Making of the Great Pent

V. THE MAKING OF THE GREAT PENT. 

In the twenty-fifth year of Queen Elizabeth's reign steps were taken towards providing a harbour with sheltered landing quays, the (Jueen granting for that purpose the dues to be raised by exporting 30,000 quarters of wheat, 10,000 quarters of barley, and 4,000 tuns of beer; she also granted, by Act of Parliament, for seven years, dues on all British ships passing Dover, whether they used the harbour or not. 

The financial part of the project having in that way been settled, the Queen, in 1582, appointed a Commission to carry out the works, consisting of Lord Cobham (the Lord Warden), Sir Thomas Scott, Sir James Hales, Thomas Wootton, Edward Boys, Thomas Andrews (Mayor of Dover), Richard Barry (Lieutenant of the Castle), Henry Palmer, Thomas Digges, Thomas Welford, and William Partridge, Esquires. Mr. Thomas Diggs, who designed the works, was an engineer of experience and ingenuity. He made a variety of plans, the most ambitious of the set being a plan to enclose the Bay from Archcliff up to the Mote Bulwark. Finally, adopting a smaller area, he decided to use that part of Henry VlIL's Pier, which had been finished, as the south-western boundary of the Harbour. The extension of the Pier which that King had commenced to build 1,400 feet beyond the Black Bulwark was, when Diggs formed his plans, quite useless, all under water, some part resthig on solid chalk, and the other part on a very bad foundation. It was proved by evidence taken at the High Admiral's Inquiry " That the great rocks that were sunken by King Henry VIII. do lie there, and are not removed by the violence of the sea, but by the wearing of them, or looseness of the ground under them, have sunk somewhat lower and lower." The part of the pier near the shore was in fairly good condition, but the harbour within it was choked up with shingle. The problem to which Thomas Diggs devoted himself was to so use the l)ack water of the river as to sluice out that shingle and keep the harbour clear. He found under the cliff above the harbour a pool of standing water impounded by the shelf of beach, twelve feet at least higher than the sea at low water. This pool he resolved to raise higher by building walls, and to use the pent-up water to scour the haven's mouth. 

Nearly two years were spent in deciding how the work should be done, and in convincing the Privy Council that the work, when finished, would answer the purpose intended. The first undertaker, named John True, proposed to build a wall of stone, from the water-gate in Townwall Street down to the stump of Henry Vlll.'s Pier, and, afterwards, to divide off the upper part of the enclosure with a wall, containing sluice gates ; but, before he had laid a single stone, he was dismissed, owing to the great expense of h's methods He had, meanwhile, prepared a large quantity of stone in a quarry at Folkestone, which was left there. 

Next came Ferdinando Poins, a Dutch engineer, skilled in building embankments against the sea. He was strongly supported by Mr. Thomas Andrews, the Mayor, and had done important works on the embankments of the Thames at Erith and Woolwich. His plan was to build the Pent with earth walls, but as he could give no estimate of the cost, nor of the time the work would occupy, he, too, was dismissed. 

Then two shii>buildcrs, named Pett and BalvCr, proposed to enclose the Pent with wooden walls, but their plan would have used up 7,000 tons of timber, and the cost would have been enormous, so that was discarded. 

Then Sir Thomas Scott proposed to enclose the Pent un the Romney Marsh plan, and employ Marsh men, who were expert in such work, promising that he would complete the work effectually during one summer, and at a far less cost than any one el.se had estimated. His proposal was accepted, and he commenced to make the Penr on the 13th day of May, 1583. 

The plan of the work was a long wall starting from the shore in front of the town (where the bottom of liverpool Street now is), and extending, like the string of a bow, across the arc of the bay to a point where the Wellington Bridge now is, the length of the Long Wall being i,q8o feet. From its western end started, at a right angle, a wall extending to the shore, under the Western Heights Cliff, called the Crosswall, 660 feet in length, on the site now occupied by Union Street. The l(jng wall was 70 feet wide at the base, and 40 feet to the top, and the Crosswall 90 feet at the base and 50 feet at the top, the cubic measurement of the whole being 140,800 square yards. The material used was chalk from the cliffs, earth from the adjoining fields, sludge from Henry Vlll.'s choked-up harbour, the whole armed and bound together, after the Romney dyke style, with faggots, thorn and piles. The earth was obtained from two and a half acres of land near Archcliff, and from a place called Horsepool Sole, between Laureston Place and Ashen Tree Lane. The chalk was obtained from the nearest cliffs, so that a cart could bring about seventeen or eighteen loads a day ; v.'hile of earth they could bring but about twelve. The sludge was all obtained close at hand from about the harbour. 

The following narrative of the making of the Pent is taken, somewhat abbreviated, from an article in Hollingshed's history, written by Mr. Reginald Scott: — 

"On the 15th of Ma)', 1583, when carts, which, by proclamation made one month before in divers market towns, were to come to begin the works, there were 542 carts and 1,000 workmen attending them. The carts and horses were so numerous that grazing ground as far out as Shepherdswell was used to turn out the horses to feed on nights and Sundays, for there was no Sunday work in making the Pent. Owing to tlie muUitude of carts assembled, it was thought meet to enter on the execution of both walls simultaneously, and to divide the carts into two parts, Richard Barry, Esq., Lieutenant of Dover Castle, undertaking the oversight of the Longwall, as Sir Thomas Scott did the Crosswall, so that the one was Sir Thomas Scott's wall, and the other the Lieutenant's wall ; and certainly they might well be so termed in respect of the care and costs empkn'ed upon them by those gentlemen. Sir Thomas Scott dwelt twelve long Kentish miles from Dover, vet did he seldom fail to come from his hou-;e to the beginning of his work every Monday morning while the walls were in hand, and from that day until Saturtlay evening, when he returned home, he came first to the walls and departed last. He lay in one John Spritwell's house, who kept an inn in Dover called the Oreyhound, and there did he, his followers, and servants, together with Master Lieutena-nt and his company, receive their diet at a dear hand, for, although the Castle stands within a quarter of a mile of the work, yet was the Lieutenant's industry and charge such that he and his servants did never return home from five o'clock in the morning until after supper. Sir James Hales was the Treasurer of the work; Sir Thomas Diggs, general surveyor; and certain of the jurats of the town were, two at once, daily assigned to be directors to see to the setting forth of the carts, not refusing their allowance, which was eightpence per day. The carting was carried on thus. There were eight men called guides, standing at eight several stations, or places of danger, to guide and help the drivers distressed with their cattle or carts, and to hasten them forward, and these guides had eightpence the day. There attended also at the walls eight men called untingers, to undo the tackle of the carts immediately before the unloading thereof, and they were allowed eightpence the day. Then were there also eight shelvers, who pulled down the carts to the place where it was needful to unload, and these were chosen of the strongest and nimblest men, having tenpence per day. There were also eight tingers whose special office it was to lift up the carts immediately after they were unloaded, and to make fast their tackle, for the drivers hasted forth without making any stay, and these had eightpence per day. The number of labourers who were to shovel and lay even the earth, chalk and slecch when unloaded, was uncertain ; the}- had trom sixjience to eightpence per day. A great many Romney Marshmen were assigned to lay the sleech on the sides of the walls ; they were called scauelmen, and they had twelvepence the day. There were also beetlemen, who served to beat the sicech to the sides of the walls, to break the great pieces of chalk laid on the walls, and to work in the earth close together, having for their wages eightpence the day. Many marsh' men were appointed to arm the sides of the walls after they were sleeched, and had twelvepence and some lifteenpence the day. The arming was done in this manner. Beginning at the foot of the wall, they laid down a row of faggots, through every one of which they drove a needle or stake about iour feet long, having a hole, called the eye, at the great end; then did they edder it with thorne, and lastly drove a key, that is, a wooden wedge, one foot and a half long, through the eye of the needle to keep down the edder which held down the faggots. There was a purveyor appointed to provide the faggot, thorne, needles, keys, etc, who for his horse and himself was allowed every day he travelled 2S. Every cart was filled over night, and in the morning at six o'clock they all approached orderly to the place where the wall should be made. The first driver was chosen to be a diligent person, and his cart to have a good gelding, for as he led the dance so must they all follow. When the first cart came nigh to the place where it should unload, one untijiged it, and when the tail of the cart was turned to the water's side the slielver jjlucked down the loa forth for a new lead, the tinger running after him, pulls up the cart, fastens the tackle, and then with all speed doeth likewise to another, until the whole course of carts, usually about 200 at one place, being unloaded. So favoured were the workers, that there was not lost in all that summer, by means of foul weather, above 3J days ; and in all this business not one person slain, and vet in almost every action there was imminent danger, particularly in laying the sluice in the Crosswall ; also, many times men in digging the chalk stood on the clifiF and undermined it so, as sometimes a hundred loads fell down at once from under their feet, and somtimes from above their heads; yet all escaped without hurt, except two persons upon whom great chalk rocks and much abundance of earth did fall, and )-et were recovered without loss of life or limb. In the passage, also, of the carts, if by chance either man or boy had fallen down amongst them (as sometimes some did), the hill was so steep in places and the carts so swift, that there could be no stay made, or the carts would run over one another; and yet no great harm happened in that way. A carL laden with earth passed over the stomach of a driver, and yet he was not hurt at all thereby. And one thing more is to be noted, this is, that in all this time, and amongst all these people, there was never any tumult, fray, or falling out to the disturbance of the works. They never ceased working the whole day, saving that n o'clock before noon, as also at 6 o'clock in the evening, there was a flag held up by the Sergeant of the town on the top of a tower, and presently, on the sign given, was a general shout made by the workers, and wheresoever a cart was at that instant, empty or loaded, there it was left till i o'clock of the afternoon, or 6 o'clock in the morning. But by the space of half an hour before the " flag of liberty " was hung out, all the drivers entered into a song, whereof the ditty was barbarous, and the note rustical, being delivered by the continual voices of such a multitude, was very strange. The words thereof were these : — 
 
As an exception to the general good fortune attending the making of the Pent, it may be metioned that on the 27th day of July, being St. James's Day, the very day when the Cross-wall and the Long-wall met, and were in eifect finished, both being brought above high-water mark, Sir Thomas Scott, the principal pillar of the work, fell sick upon the walls, and was conveyed thence in a waggon to his house, where he remained six weeks more likely to die than to live. During Sir Thomas Scott's illness, the heightening of the walls two feet above high water mark was continued and finished by the middle of August, so that in the space of three months, the great work was completed at the small cost of £2,700." 

Three years after the Pent was finished, says a contemporary writer, the walls and sluices were so perfect that '' a full pent shrinketh not any whit betwixt tide and tide." He further stated that the sluicing power of the Pent fully answered expectations in keeping the harbour mouth clear during the three years following its completion, and further illustrates the point by stating that in October, 1586, one gate of the sluice was accidentally broken, and in less than four davs the mouth of the haven was choked up, so that an ambassador desiring to cross from Dover to France, had to send for a ship from Sandwich, because no vessel could enter or leave Dover Harbour ; yet, on the next tide after the sluice gate was repaired, one pent full of water had so scoured the channel that a 300-ton vessel easily did pass in and out. 

According to other writers, the Pent showed two great defect.s — the Long Wall (alongside the present Ordnance Wharf) was unable to resist the rough sea, which made a breach there, and the sluicing power of the Pent failed to keep the harbour mouth open. These two points detract nothing from the credit due to those who, by wonderfi 1 organisation and energy, enclosed the Pent at .s(^ small a cost and in so short a time. The breach in the Long Wall might easily have been remedied by the same means by which the wall was originally built, and the failure of the original sluices arose from later harbour makers placing the mouth of the harbour further seaward at too great a distance from the sluices for them to be effective. 

The object of constructing the Pent being to clear the harbour of the shingle and silt that barred ifs entrance, it was found that when the harbour mouth was finally carried out to where the entrance to the old harbour still is, other works were necessary to shoot the sluicing water directly against the bar. To do this Mr. Uiggs made a culvert from the Pent along the line now occui)ied l)y Strond Street, and, near the south end of that street, constructed a pair of flood-gates twenty-four feet wide and seventeen feet high, from whence he built a stone sluice to deliver near the bar. Beside the flood-gates he erected an engine-house containing machinery for working the flood-gates expeditiously ; and, as Mr. Diggs thought that this would be the crowning work which would effectually remove the troubles of Dover Harbour, he placed over the building an effigy of Queen Elizabeth, the patron of the Port. After these gates were built, Paradise Harbour was called " Paradise Pent." 

This sluice did not end the troubles. The force of the water was so great that it undermined the Black Bulwark and Poin's droin, which then formed the mouth of the Harbour. This made some outer works nece.ssary. Mr. Diggs continued the Long Wall from the south-east corner of the Pent down to the Harbour mouth, and this made the outline of the harbour almost the same as the space within the old pier-heads is now. The harbour then consisted of three parts — the Great Pent, which was only a reservoir ; the Paradise Pent, which was an adaptation of the old Paradise Harbour for improving the sluicing power; and a large tidal basin extending from the line of Strond Street and Clarence Place to th j pier-heads, called " Great Paradi.se Harbour." Excluding minor details, these works, carried out under the direction of Mr. Diggs, completed the harbour works of the Elizabethan Period.