Chichester Harbour - The Thirteen Villages and Moments in Time
Chichester Harbour - The Thirteen Villages was written and published before Jill married, under the name of Jill Dickin. Chichester is a market town on England’s south coast and its harbour is one of several rias and estuaries which indent the shore behind the Isle of Wight.
Chichester Harbour - The Thirteen Villages was written many years ago when I lived in the old tide mill at Birdham Pool. The booklet provides a perfectly accurate but inevitably brief account of the history of the villages around the harbour. It is now available only from the Chichester Harbour Conservancy.
I never intended that The Thirteen Villages should be my last offering on this subject, and having spent many years gathering information I am now in the process of writing a much more comprehensive book. This will cover every period of the history of Chichester Harbour, from the time long before the glacial rivers began to carve out its shape, all the way down the ages - past our stone age ancestors with their flint axes, and Bronze age man with his burial mounds; past the war-mongering Celts and the Pax Romanis; past the Saxons, the Normans, the Tudor kings and the Commonwealth - past all the ages until we arrive in the present time. This opus magnus is provisionally entitled Moments in Time: The History of England as glimpsed from the shores of Chichester Harbour.
If the title seems a little pompous consider, if you will, the difficulty of painting a true portrait of the history of this place without putting it in the context of national events. How is one to explain the presence of the Romans at Fishbourne without describing the chain of events which brought them here? And how is the reader to understand why the shrine of St Richard and his chapel at West Wittering were desecrated if he has no knowledge of King Henry VIII’s row with the pope? These are but two examples of the futility of reciting historic details in isolation.
Moments in Time is written in a manner which will appeal both to local residents and to visitors, and it is hoped that the book will also be of use to schools in the area.
The book will be copiously illustrated with line drawings, cartoons and watercolours. Indeed, it is these which will provide the reader with glimpses of those “moments in time”. Where appropriate, reconstructions of ancient events and ancient buildings will be superimposed upon contemporary scenes. In this way I hope to be able to set the past within the context of the present, so making it more accessible.
I would be very pleased to hear from anybody who happens to have any old paintings or old (pre 1920) photographs of Chichester Harbour. Access to such material enables me to create accurate illustrations.
If you think that you might be interested in buying a copy of Moments in Time please contact me and I will let you know when the book becomes available.