A haven for history
Cuckmere Haven might now be a tranquil bay for walkers, artists, nature lovers and more, but its history is rather more adventurous.
Its location on the Sussex coast gave Cuckmere Haven a pivotal role in the battles against the smuggling trade of the early 19th century and in protecting Britain during the World Wars.
A constant through the tumultuous times were the Coastguard Cottages, watching over the bay, carrying out salvaging and lifesaving duties, and guarding against invasion. The Cable Hut, one of the few remaining cable stations that once lined the coast, was a major and important cable route taking messages from London to France and on to Canada.
The Cable Hut is part
of the Treasure the Treasures on your Doorstep! national campaign from
Heritage Open Days.
Smuggling at Cuckmere
200 years ago this black market economy played a major role in England’s social history, as it was the common peoples’ response to high levels of taxation on ordinary, everyday goods (first put in place by the King during the many years of Civil War), which left many people in acute poverty.
“In September 1783 gangs of 200 or 300 men arrived at Cuckmere Haven twice within a week, and defiantly carried off their goods, despite opposition and the fact that the sea was extremely rough on the earlier occasion. A contemporary newspaper reported that it was quite common to see a dozen smuggling vessels lying off the coast in broad daylight at this time”.
By the early 19th century smuggling was big business, and was controlled by large gangs operating on land and sea between England and France. Many spots along the Kent and Sussex coast were popular landing points, in particular Cuckmere Haven, Crowlink and Birling Gap. Combating these gangs fell to Customs officers, backed by the Royal Navy and local units of soldiers. At the end of the Napoleonic Wars the ‘Coast Blockade Service’ was formed along the Kent and Sussex coast, and in 1822 the national Coastguard Service was born.
“Men from every hamlet and village behind the coast took part in whatever opportunities were available. For centuries they pillaged wrecks or smuggled, though often on a relatively small scale. Only the shingle beaches in the larger bays attracted the major gangs to the area.. After 1817, when the Coast Blockade made things much more difficult, all the smaller gaps were pressed into use, particularly Birling Gap and Crow Link among the Seven Sisters.. Of all the landing places Cuckmere Haven remains the most evocative.”
“Of all the landing places Cuckmere Haven remains the most evocative.”
The Coastguard Cottages
Over the next century, Officers based in the cottages watched over the bay, combating smuggling, performing salvaging and lifesaving duties and, during the World Wars, guarding against invasion.
The history of the area is rich and together with its archaeological interest, outstanding natural beauty and diverse wildlife, Cuckmere Haven and the Coastguard Cottages have become one of the most loved views in the country.
A Short History of Sea Defences at Cuckmere - an account from Richard Abbott, descendant of the original Coastguards.
1947: Large Sea Wall built with war reparation after military requisitioned cottages during WW11 to compensate for the damage caused to the cottages..."Much of the woodwork was missing, the floorboards, doors and windows.”
1948: Grandfather and Great Uncle Bert self build wall below cottages 3 &4 with some help from some locals from Seaford. The wall was strengthened using old bedsteads.
1985: Easter time saw the demise of the wall under cottages 3 & 4.
1987: New Wall built by Durkan Contractors Ltd under cottages 1 to 5 joining to the great sea wall funded by the residents.
1993: New Wall Facing installed to cover concrete reinforcing rods that became exposed due to sea action funded by the residents.
1999: West flank rock revetment constructed with 500-ton limestone rock brought over from Boulogne by barge to stop the sea coming behind the new wall.
1995-2000: Terracing in front of No 5 constructed using reclaimed timbers from vinegar vats.
2003-2005: a series of repairs and strengthening works have been carried out by residents and friends to ensure the continued protection offered by the Great Wall.
2014: the sea overcame the defences at the bottom of the lower cottage garden putting at risk the large Wall and Cable House - this was repaired by reinstating the timber wall and use of rocks to break the force of the sea. Funded by the residents.
“When man added the Coastguard Cottages to combat the brisk smuggling trade, he inadvertently put the icing on the cake.”
“It was Easter time during a big storm and I was in bed and woken by a huge rumble. The bed shook and there was a great cracking sound as part of the sea wall fell into the sea during a big storm; none of us wanted to go outside because of the ferocious storm.
The next morning we found remains of the wall lying on the beach. You can still see one lump of concrete from this wall lying on the beach below the upper coastguard cottages today.”
Even though there are no longer coastguards living in the cottages, the owners always keep a weather eye on the sea to ensure the alarm is raised if anyone gets into trouble.
The Cable Hut
The Cable Hut is one of the most intriguing secrets of Cuckmere Haven. Most visitors wonder what this strange building is doing on the beach and are unaware of its significance. It is one of the few remaining cable stations that once lined the coast.
In November 1900 The Anglo American Telegraph Company bought the little plot of land from The Right Honourable Walter John Earl of Chichester to use as a cable station for telegraph lines to France. Western Union took over the operation of the lines and by 1918 one cable ran from Cuckmere to La Havre and two more to Cap d'Antifer.
During the WWII the cable hut was requisitioned by the military authorities and in 1940, like all the cables running under the sea, the lines were cut. They lowered the roof, added strengthening materials, and inserted gun slits; thus converting it into a "pill box". By the end of the war it had been demolished by gunfire.
Cable Hut 14 was a major and important cable route taking messages from London to France and on to Canada.
In 1947 Anglo American Telegraph Company and Western Union wished to move the station to a more convenient site near a main road. Captain Douglas Ann, the father of the present owner of the cable hut, had built and been running The Golden Galleon tea house at Exceat bridge just up the river. This was an ideal site for the cable companies and as Captain Ann was a keen fisherman an exchange was made - a parcel near the A259 for a ruined building by the sea.
Captain Ann restored the hut to its wartime state as a convenient place to store his fishing gear but the local council objected and told him to tear it down and reinstate it as a ruin.
He went to appeal and won the case. GPO and Western Union continued to maintain a manhole there some years after. The Ann family continue to use the hut to house bathing, fishing and boating equipment and enjoy days on the beach with their family.
“Tear it down!”
CHAPTER XVII.
PREPARATIONS AND ORGANIZATION OF THE SIGNAL CORPS, AMERICAN EXPEDITIONARY FORCES.
Extract:
"The chief signal officer visited England in November [1917] to arrange for the laying of a 4-conductor cable across the channel and for telegraph and telephone lines in England. The British post-office authorities agreed to place, at our expense, and within two months, a 4-conductor telegraph cable from Cap d’Antifer to Cuckmere Haven, and to lease to us four telegraph wires from Cuckmere to London, and one telephone circuit simplexed for telegraph from London to Winchester and Southampton."
The map and quote are taken from History of the Atlantic Cable and Undersea Communications
Cuckmere and the World Wars
Cuckmere Haven in Napoleonic times
and the Great War
- Peter Longstaff-Tyrrell
Traditionally the low lying acres of the county coast at Cuckmere Haven, and also to a lesser degree at Hope Gap, Crowlink and Birling Gap, have been exposed and vulnerable to attack and invasion threats. In a summary headed General Defence of the Southern District in early 1798 a battery was noted as extant at Cuckmere Haven. In 1806 Henry Viscount Gage wrote to the Quarter-Master General Robert Brownrigg requesting that the barracks be removed as amongst other matters soldiers’ dogs had pestered sheep belonging to John Ellis his tenant farmer John Ellis. Lieutenant-General Hewett declined Lord Gage’s request indicating that Sir James Putney had installed the barracks there. The presence of troops there had also served to police the area from smuggling activities until the Coastguard Cottages were established in 1809.
The Sussex Weekly Advertiser of 5 September 1814 commented on governmental defense cuts and the dismantling of the Cuckmere barracks. A survey of the site from July 1975 appears in Monty Larkin’s excellent book Seven Sisters, the history behind the view. An auction advertisement from 23 September 1814 offers [timber] buildings for removal - comprising of two officers buildings, four soldiers properties, two magazines, a Barrack Masters Store, forage barn, coal yard, Ferry Boat &c &c. Perhaps the ferry boat and soldiers foot bridge are interesting as access across the tidal Cuckmere was regularly required. If threats of invasion arose then a evacuation and scorched-earth evacuation policy was in situ.
With the advent of the Great War from 1914 the Cuckmere slopes and meadows were dominated by Canadian troops that had hutted camps known as South Camp and North Camp that had spawned from Blatchington across urban Seaford onto the golf links and towards Chyngton Farm and South Hill. At Cuckmere Haven a rifle range was marked out near Cliff End, with butts inland near Foxhole where the cottages were most probably evacuated. Across the western slopes down towards the Vanguard Way lines of trench works have been recorded, with some excavated in recent times, that reveal the extent of the training trenches across the lower Cuckmere Valley. An ominous gas chamber has been suggested, but no actual location has been determined, troops would pass through the chamber to simulate potential gas attack conditions on the Continent. The excavation and recording of the maze of WWI training trenches is an on-going exercise for archaeological groups.
W.E. Baxter’s 1813 engraving indicates barracks either side of the Cuckmere estuary
This 1835 engraving by B.R. Davies shows barracks sites west of the estuary and at the old Blatchington site.
“The Cuckmere Haven defences provide a very good example of coastal anti-invasion defence in a location that has excellent public access. It is documented that this would have been a key point in the German invasion and...make the area one of particular importance. The symbolism of this location, flanked by the white cliffs, spells out well the message of Britain’s defiance in 1940.”
Canadian troops practise an amphibious landing in May 1942 at Cuckmere Haven.
German reconnaissance photograph of Cuckmere Haven, August 1940. By August 1940, a German air reconnaissance photograph shows an extensive concentration of defences.
For the same reason Cuckmere Haven was an ideal secluded landing place for smugglers: so too it was for the Germans during WWII.
From June 1940, work was put in hand to defend this area against the threat of German landings by sea and by air. Cuckmere Haven was a specific assault target under the German plans for "Operation Sea Lion". Amongst the many defences were anti-tank ditches fronted by massive concrete blocks, antitank cubes and an anti-tank wall. Pillboxes, guns, machine guns and minefields were ringed with barbed wire.
From 1941, anti-tank scaffolding was placed in a continuous run along the beaches on both sides of the river. On the flanks of Cuckmere Haven, the high downland was extensively trenched against enemy aircraft landing.
The story doesn't end with the threat of invasion receding.
We have ongoing activity through into 1944. We have the anti-raid period of 1941-44 when the threat of small-scale German commando raids became the focus of the defences.
We have the lighting decoy of 1942 that replicated the lights of Newhaven.
We have all manner of training exercises from 1940 onwards. On the periphery of the valley we have gunnery ranges and an airfield. We have the submarine cable station at Exceat that formed part of the communications network for the invasion of Normandy in 1944. Cuckmere Haven was the western-most boundary of the main corridor through which the V1 flying bombs passed on their way towards London.
"The Cuckmere Haven defences provide a very good example of coastal anti-invasion defence in a location that has excellent public access. It is documented that this would have been a key point in the German invasion and...make the area one of particular importance. The symbolism of this location, flanked by the white cliffs, spells out well the message of Britain’s defiance in 1940."
Graphical representation of beach defences at Cuckmere Haven, East Sussex. For more information see
Tank traps strategically placed to prevent the Germans landing on the beach