About Robertsbridge
Robertsbridge is an old settlement probably founded about 1176, when the only Cistercian Abbey was built on the site of the current War Memorial . Remnants of the old chapel cellar from the monastery can still be seen in the basement of one of the houses in the high street
The village was left when the abbey was moved about 1 mile to the East to the village of Salehurst in 1210. It is believed that the name of the village was derived from the bridge built by the 1st abbot - Robert de St Martin, abbey records show it as "Pons Roberti" which translates from the Latin to The Bridge of Robert.
In 1193 Richard the Lionheart was returning from the 3rd Crusade across Europe, when he was captured by Duke Leopold of Austria, and handed over to the Holy Roman Emperor who imprisoned him. Abbot William of Robertsbridge Abbey was commissioned by Parliament to find the King. He was located in the Castle of Derstein in Bavaria, and William successfully negotiated his release for 150,000 marks.
The main business of the village was as a stopping and resting place for travellers from Hastings to London. The large numbers of late 14th and 15th Century Wealden Hall Houses show a period of wealth possibly due to the weekly market that was granted the village by Henry III in 1254.
Henry III visited the Abbey in 1225 and 1264, and Edward II in 1295 and 1297, staying in the village.
The body of Sir John Pelham and his wife were buried in Robertsbridge Abbey.
In 1541 a forge was built by the Churchill family on the old Abbey grounds at Salehurst , this was supplemented by a furnace in 1754. The manufactured goods were despatched from Bodiam bridge, the furthest navigable point up the river Rother. The main production of the furnace was of cannons manufactured by melting down other guns rejected by the navy or from pig iron. The use of pre manufactured iron as a raw material ensured the quality of the castings was better.
In 1740, at Silver Hill between Hurst Green and Robertsbridge a Revenue Officer Thomas Carswell was shot and killed while trying to apprehend some of the smugglers from the Hawkhurst Gang .
During the 1700 and 1800's women's stays were manufactured in the area, and flour milling was carried out, together with the manufacture of guns for the navy. The area was also well known for smuggling , and the robbing of travellers.
In the late 1800's cricket bats and equipment were manufactured by Gray Nichols, whose factory is still in the village.
Finally the very first Cub Scout Pack was started in Robertsbridge by Baden Powell.
About Robertsbridge Abbey
Extracts from ‘A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 2
Houses of Cistercian monks
Abbey of Robertsbridge
Sponsor: Victoria County History
Year published: 1973
Pages: 71-4
Citation: 'Houses of Cistercian monks: Abbey of Robertsbridge', A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 2 (1973), pp. 71-4. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=36589.
The Cistercian abbey of St. Mary was founded in the vill of Robertsbridge within the parish of Salehurst in or about 1176 by Alvred de St. Martin, sheriff of the rape of Hastings and 'dapifer' to Richard I, who married Alice widow of John count of Eu. Besides the site of the abbey and the adjoining lands he bestowed upon the monks estates in Ewhurst and Sedlescombe, and land lying between Winchelsea and 'Cliveshend,' and other lands belonging to the Ewhurst prebend of Hastings college. These gifts Seffrid II, bishop of Chichester (1180-1204), confirmed as far as was in his power, taking the abbey and its possessions under his protection. The Countess Alice associated herself with her husband in his foundation, and her son Henry count of Eu so liberally followed in her steps that the abbots of Cîteaux and Clairvaux, by the advice of Denis abbot of Robertsbridge, conferred upon him and upon his mother's soul the benefits of the Order. Other benefactors added their gifts of lands and rents, the most prominent being the families of Bodiam and Echingham. It would seem that as a consequence of their increased wealth the monks removed to another site, as a charter of 1314 refers to 'the chapel in the said vill (of Salehurst) on the spot where the abbey was originally founded.'
Besides grants and purchases from laymen the abbey was frequently brought into contact with other religious houses, several agreements being made with the canons of Hastings, the abbot of Battle, the prior of Leeds in Kent, and the abbot of Tréport in Normandy, from whom the Sussex abbey purchased lands in Playden and Bexhill. Though their lands were thus increasing there was the drawback that many of them lay exposed to the ravages of the sea, entailing heavy expenditure for the maintenance of seawalls—towards which the earl of Arundel left a sum of £20 in 1396, and even then not always proving productive, so that in 1257 Pope Alexander IV, considering the sterility caused by influx of the sea, excused the monks from payment of tithes upon those lands which they had 'inned' and brought under cultivation. But in spite of losses the abbey at the time of the Taxation of 1291 held property worth nearly £110.
The ravages of the sea, however, during the great storm of 1287 and in subsequent years so reduced the monks' revenues that in 1309 they obtained the royal licence to acquire lands to no less a value than £100, and in the same year their patron, Sir William de Echingham, obtained licence to grant them the advowsons of the churches of Salehurst, Udimore, and Mountfield with their appurtenances, valued at 50 marks. This valuable gift, however, proved for some time a source of expense rather than profit, as it involved twenty years' litigation, and necessitated journeys to the papal court, where the abbot had to make a longer stay than he had intended, as money gave out and he had to send to England for further funds, and to the royal court at London, Waltham, York and elsewhere— one abbot dying suddenly while engaged upon the business. At last, after they had gained the consent of the bishop of Chichester, the dean of Hastings College—of which the three churches formed a prebend—and Sir Simon de Echingham as patron of the churches and prebend, the king, whose claims as patron of the college of Hastings had been the cause of all the difficulty, allowed the abbey to appropriate the three churches in 1333. In the course of the negotiations the monks had incurred in addition to monetary losses, considerable obligations of a spiritual nature. In 1314 Sir William de Echingham bargained that in return for his benefactions they should maintain two chaplains, monks or seculars, to perform service for the souls of himself, his wife Eva and his heirs in the chapel in Salehurst where the monastery was first founded, providing vestments and other necessaries. These privileges were extended in 1325, when the abbot undertook to find two chaplains to celebrate daily—except on Good Friday and Easter Eve—for the souls of Sir William and Lady Eva, the one at the altar of the Holy Cross the other at that of St. Giles, and a third in the chapel of St. Mary at the abbey gate, besides two others to do service in the abbey church at the altar of the Holy Martyrs on the right side of the choir where the bodies of Lady Eva and of Sir William's daughter Joan lay; all these chaplains were further to say before the said altar of the Holy Martyrs 'Placebo' and 'Dirige' with the commendation on the days customary in the Cistercian order. By a further agreement in 1356 the monks were relieved of the maintenance of the two chaplains for the original chapel of Robertsbridge, but continued bound to provide the other five. Moreover, the abbot, in return for the privilege of being a non-resident canon of Hastings, was bound to provide a fit secular priest to serve the prebend, and in 1501 the abbot agreed to pay the dean of Hastings 4 marks yearly for the celebration of services and in discharge of all claims. Another obligation had been incurred in 1304, when the abbot had secured the bishop of Chichester's favour by a gift of a yearly rent of 100s. for the support of two clerks in the cathedral church to cense the host at the time of its elevation during high mass.
During the early years of its existence the abbey of Robertsbridge plays some considerable part in history, its head being sent with the abbot of Boxley in 1192 to search for King Richard, whom they found in Bavaria, and by whom they were sent back to England with the news of his treaty with the emperor. The same two abbots in 1198 acted as the archbishop's agents to the pope on the occasion of his quarrel with the monks of Canterbury over the church of Lambeth. In 1212 the abbot of Robertsbridge was dispatched abroad as the king's messenger, and was given 2 marks with which to buy a palfrey, and he was selected for the same purpose in 1222, and again in 1225, in which latter year the king paid a visit to the abbey. Henry III was again at Robertsbridge in 1264, when at the head of his troops marching to the disastrous battle of Lewes, he extorted large sums of money from the unfortunate monks. A later royal visitor was Edward II, who was there on 27 August, 1394.
By this time, however, the fame of the house seems to have dwindled, as when John, bishop of Exeter, purchased a book (now in the Bodleian Library), whose flyleaf contained an anathema upon anyone alienating it from the house of St. Mary of Robertsbridge, he relieved his conscience by noting that he did not know where that house was.
Of the inner history of this house little is known. It appears to have had a good reputation, as it was frequently selected by pious monks of Canterbury who wished to leave the Benedictine for the stricter Cistercian order. On the other hand Giraldus Cambrensis in his article 'on the secret luxury of the Cistercians' tells the following story:—John who succeeded Odo as abbot of Battle (in 1200) happening to pass an abbey of that order in Sussex called in to see the abbot, whom he knew. While passing through the cloisters he insisted upon going into the refectory, although the abbot tried to dissuade him, saying that they would disturb the servers who were having their meal after having waited upon the other members of the convent. Going in the visitor saw the tables laden with fine fat joints, and turning to the abbot completed his confusion by asking of what saint those bones were the relics, further pointing his humorous rebuke by at once leaving the abbey. A case of apostasy is mentioned in 1344, when the pope gave orders for the reconciling of Robert Coumber, who had left the monastery but now desired to return; and in 1351 another monk, John Crompe, was permitted to return to the abbey, which he had left without leave in order to go to Rome for the general indulgence which had been in operation the previous October; and in 1363 another apostate monk was reconciled. That these instances do not point to any laxity of discipline is suggested by a record of 1403 which tells that John Holmborn, a monk of Robertsbridge, having been found in a wood with an unmarried woman was beaten to the effusion of blood and then sent by his abbot to Coggeshall Abbey, in Essex, where he long lived a miserable life; now he was old and longed to return to Robertsbridge, he had therefore gone to Rome, where he had obtained absolution from the pope, who further ordered that he should be restored to his former stall and place in chapter and to have the room, books, clothes and other things formerly his.
The income of the abbey being £248 10s. 6d. it escaped the first suppression and survived until 16 April, 1538, when it was surrendered by the abbot, Thomas Taylor, and his brethren, who were then eight in number, the same number of monks as were resident in 1418.
Further information can be obtained from:
www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=36589
About Salehurst
Salehurst is an old Saxon settlement that is mentioned in the Domesday book(1086 AD), as having been destroyed by the Normans just before the Battle of Hastings in 1066 ( Battle ). It is believed that the illustration on the Bayeux Tapestry of Saxon homes being destroyed was based on events surrounding Salehurst .
The name Salehurst derives from the Anglo Saxon Sealh meaning willow, and hurst a thick wood.
Nowadays the area is arable, and many hops are grown in its surrounding fields.
In 1210 the Robertsbridge Abbey was moved to a site opposite the church on the other side of the river. This event probably revived the hamlet of Salehurst , with the church being given its Salmander Font by the Abbot. This was a gift to Robertsbridge Abbey for its part in the discovery and eventual return of Richard the Lion Heart , from imprisonment by the Bavarians(See Robertsbridge ).
During medieval times the main road from London came down from Hurst Green to the church at Salehurst , then across the valley and up into Robertsbridge .
In 1538, the abbey was closed by Henry VIII, and the hamlet started to decline. The 1597 local records show about 50 properties in the locality of the church, which now stands at 3 farms, and a dozen houses.
In the churchyard lie a number of tombstones decorated with Harmer terracotta plaques.
About The Gun Powder Plot
2005 marked the 400th anniversary of a violent attempt to overthrow the government. In 1605 London, a gang of fanatics armed with powerful explosives planned to kill the King and install a regime more to their liking. Fortunately for King James I and his government the plan was discovered at the eleventh hour and the plotters were caught. The would-be terrorist outrage, known as the Gunpowder Plot, is remembered now as Guy Fawkes Day, after the gang member who was caught red handed.
Guy, or to give him his real name Guido Fawkes was one of a group recruited by wealthy Catholic aristocrat Robert Catesby, to overthrow the Protestant King and install a government that would look more kindly on their religion.
The struggle for religious ascendancy was one of the main political motivators throughout the second half of the sixteenth century following the efforts of Henry VIII to divorce his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, which caused England’s 1534 break with the Church of Rome. After Henry died his daughter Mary I tried to return the country to Catholicism, which led to the torture and killing of many Protestants. She was succeeded by her Protestant sister Elizabeth I, who feared a Popish plot to overthrow her, and brought about the persecution of a great many Catholics. By the time the Protestant James VI of Scotland succeeded the childless Elizabeth in 1603 to become James I of Great Britain the county’s Catholics were forced to hide their religious allegiance and lived in fear of betrayal.
Catesby was determined to do something to redress the situation and recruit 12 other liked-minded men to do the deed. Guy Fawkes joined the conspiracy after meeting Catesby at a London inn, the Dog and Duck in May of 1604. Fawkes was a tall, powerfully built man with thick reddish brown hair, a flowing moustache and bushy beard, who had served as a mercenary in the Spanish army fighting in Flanders. The conspirators decided that they would blow up the House of Lords while the King and all his government were present for the State Opening of Parliament at the beginning of November. Another of the conspirators, Thomas Percy, hired a cellar under the Lords’ Chamber and over a period of weeks in the autumn of 1605 the conspirators stashed away 36 barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes as the experienced military man was chosen to light the fuse.
The plot was discovered when a catholic peer, Lord Monteagle, received a letter on October 26th, possibly from another of the conspirators, his cousin Francis Tresham, warning him not to attend the Opening. Monteagle took the letter to Robert Cecil, James I First Minister, who organised searches of the Parliament buildings. At midnight on November 4th Guy Fawkes was found hiding in the cellar along with the barrels of powder and a lantern to setting them off. By November 12th all of the plotters had been killed or arrested; Catesby was shot dead whilst resisting arrest. Under torture Fawkes admitted the plot, apparently realising that God did not want it to succeed. A report of the time said that ‘Yt was past, and he is nowe sorry for yt, for that he nowe perceyveth that God did not concur with yt’
The surviving conspirators, including Fawkes, were put on trial at Westminster Hall on 27th January 1606 and were executed on January 31st. In 1606 Parliament passed an act to appoint November 5th as a day of thanksgiving for ‘the joyful day of deliverance’ which remained on the Statute Books until 1859. Today our bonfires and fireworks remind us that we still cause to celebrate that last minute deliverance.