Isle Of Sheppey Research Articles

Diatoms in the Thames

IN NATURE, vol. xxxii. p. 223, you were good enough to publish a note from me respecting the occurrence in great profusion of small gelatinous bodies in the water surrounding the Isle of Sheppey. The same conditions prevailed at about the same time last year, and in all probability will reappear at the latter end of this month.

The Bagshot Sands in the Isle of Sheppey

The Bagshot Sands in the Isle of Sheppey

The Bagshot Sands in the Isle of Sheppey

The Bagshot Sands in the Isle of Sheppey

XII.—Inventories and Valuations of Religious Houses at the time of the Dissolution, from the Public Record Office

Among the scarcest illustrations of monastic arrangement are original ground plans, such as those of Canterbury, Chester, the Charter House, and Tynemouth, with descriptions of a later date in the Rites of Durham. Next in value are inventories in detail, as in the case of Christ Church (Hants), Bridlington, and Tewkesbury; these also are extremely rare, but I have been able to add to them those of Whalley Abbey, Stanlaw, St. Martin's Newark, Dover and the Maison Dieu in the same town, Minster in the Isle of Sheppey, St. Osyth's (Essex), and St. Alban's, in the time of Edward VI.

The Geology of Maidstone

The Kentish Ragstone is a source of very considerable trade to Maidstone, and gives employment to many workmen. Several barges are constantly engaged in conveying to the coasts of Kent and Sussex, in the marshes of which it is very extensively employed for the banks or sea-walls. In Romney Marsh and on the eastern side of the Isle of Sheppey a large expenditure is yearly incurred in thus protecting large and valuable tracts of land from the ravages of the sea. The ragstone is also extensively used as a road-stone and for buildings, large quantities of the stone being sent to London and other places especially for the former purpose. A small quantity is burnt into lime of a very superior quality; but the abundance of chalk in this neighbourhood, and the greater cheapness of that rock, prevents the general use of the stronger but more costly stone-lime.Many handsome buildings in Maidstone and other places in the county are built of it. Of these in Maidstone may be mentioned the new gaol, the lunatic asylum, and the new church. Of ancient buildings constructed of it are the old parish church of All Saints, the Episcopal Palace and College. Many of the London churches, and nearly all of those on the banks of the Thames and Medway, have a great proportion of this stone in their walls; and proofs of its durability and early application to building purposes may be seen in the present condition of Allington and Rochester castles, and most of the bridges from Aylesford to Tunbridge.

A Visit to Reculver, in Kent

Those who are familiar with Sir Charles Lyell's ‘Principles of Geology’ will remember the illustrations given, in the twentieth chapter of his able and most philosophical book, of the action of the sea on various parts of the coasts of Britain. The changes that have taken place in some parts, even within the historical period, have been very considerable, and perhaps none more so than on the eastern and south-eastern coasts of England, where the encroachments of the sea seem to have been of the most destructive character. From the western coast of the Isle of Sheppey, extending eastwards to Herne Bay, Reculver, and Thanet, the destructive action of both the sea and the other elements has been witnessed by many in our own time; and every year tells its history of a change in some part of this line of coast.I had long contemplated a visit to Reculver, and in the month of June last the opportunity of seeing this part of the coast was afforded me. No place is more accessible from London than Herne Bay; the visitor has the opportunity of running down either by steamer from London Bridge, or by the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway from either the London Bridge or Victoria stations. If time is an object, the latter is preferable, and it was the route I chose, which enabled me to see and learn all that I desired in a single day.

On the Thickness of the London Clay; on the Relative Position of the Fossilferous Beds of Sheppey, Highgate, Harwich, Newnham, Bognor, &c.; and on the Probable Occurence of the Bagshot Sands in the Isle of Sheppey

H aving frequently had my attention directed by Mr. Searles Wood to the question of the exact position in the London Clay of the peculiar and remarkable fossiliferous beds of Sheppey, and of the thickness of the London Clay itself at that place, I have, with that special object in view, made a further examination of the Island, and now beg to lay before the Society the result of these observations. I have availed myself of this opportunity to determine also more correctly the importance of the London Clay in other parts of its range, and to settle approximately the position of the strata of some other localities, well known for their fossils—separate lists of which I give at the end of this paper. This question of the thickness of the London Clay remains nearly in the state in which it was left by Phillips and Conybeare in 1822. The impression likely to be conveyed by the observation on this subject in their valuable work* is one which would suppose its development to be more irregular, and in places considerably greater, than will, I believe, prove to be the case. They state,—" The actual thickness of the London Clay in Sheppey may be estimated, by adding the height of the cliff to the depth of the wells, at 530 feet.” They then proceed to say that “it may be supposed to be much thicker in Essex,” estimating it at “High Beech to be about 700 feet thick;” and further, they report

Effigy of a Knight of the Fifteenth Century, Dug up in the Churchyard at Minster, Isle of Sheppey, in 1833, and now Preserved in the Church There

(1849). Effigy of a Knight of the Fifteenth Century, Dug up in the Churchyard at Minster, Isle of Sheppey, in 1833, and now Preserved in the Church There. Archaeological Journal: Vol. 6, No. 1, pp. 351-358.

XXI.— Description of some Ophidiolites (Palæophis toliapicus) from the London Clay at Sheppey, indicative of an extinct species of Serpent.

Plate XXII. Whilst recording the evidences of the warm-blooded Vertebrates which have been found in the London Clay, I take the opportunity of describing some fossils from the same formation, referable to an order of reptiles which appears to have been very sparingly represented in the fauna of former periods of the history of the earth. Vertebræ joined enarthrodially by a deep anterior transversely oblong cup and a corresponding prominent posterior ball, and further articulated by two projecting posterior flat oblique processes wedged like the carpenter’s tenon into a mortice excavated in the anterior oblique processes of the succeeding vertebra; supporting, moreover, on either side of the fore-part of the body, an oblong convexity for the moveable articulation of the rib, belong unequivocally to a reptile of the Ophidian order. A group of about thirty vertebræ of this description, with a number of long and slender ribs, having expanded concave vertebral extremities, cemented irregularly together by a mass of indurated clay, forms part of the choice collection of fossils left by John Hunter, and now in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, London*. A portion of the spinal column of apparently the same species of Serpent, measuring eighteen inches in length, and including twenty-eight vertebræ; a smaller group of seven vertebræ, and a few detached ones, are contained in the museum of Mr. Bowerbank. All these specimens are from the Isle of Sheppey. The vertebræ in each specimen present the same conformation and nearly the same size: they

LXXXIII. An account of several bones of an elephant found at Leysdown in the lsland of Sheppey. In two letters from Mr. Jacob, Surgeon at Feversham, to James Parsons, M. D. F. R. S. dated May 24, 1754.

Sir, Three or four years ago I sent you the acetabulum of an elephant, which was discover’d sticking in the clay, which was partly wash’d away from the cliff, at a place call'd Leysdown, in the isle of Sheppey, a full mile eastward of the cliffs of Minster.