A postally unused Mitchell's Series postcard that was published prior to June 1918 on behalf of Edward J. Spicer, proprietor of the Ship Hotel in Dymchurch. The card, which has a divided back, was phototyped in Berlin.
The building looks very similar today, except that a porch has been added to the front door.
Dymchurch
Dymchurch is a village in the Folkestone and Hythe district of Kent. The village is located on the coast five miles (8 km) south-west of Hythe, and on the Romney Marsh.
New Hall was rebuilt in 1575 after an earlier wooden structure was destroyed in a fire. It was used as a court room for the Romney Marsh area. The head magistrate was known as Leveller of the Marsh Scotts.
It was there that the so-called Scot tax was introduced, levied on residents to fund maintenance of the sea wall. Those directly outside the boundaries and thus not eligible for the tax were said to have got away "scot free".
Residents with land were required to grow thorn bushes for building the wall, as thorn twigs were believed to be impervious to sea water. Failure resulted in an ear being cut off.
The Anglo-French Survey
Dymchurch played a significant rôle in the Anglo-French Survey (1784–1790), which linked the Royal Greenwich Observatory with the Paris Observatory using trigonometry. There were two baselines for the English part of the survey, on Hounslow Heath and on Romney Marsh. The Romney Marsh base-line extended from Ruckinge to High Nook, on the sea-wall near Dymchurch.
The Foundering of the Courier de Dieppe
In January 1867, the Courier de Dieppe was spotted foundering in a gale off Dymchurch, with the crew clinging to the rigging and one by one dropping off into the sea. After repeated attempts, a line was thrown to the boat, but by this time there was only one of its crew left.
The Reverend Charles Cobb, rector of the parish, volunteered to swim to the boat to try to save the last man. Encouraged by his wife and the gathered crowd, he dived into the troubled waters and swam the 50 feet or more to the vessel.
He was then joined by a local coastguard, John Batist. Together they reached the trapped man, and managed to carry and drag him back to shore, where they received much applause for their heroism. The rescued man was the only survivor of a crew of four from the ship. Cobb was awarded the Albert Medal of the First Class, and Batist was awarded the Albert Medal of the Second Class. The street nearest to where this heroic action occurred was later named "Charles Cobb Close" in his memory.
Paul Nash
The artist Paul Nash settled in Dymchurch in 1919, and lived there for a number of years, painting a number of important paintings, as well as producing lithographs and wood engravings, based on the sea wall and the surrounding countryside.
Dymchurch in WWII
-- On the 24th. August 1940, Dymchurch was bombed and the first local people were killed by enemy action. They were Alfred and Ada Austin. Their house, Sea Breeze, was rebuilt.
-- In 1942, the primary school suffered a direct hit from a bomb dropped from a plane. The teacher and pupils had escaped to the bomb shelter, and there were no reported casualties.
-- In February 1944 a USAF Flying Fortress developed engine trouble while returning from a bombing raid, and crashed into the police station, damaging several neighbouring houses in Lyndhurst Road. A soldier was killed and three people were injured.
-- In May 1944, 22 soldiers were killed by the explosion of anti-tank grenades at Dymchurch. The cause of the explosion was uncertain; at the inquest it was suggested that it may have been the heat of the sun, or a match-head falling into a box of detonators.
-- The Observer Corps used Martello Tower 25 as a vantage post, and it was there that the first V-1 flying bomb to fly over England was spotted on the 13th. June 1944.
Dymchurch underwent significant fortification during the Second World War, with bunkers and pillboxes. The gun platforms were encased in concrete for machine guns to be mounted, artillery emplacements constructed and an observation post erected.
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