These upper rooms are plastered and papered, and nothing can be seen in them.
South of this gate the wall continues in a fairly perfect state for 80 yards, and finally has been pulled down and removed. It may be traced as far as the site of a half-round tower, and some remains of an arch. Beyond this, also, the line of the wall may be traced as far as the site of Bugle Tower, 180 yards from the west gate, and which caps the south-west angle of the town.
The south wall is almost wholly destroyed, and the foundation either removed or covered up by the broad and handsome quay which now intervenes between the base of the wall and the sea. This front was more or less convex, or rather polygonal, the angles being capped with drum towers. There are some traces of the south gatehouse. In the rear of this part of the wall are the site of St. Mary Magdalene’s Hospital, and in Porter Lane what was called Canute’s Palace. A representation of the south gate before 1784 is preserved by Grose. It had a low, broad Edwardian arch, with bold machicolations above, and toward the east it was protected by a long flanking wall, parallel to its approach. It was removed 1830–40.
Forty yards from the south gate was another half-round tower, and thence the wall ran straight east for 83 yards, when it reached the south-east angle of the town. In the rear of this part of the wall, in Winkle-street, is “God’s House,” a Norman church, now restored very badly, and converted into a French Protestant place of worship.
At the south-east angle of the town, in the end of the east wall, is a gate, called God’s House Gate, or South Gate, but which should be called Spur Gate, as it opens upon a work of that class. This gatehouse is rectangular, quite plain, and without buttresses, having two upper floors. Its dimensions are 28 feet broad by 23 feet deep, and the south end projects as a low salient of two faces, upon the south wall, now removed. The passage is vaulted with a high pointed arch 12 feet broad. Like the west gate, it had a central recessed doorway, now much cut away, and two portcullis grooves. The vault in front of the door is supported by two, and in rear of it by three, cross-ribs. Altogether, in substance, this gatehouse resembles that of the west gate, and is of early Decorated date. Its front may have been rebuilt when the spur tower was added.
The spur work projects from the northern flank of the entrance of the gatehouse for about 80 feet. It is composed of a sort of lofty gallery, or curtain, terminating in a rectangular tower, about 22 feet square, with buttresses capping the two east or outer angles diagonally. It is of three stories, and is built across the eastern ditch, no doubt to contain and protect its sluice communicating with the sea, which originally flowed up to the wall of the tower. There are seen large arches in the north and east faces, which look as though there had been a passage for boats; but these seem really to have been arches of construction only, intended to throw the weight of the building upon the corners, which probably are more deeply founded than the curtain. In the north face is also a large modern arch, a relic of the canal which was to have been carried beneath the tower. The spur-work and the gatehouse were long used as a Bridewell. All still bear marks of that degrading occupation. The whole spur-work is good Perpendicular. Leland calls this the south gate, and the spur tower the Castellet. Grose gives a view of it about 1770. From the Spur Gate the town wall is tolerably perfect as far as the first half-round tower, 60 yards. From hence the wall may be traced 35 yards to a flat buttress, 14 feet broad and 3 feet deep, of which there are some remains. Beyond this, at 37 yards, is the site of a rectangular tower, 30 feet broad and 24 feet deep These two are said to be additions of the time of Edward VI. They look much older.