AN ENGLISH LADY'S LETTER: by F. D. Udall (London)

PEVENSEY CASTLE is one of the most interesting of all the ancient and historic castles of old England. It was seized by William the Conqueror immediately he landed in the bay close by, and he left a garrison to hold it while he pushed on to Hastings and subsequently to the country round about the "hoar apple tree" mentioned in the Saxon Chronicle, where the decisive engagement with Harold and his army took place. This spot, ever since commemorated in the name of the village—Battle—is some seven miles inland. Harold had taken care to leave a garrison, too, at Pevensey, while he went north, but according to Freeman, William found the place wholly undefended or else with a force totally inadequate to resist the Normans. At all events there appears to have been no resistance offered to the invaders, on that fateful Michael's Eve. The castle and land for miles around eventually became the property of the Conqueror's half-brother.

How old the castle is nobody knows. British coins have been discovered at Pevensey, and it is thought that the place was an ancient British settlement. As to the castle itself, the general opinion is that it was built by the Romans, and the many Roman coins found in its precincts, chiefly of the Constantine family, give support to the theory. In the days of the venerable Bede there was a great forest in these parts, the forest of Anderida, roamed by herds of deer and swine. Pevensey is first mentioned in historical documents in the year 792, when its owner—generous man!—gave it away, together with Hastings, to the Abbey of St. Denis at Paris. Sir John Pelham was appointed Constable of the Castle in the reign of Edward III, and his courageous wife held it during a siege in her husband's absence, in the following reign, in 1399. This lady gives the old ruins an interest of quite another character from their warlike associations by reason of a letter she dispatched to her husband during that siege. He was up in Yorkshire at the time. The letter has come down through the centuries—a brave, sweet, womanly, wifely relic of those early days in "our rough island story." It enjoys the honor of being enshrined in Hallam's Literature of Europe, and well it deserves the distinction. Here is what the lady wrote while the enemy was at the gate.

My dear lord:

I recommend me to your high lordship with heart and body and all my poor might, and with all this I thank you as my dear lord, dearest and best beloved of all earthly lords, I say for me, and thank you, my dear lord, with all this that I say before of your comfortable letter that ye sent me from Pontefract, that come to me on Mary Magdalene day (July 22); for by my troth I was never so glad as when I heard by your letter that ye were strong enough with the grace of God for to keep you from the malice of your enemies. And, dear lord, if it like to your high lordship that as soon as ye might that I might hear of your gracious speed; which God Almighty continue and increase. And, my dear lord, if it like you for to know of my fare, I am here by laid in manner of a siege with the county of Sussex, Surrey, and a great parcel of Kent, so that I may nought out, nor none victuals get me but with much hard. Wherefore, my dear, if it like you by the advice of your wise counsel for to set remedy of the salvation of your castle, and withstand the malice of the shires aforesaid. And also that ye be fully informed of their great malice workers in these shires, which that haves so despitefully wrought to you, and to your castle, to your men, and to your tenants for this country, have yai (sic) wasted for a great while. Farewell, my dear lord; the Holy Trinity you keep from your enemies, and soon send me good tidings of you.

Written at Pevensey in the Castle on St. Jacob day (St. James, July 25) last past,

By your own poor,
J. Pelham.

To my true lord.

Lomaland Photo. and Engraving Dept.

RUINS OF PEVENSEY CASTLE

IN THE FOREST