Printed and Published at the Dover Express Works. 1916.

TO BE FORMATTED

ANNALS OF DOVER.
SECTION THREE.
THE PASSAGE.
I. THE EARLIEST PASSENGERS.

When mankind began to spread themselves over the face
of the earth, crossuig the seas from one land to another,
they would naturally select crossing places where the sea
was the narrowest ; therefore, it may be assumed that the
first passengers who came from the Continent into Britain
navigated the Straits of Dover. Twyne, and other old
writers, dispose of the qucsti(jn of navigation by saying that
" long since there was an isthmus, or bridge of land, by
which there was a passage on foot between France and us,
although the sea hath long since fretted the same in sunder. ' '
But, although geologists accept the theory of the isthmus,
they are of opinion that the land passage was " fretted
asunder " before the human race arrived upon the scene. We
must conclude, therefore, that those adventurous emigrants
who originally colonized this island were the first passengers
of the Dover Passage.

There has been speculation as to who those emigrants
were. Lambard, " discarding dreams and fables," says it
has been " collected out of Herodotus, Berosus and other
most grave and ancient authors that one Samothes, the sixth
son of Japhet, about 250 years after the general inundation
of the world, did take upon hun the dominion of these
countries now known as France and Britain, and that
England was called after him by the name of Samothaj for
the space of 300 years, after which it was called Albion.''



144 ANNALS OF DOVER

According to that theory, the landing of Saniothes must have
been 2,043 years before the landnig of JuHus Caisar, and
the Dover Passage, on that reckoning, may now claim an
antiquity of four thousand years.

The Passage from Dover to the little P'rench port of
Wissant was well known before the Roman Invasion. Caesar's
Commentaries state that, " Csesar determined to proceed
into Britain because he was told that in almost all the
Gallic wars succour had been supplied from thence to our
enemies." The war between the Romans and the Gauls
had been in progress 300 years before the Roman Invasion
of Britain, so that for more than three centuries before
the Christian Era the Passage had been regularly used by
the islanders. Ancient writers say that the intercommuni-
cation across the Straits of Dover was for the purposes of
trade, religious culture obtained from the Druids of this
island, and for securing the aid of skilful warriors to assist
in repelling the advances of the Romans on the Continent.
Between Gaul and Britain there was even then an " entente
cordiale," cau.sing a constant neighl)ourly intercourse across
this narrow sea ; while travellers from much greater distances
occasionally crossed to buy the precious metals which
Britain yielded. For such traftic the Passage was used long
before the Roman Invasion, and when the Romans were
settled here the traffic, probably, was greater.

From the crossing of the Romans down to the days of
the Saxon Heptarchy it would be vain to seek details as to
the Passage business, for the records of that dark period
are very scanty. The Britons who navigated the Passage
appear to have been able to find their way across without
fixed lights on the coast ; but the Romans, not so well
acfjuainted with the tides and currents, built two lighthouses
at Dover — the one still remains on the Castle hill, and the
foundations of the other underlie the Western Heights,
constituting interesting memorials of the early days of the
Dover Passage.

In the Saxon times the Passage across the Straits of
Dover was a regularly established route secured to the
Dover mariners by Royal Decrees and patronised by Kings.
This Passage as it was used by the authority of the last
of the Saxon Kings is sijecially mentioned in the Domesday
Book. Referring to Dover, it says: "The burgesses gave
the King twenty ships once a year for fifteen days, and in



THE PASSAGE 1 45

every ship twenty men." Those were the ships built by
Dover men, and used on the Passage; and the mariners
who manned them gained their experience in seamanship in
working the Passage. The entry continues: " This they did
in return for his having endowed them with sac and soc,"
i.e., free courts and free local government; hence, it appears
that it was from the services to the King rendered by the
Dover mariners of this Passage that Dover secured its
Municipal privileges.

Further details of the regulations as to the charges for
carrying King's Messengers across are also given; thus
" when the King's Messenger came there he gave for the
passage of a horse three pence in winter and two pence in
summer, but the burgess found the pilot and one other to
assist him ; and if the Messenger wanted more it was hired
at his own cost." It is difficult to form an accurate
estimate of how much the three pence charged for carrying
a King's horseman across the Straits would represent in
our present money, but it seemed then to be a valuable
consideration.



146 ANNALS OF DOVER