"Firing into the Brown" #72 - City gates , giveaways, and stuff..

"So Carnehan weeds out the pick of his men, and sets the two of the Army to show them drill and at the end of two weeks the men can manoeuvre about as well as Volunteers. So he marches with the Chief to a great big plain on the top of a mountain, and the Chiefs men rushes into a village and takes it; we three Martinis firing into the brown of the enemy".

Kipling "The Man Who Would Be King"

Time for another update..

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...and so a local history mini project starts...  😏

Back in the day Portsmouth (my local city), was far smaller than it is now..  so small, and important a site in fact, that they were able to surround it with a defensive wall. This was mostly to protect the dockyard supply depots, ammunition stores, and the inhabitants of the city a lot of whom who would have either worked in, or supported, the dockyard. To give access to the city there were four ornate gateways - so I thought it might be fun to go and visit them in turn.. 

First though some preamble....

1797 Ordnance Survey map - the walls were well developed and encompassed both city and dockyard in almost a single uninterrupted length by this point in time..

The defences of the city went through multiple stages of development (of course 😏) - and given this is about the city gates, I have focussed purely on the city defences, rather than work also done to defend the dockyard..

• Earthen ramparts protecting the land side of the port were first built in the 14th century
• These were strengthened by Henry VIII in the 16th century as part of a general improvement in the area (Southsea Castle was built about the same time, and was famously where he was supposed to have been when Mary Rose sank) - by 1542, Portsmouth was surrounded by defensive ramparts and towers built from earth and wood.
• Improvements continued through Elizabeth's reign with many of the towers being converted to stone, and in some cases becoming full on bastions
• By far the most significant update to the fortifications was done during the 17th Century though, when in 1665, Charles II ordered Bernard de Gomme to begin the reconstruction of Portsmouth's fortifications. I think from my reading, De Gomme was a military engineer on a par with with the (probably) better known Vauban. Among many other things
• The city walls were rebuilt.
• A (second) moat was also added with a new defensive line being constructed between the two moats.
• A ravelin was added at Landport where the London road entered the city (see map below).
• About 1730 the double moat system used around Portsmouth was abandoned with the outer moat being filled in - the sheer number of men required to defend it was too much
• In the 18th century, as Portsea continued to expand and grow around the dockyard a further series of ramparts and moats were constructed to protect this new settlement in the 1770s - the 1797 Ordnance survey above gives a view of the fortifications at the time .

...and that was largely it - all future work was then focussed on protecting the whole island rather than this very specific area.. it's kind of interesting that in much the same way as the Hilsea Lines were outdated before they were even built, the same eventually happened to these walls - as artillery range improved, landward protective defences for a location needed to move out and out.. the walls simply became irrelevant, and with the continued growth of the city would have been an impediment to any expansion - the majority of the town walls were demolished in the 1870's.. 

So...  having to start somewhere I thought I'd start with the Landport Gate - why start with the Landport Gate??  Well mainly because it's the only one of the four gates in the walls of Old Portsmouth to survive in its original position and is/was considered to be the main gate. 

So starting with a the following, this is a copy of de Gomme's map of 1668, which shows the huge difference a 100+ years has made when compared with the 1797 map above. Note that by then the city and the dockyard are a single entity, whereas at the time de Gomme was working, the dockyard was still very much separate ..  I've ringed the Landport ravelin mentioned above as that's our starting point.. I've also coloured water so that moats and water levels are more obvious..

In 1760 it was decided that for defensive purposes it made more sense to have the this gate in the centre of the northern ramparts rather than were it was (you'll note in de Gomme's map that the ravelin is not central to that stretch of wall, and the military mind was ever ordered.. 😏) so the old gate at the end of the High Street was dispensed with, and the Landport Gate constructed half way between Town Mount Bastion and Guy's Bastion (the two bastions at either end of the wall). 

The design of the gate has been attributed to Nicholas Hawksmoor, though it was constructed after his death. It features a simple stone arch built of Portland stone with octagonal turret above. It would originally have been flanked by ramparts, and had a drawbridge which led to the Landport Ravelin, from which a smaller drawbridge would lead to solid ground (a lot of the area outside the old city was marsh back then) and to what was then known as the London Road.

Landport Gate (outer view, so front face) taken c1870 - note ramparts/moat are still in place - note also Landport Town Mount (cheers Jim! 😁) ravelin in the left foreground and the bridge leading from it..

One last map - this one dates from 1860 and shows the access to the London Road via the ravelin..

Sorry - I lied - I do like a map 😁. This one dates from 1797 and also shows the drawbridges/bridges ..

Time for a visit to the actual site I think!

Other reading:

• Memorials and Monuments in Old Portsmouth (Landport Gate)

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Been having a clear out - can anyone use these??  Yours for the price of postage - either leave a comment (I won't publish), or use the 'contact me' button over on the side to contact me with an email address..  after two weeks with no takers they head for the recycle bin..  😁

First off a couple of Arquebusiers.. these date from 2010

Journal of the Pike and Shot Society

Next - some Solo Wargamers Association Journals - published quarterly:

Lone Warrior June/Sep/Dec 1998

Lone Warrior 1999 - Mar/June/Sep/Dec

Lone Warrior 2000 - all four

Lone Warrior 2001 - all four

Lone Warrior 2002 - all four

Lone Warrior 2003 - all four

Lone Warrior 2004 - all four

Lone Warrior - Mar 2005

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 "Laters", as the young people are want to say...