In our account of Teddington (see page 130, ante) we have spoken at some length of the swans on the Thames. They are to be met with here in has been added to the west end. The tower, and Duchess of York. It is now an hotel for with its parapet, was built in 1710, at the expense resident families. of the then rector, the Rev. Lewis Atterbury, a brother of the celebrated Dr. Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester. From the mention of a priest in the Norman | plenty during the bright days of summer, and add survey, it would appear that there was a church at Shepperton at a very early period, but no marks of such remote antiquity are observable in the present structure. William Grocyn, who was instituted to this rectory in 1504, is supposed by Newcourt, the author of the "Repertorium," to have been the celebrated friend of Erasmus, and who was largely instrumental in rendering the Greek language a general object of study. not a little to the beauty of the river scenery- Her glossy plumage laves, What a charming description of the long reaches about Shepperton, Twickenham, Teddington, and Richmond! The present Shepperton Green-a long, narrow strip of land, pleasantly fringed with stately elms The old rectory, a most substantial red brick and chestnut-trees-lies between the village and building, with projecting beams and a picturesque the railway-station, which is about half a mile disroof, adjoins the north side of the churchyard.tant to the northward, and where is the terminus of Before it is a small square, now gravelled, but the Thames Valley branch of the South-Western which once, doubtless, was a village green. One | Railway. side of it is occupied by a hostelry, much frequented by the angling fraternity, "The Anchor." There are other smaller inns, all of them in the same line of business. In fact, the river at Shepperton, and from thence to Chertsey up stream, and to Halliford down, is "piscosissimus." During the summer months the disciples of Izaak Walton flock hither in large numbers, and some good sport is obtained, the river at this point being particularly plentiful in roach, barbel, perch, and jack. ""Tis observed by Gesner," writes honest Izaak Walton, in his "Angler," ," "that there is none bigger salmon than in England, and none better than in Thames." Salmon have been caught in Shepperton Deep many years back, but they are no longer taken here. Recently much antagonism has existed, respecting the right of fishing in the Thames, between the anglers and the "riparian" owners of land abutting upon the river; and the question has been taken up by a society called the Thames Rights Defence Association. Shepperton is one of those fortunate places which possesses no There which possesses no "history" worth recording, and, consequently, we may be pardoned for quoting a singular item of information concerning it which appears in "Social Gleanings." The writer remarks: "Either the late Mr. Fisher, or Mr. Elwes, of Kempton Park, Sunbury, Middlesex, was in the habit of paying an annual visit to the Rev. Mr. Hubbard, the rector of Shepperton-that wellknown rendezvous on the banks of the Thames for the disciples of Izaak Walton. The rector's son, who told me the story, described a peculiarity in regard to this annual visit worth recording. The visitor was stone blind, both his carriage horses were stone blind, and his coachman was a Cyclops, having only one eye." Here, at the commencement of the present century, lived Mr. Josiah Boydell, a gentleman of some little antiquarian taste. Among the objects which he possessed was a canoe, which would appear to have been constructed in a very remote and rude age. This interesting vestige of antiquity was discovered in September, 1812, and was presented to Mr. Boydell, who furnished the following particulars of it to Mr. Brewer, the author of the "Beauties of Of late years a fashion has grown up of spending a part of the summer in a house-boat on the river. These house-boats are much affected by the artist tribe we see signs of the craft in the easel, the palette, and the paint-box left outside, and on the pictures which adorn the walls of the dwelling- | England":"The canoe is obviously hewn out of room. These human water-houses, moored to the banks, are simply caravans set on a substantial boat instead of on wheels. The Thames at this point has many pleasant reaches, and across the river we see Oatlands Park and the fir-woods about Walton and Weybridge. Oatlands was the favourite residence of the Duke one solid block of oak, and when perfect the dimensions must have been as follows: the entire length 12 feet, the depth of the sides 20 inches, the width. across the top 3 feet 6 inches in the middle. The sides are 1 inches thick, the keel or bottom is, in the middle, 15 inches wide and 2 inches thick, but grows narrower as it approaches the ends. Throughout the whole there is not any appearance of a peg or nail having been used. At one end was a piece hewn out of the solid wood, and left across the boat, apparently to hold the sides together; and it is supposed that there was a similar piece at the other end; but one end and one side of this curious relic were unfortunately broken before it was inspected by Mr. Boydell. This canoe was found about twenty yards within the brook, in the part nearest to Shepperton town, and was lying in a shelving position, buried in a bed of gravel, within two inches of a layer of peat. Above was a mass of gravel 3 feet 6 inches in depth, and over that were 4 feet of mud. Within a few yards of the canoe, and beneath an equal mass of gravel, mud, &c., was found a stag's horn, the stem and one of the sharp antlers being perfect. . . . Near the above was found a boar's tusk, supposed to be of the wild black breed, and perfect, with the exception of the extreme point, where half an inch appears to have been broken off." All sorts of antique articles of manufacture, of British, Roman, Saxon, and more recent periods, have been found from time to time in the bed of the Thames. Some idea of their number and variety may be formed if we state that the list of them, including celts, urns, and other pottery, swords, spear-heads, bosses, shields, daggers, seals, pilgrims' tokens, pyxes, axe-heads, coins, &c., occupies a column in the index volume of the Royal Archæological Institute. The whole valley of the Thames is considered by geologists to be quite "an after-thought" of Nature, having come into being, as shown by Professor Ramsay, after the close of the Miocene age. The vegetation preserved in the London clay is of a tropical and even Indo-Australian character, being composed of palms, cypresses, &c., not unlike those of Tasmania and the Philippine Islands. 179 be ornamental circumstances of terrace walks. The adjacency of remains, confidently supposed to be Roman, induces us to believe that there may foundation for the conjecture of Dr. Stukeley in regard to these inequalities of surface; but it certainly appears difficult to pursue them through any traces bearing resemblance to the form of a regular encampment." At a short distance eastward from Lower Halliford is the site of the celebrated Coway Stakes, which are by tradition said to have been placed across the Thames to oppose the passage of Julius Cæsar over this river, when in pursuit of Cassivelaunus, and many antiquaries have agreed as to the probable connection with fact of such a traditionary assertion. We read in the account of the second expedition of Julius Cæsar (B.C. 54), that, having landed at Pevensey, he marched further inland, and came upon the Thames at a distance of about eighty miles from the sea. He found the river fordable at only one point; here the natives were drawn up in array to oppose his passage, and the river was fortified with sharp stakes. He, however, effected his passage, though only with great difficulty, and pursued his way into the territory of Cassivelaunus probably Hertfordshire, the ancient home of the Cassii. The British chief submitted, and Cæsa returned to Rome, carrying off some of the natives as hostages. The exact spot where Cæsar crossed the Thames has been for centuries a matter of dispute amongst antiquaries, many of whom have claimed Wallingford, and others Kingston, as the place. But it is recorded, on the most undoubted authority, that stakes sheathed with lead or iron were to be seen at this spot under water down to the seventeenth, and even the eighteenth, century. Camden and Hearne, two of the very highest authorities on this matter, strongly incline to the belief that Coway Stakes mark the spot, following this statement on the authority of a London priest, Nothelin, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury; and he adds that the remains of the stakes were visible in his own time. Mr. T. Wright, however, in his "Celt, Roman, and Saxon," whilst agreeing in the main in this view, suggests that these stakes, though of Roman workmanship, were of later date, and perhaps connected with the navigation or fishery of the Thames in a way which we cannot now explain. "In some small fields, to the north-east of the village, termed the Wall Closes," writes Mr the testimony of the Venerable Bede, who makes Brewer, in the "Beauties of England" (1816), "are several artificial inequalities of surface, which Gale and Dr. Stukeley conjecture to be the remains of a Roman camp. Mr. Lysons, in his Middlesex Parishes,' supposes these to be merely the vestiges of buildings on the site of the old manor-house; and, according to the tradition of the neighbourhood, an ancient mansion assuredly appears to have occupied a portion of the Wall Closes. But these earthworks, though much levelled within the last twenty years, would still seem more extensive than the probable site of a manorial dwelling, even allowing it to have possessed the Camden was the first in recent times to point out Coway Stakes as the ford which the Britons defended. "It is impossible," he observes, "I should be mistaken in the place, because here the river is scarce six feet deep; and the place at this day, from those stakes, is called Coway Stakes; to which we may add that Cæsar makes the bounds of Cassivelan, where he fixes this his passage, to be about eight miles distant from that sea which washes the east part of Kent, where he landed; and that the tide probably ran up as high as this spot. Of the stakes themselves, Gale, the antiquary, says:-"The wood of these stakes proves its own antiquity, being by its long duration under the water so consolidated as to resemble ebony, and wil! admit of a polish, and is not in the least rotted. SHEPPERTON RECTORY. (See page 178.) now this ford we speak of is at the same distance from the sea; and I am the first, that I know of, who has mentioned and settled it in its proper place." * It is evident, from the exterior grain of the wood, that the stakes were the entire bodies of young oak-trees, there not being the least appearance of any mark of any tool to be seen upon the whole circumference; and if we allow in our calculation for the gradual increase of growth towards its end, where fixed in the bed of the river, the stakes, I think, will exactly answer the thickness of a man's thigh, as described by Bede; but whether they were covered with lead at the ends fixed in the bottom of the river, is a particular I could not learn." None of the stakes remain now, the last having been removed about the year 1840. They are said to have been capped with metal for convenience of driving, but whether it was with brass, iron, or lead, is very uncertain, as the different accounts vary. The position of these stakes is described in the Archæologia by the Hon. Daines Barrington, who inspected the spot in 1740, and it is said that one of them is preserved in the British Museum, having been obtained here in 1777. It must be remembered that in early times there were no weirs or dams so near to the mouth of the river, • Camden's "Britannia," Gibson's Edit., 1772, Vol. I., p. 236. Both Daines Barrington and Dr. Owen, it may be observed, doubt whether Cæsar ever did pass the Thames at all. They allege that stakes intended to oppose the landing of an enemy would have been so placed as to line the friendly shore with their armed points inclining to the adverse And 181 bank; whereas Coway Stakes range directly across Harmondsworth, nearly in a line with the prethe river, and therefore could not have obstructed sumed march of Cæsar when pursuing Cassibelan, troops attempting to pass the ford. Those who were, until lately, the perfect remains of a camp are thus minded suppose that the Stakes of Coway appearing to be formed by the Romans." In a were merely intended for a fishing weir! foot-note the above writer remarks:-" We cannot yet some still say that the stakes were too massive avoid observing that, in a meadow immediately and armed for a mere fishery. These are the bordering upon Coway Stakes, on the Middlesex opinions of the learned, and such is the glorious side of the river, there are vestiges of a broad uncertainty of antiquity. raised road, which would appear to have led from a spot near the present bridge of Walton towards Halliford. The road terminates about 100 yards on the Halliford side of the river, but the cessation may be accounted for by observing that a mill, with large enclosures, occupied, within memory, the space now level." In the Archæological Journal for September, 1866, will be found a full account of the campaign of A. Plautius, by the late Dr. E. Guest, with a plan of the fortified ford at Halliford and the Coway Stakes. Dr. Guest thinks that the stakes mentioned as protecting the ford were there many years before the arrival of the Romans. Mr. Brewer, in his work above quoted, writes:"We confess that the position of the stakes appears an insuperable objection to believing that they were meant to oppose the landing of an enemy intent on passing from the Surrey to the Middlesex shore; but their massive and armed character would appear to be the result of too much labour and cost to allow of our supposing that they are no more than the remains of a weir for fishing." In the same work it is observed that "Mr. Bray (a writer not likely to be misled by careless and futile assertion) 'was informed by a fisherman who has lived at Walton, and known the river all his life, that at this place he has weighed up several stakes of the size of his thigh, about six feet long, shod with iron; the wood very black, and so hard as to turn an axe.' On St. George's Hill, at a short distance from the Thames, on the Surrey shore, is a camp, called Cæsar's Camp, appearing to be Roman, which comprehends in its area more than thirteen acres, and which probably communicated with a much larger castrametation at Oatlands. We have already observed that Stukeley supposed he had discovered the remains of Roman works at Shepperton; on Greenfield Common he also notices an encamp ment; and on Hounslow Heath, in the parish of About midway between Sunbury, Shepperton, and Laleham, is Littleton, where formerly stood a magnificent mansion, the seat of the Wood family. It stood in a pleasant but level park, but was burnt down a few years ago, and has not been rebuilt. The house was rather of the Dutch type, reminding one of Kensington Palace. It contained some fine pictures, which perished in the flames, including Hogarth's celebrated painting of "Actors Dressing." It is not intended to rebuild the mansion. The late General Thomas Wood, of Littleton, was for ten years M.P. for Middlesex, and colonel of the 84th Regiment, and his father, Colonel Thomas Wood, was for upwards of half a century M.P. for Brecon, and colonel of the East Middlesex Militia. General Wood died in 1872, when the property passed to his son, Mr. Thomas Wood, the present owner. Littleton would seem to be one of the smallest parishes in Middlesex; at all events, according to the census of 1881 it had only about twenty inhabited houses, and a population of 126 souls. The church, dedicated to St. Mary Magdalen, is an ancient structure, of Early English architecture, but of no particular interest. The chancel, which contains several brasses and memorials of the Wood family, was restored a few years ago. CHAPTER XVI. LALEHAM, ASHFORD, AND STAINES. "Such tattle often entertains My lord and me as far as Staines, As once a week we travel down To Windsor, and again to town."-POPE'S Satires. Situation and General Description of Laleham-Remains of a Roman Castrametation on Greenfield Common-Mention of Laleham in Domesday Book-Descent of the Manor-The Parish Church-Laleham House-Dr. Thomas Arnold and his Residence here-The Village of Laleham— Population-The River Thames at Chertsey Bridge - Chertsey Meadows-Laleham Burway-Ashford-Descent of the Manor-The Village of Ashford-The Common-Population-The Parish Church-The Parish Registers-The Welsh Charity School-The West London District Schools-The Town of Staines-The Roman Road and Roman Antiquities-The Boundary Stone of the Thames Conservancy— The Ancient Forest of Middlesex-The Notice of Staines in Domesday Book-A Benedictine Abbey-The Parish Church-An Ancient Guild -The Town of Staines-Markets and Fairs-Population-Inns and Taverns-The Thames and the Water Supply-The Bridge-Duncroft House-Staines Moor-Yeoveney-Runnymede-Magna Charta Island-Ankerwyke-Egham-Cooper's Hill and Sir John Denham. PURSUING Our course along the left bank of the | discernible, as measured with a line, are nearly as Thames, we soon reach the south-western limit of follows:-North side of the outward camp, about the county of Middlesex, and, at the same time, 400 feet; south side, about 390; east side, about the most westerly point of the jurisdiction of the 420; west side, nearly 500. North side of the Thames Conservancy at Staines. Laleham, the inner camp, about 245 feet; south side, about 230; first village through which we pass, possesses no- east side, about 285; west side, about 290."* thing attractive in the way of scenery, but is simply a continuation of the dead level which pervades the district which we have just left behind us. The village is situated about midway between the towns of Chertsey on the south and Staines on the north. It has but few historical associations, but it is stated in The Gentleman's Magazine that Queen Anne had a fishing-box on the river side here, though no proof of the fact is given, and no allusions to it occur in the diaries and personal biographies of her reign. Dr. Stukeley notices the remains of a Roman castrametation on Greenfield Common, in the parish of Laleham, which he supposes to have been the camp in which Julius Cæsar halted after passing the Thames. But Stukeley is not always to be trusted. Indeed, the statement is considered by the inhabitants to be altogether a myth; but traces of a camp in the Ferry Field are still very evident, as also are others on the top of St. Ann's Hill, on the opposite side of the Thames. Mr. Brewer, in the "Beauties of England and Wales," observes that "Dr. Stukeley pursues his supposition to a great extent, and raises several hypotheses on grounds entirely conjectural. If Cæsar crossed the Thames at Coway Stakes, it is quite possible, and perhaps probable, that he might then form an encampment here on his march toward Hertfordshire. But every appropriation of the relics to a particular passage of history must needs proceed from an unsatisfactory ingenuity of surmise." Mr. Lysons, having carefully examined and measured these remains about the year 1800, says: "There are two camps; the fosses, being very Between Ashford and Bedfont Roman coins and other objects have been dug up, in quantities sufficient to make it probable that these level plains were the site of a camp or station during the occupation of the Imperial Eagles. Laleham is recorded in "Domesday Book" under the name of Leleham, and it is stated that "the Earl of Moreton (Mortain, in Normandy) holds in Leleham two hides, which are held under him by the Abbot of Fescamp in Normandy." Robert Blount is also described as holding eight hides of the king in this parish, which were held under him by "one Estrild, a nun." In the thirteenth century the manor of Laleham formed part of the possessions of Westminster Abbey, and early in the seventeenth century it was annexed, together with the smaller manor of Billets, in this parish, to the Honour of Hampton Court, and subsequently granted in fee to the trustees of Sir Henry Spiller, by whose daughter it was afterwards conveyed in marriage to Sir Thomas Reynell. About the middle of the last century, Laleham House, together with the lordship of the manor, was bought by Sir James Lowther, who, having for several years represented the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland in Parliament, was elevated to the peerage in 1784 by Mr. Pitt as Earl of Lonsdale. His lordship, having no issue, obtained a new patent in 1797, creating him Baron and Viscount Lowther, with remainder to the heirs male of his cousin, the Rev. Sir William Lowther, Bart., of Swillington, in whose favour the "Middlesex Parishes," p. 197. |