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2(b) - England: South-East

from Part I - Area surveys 1540–1840

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

By
C. W. Chalklin
Edited by
Peter Clark
Peter Clark
Affiliation:
University of Leicester
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Summary

A mercate town [Guildford] is well frequented and full of faire inns.

(W. Camden, Britannia, 1607, 1977 edn, Surrey and Sussex)

[Canterbury is] a flourishing town, good trading in the Weaving of Silks … There is fine walks and seates [for] the Company; there is a large Market house and a town Hall over it … [and] the Cathedral.

(C. Morris, ed., The Illustrated Journeys of Celia Fiennes c. 1682–1712, 1984)

In the reign of George II, Brighton began to rise into consideration as a bathing-place … and it ultimately obtained the very high rank which it now enjoys as a fashionable watering-place, and its grandeur and importance, under the auspices of George IV … Steam vessels sail from this place to Dieppe … The principal branch of trade is that of the fishery.

(Lewis, Topographical Dictionary of England, 1840)

[Portsmouth is] a seaport, borough, market-town; [Portsea is] now the principal naval arsenal of Great Britain.

(Lewis, ibid.)

Lewisham is a most respectable village and parish … inhabited by a great number of opulent merchants and tradesmen who have selected this pleasant and healthful neighbourhood as a place of retirement from business.

(Pigot and Co.&s National Commercial Directory, 1839, Kent, Surrey and Sussex)

The special features of the towns of the Home Counties and adjoining shires which these quotations illustrate were the result of several factors. Unlike much of the Midlands communications were good except in the Weald. Essex, Kent, Sussex and Hampshire had a big coastal traffic which was more sheltered than that of North-East England. Inland counties were tied by the Thames and a growing number of navigable tributaries, and the Ouse linked Bedfordshire to the Wash.

Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Urban History of Britain , pp. 49 - 66
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2000

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References

Ashford, L. J., The History of the Borough of High Wycombe from its Origins to 1880 (London, 1960), p.Google Scholar
Dyer, A., Decline and Growth in English Towns 1400–1640 (London, 1991), p. ;CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Everitt, A., ‘The marketing of agricultural produce’, in Thirsk, J., ed., The Agrarian History of England and Wales, vol. IV (Cambridge, 1967) 5, 496–7.Google Scholar
Farrant, S., Georgian Brighton 1740–1820 (Brighton, 1980), p. ;Google Scholar
Fisher, F. J., ‘The development of the London food market, 1540–1640’, Economic History Review, 1st series, 5 (1934–5), 60.Google Scholar
Hooper, W., Reigate: Its Story through the Ages, … (Dorking, 1979) 1;Google Scholar
J, A. F.. Brown, Essex at Work 1700–1815 (Chelmsford, 1969), p. ;Google Scholar
Rosen, A., ‘Winchester in transition, 1580–1700’, in Clark, P., ed., Country Towns in Pre-Industrial England (Leicester, 1981), p. ;Google Scholar
Tittler, R., Architecture and Power (Oxford, 1991) 7.Google Scholar
Walton, J. K., The English Seaside Resort (Leicester, 1983), chs. 2, 3;Google Scholar

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