Langstone Harbour

Finds dated from Mesolithic to Bronze Age

Contributions to archaeology and history have never been possible without the love of local people for their heritage. One day, in the 1970s, a local amateur archaeologist, Chris Draper, brought a bag of flints, which he had found on the eroding foreshores of North Binness and Long Island, to one of the evening meetings of volunteers arranged in the local museum. This was the beginnings of continued research and exploration into the prehistory of Langstone Harbour which carries on today.

Mesolithic flintwork is recorded from all the islands in the harbour, and dates between 11 kya - 6 kya. Most of it seems to come from the southern foreshores and mudflats and shows a mix of diagnostic tools. The flint assemblage is extremely limited and confined to waste material and tools including tranchet adzes and sharpening flakes, picks, scrapers, and serrated and retouched flakes; suggesting a limited range of activities. A number of hearths have also been uncovered across this area (Briant et al., 2009: 52). The foreshore distribution continues around Farlington Marshes and into the northwest corner of the harbour. Such a pattern allows us to reimagine a vivid landscape and the people who lived here during this period. In other areas of Hampshire and West Sussex, the Mesolithic record is characterised by an extensive number of find locales and a long history of the active collection and research extending back into the early twentieth century (Pope et al., 2019: 7).

As well as Mesolithic finds, Later Prehistoric flint and pottery implements, Iron Age, and Romano British pottery besides, potboilers, briquetage, and Roman brick were also found spread across the islands. Arguably most significant was a series of Bronze Age cremation urns discovered lying within the tidal muds to the south of North Binness.

Iron Age saltwork site

This point is a salt working site. Finds included pot-boilers, sherds, and briquetage, a ceramic-based material used in the production of salt. From the late Iron Age, Langstone was a tidal inlet and a principal activity around its margins was salt production. In common with some of the other harbours of the Solent coast (e.g. Chichester), Langstone is an ideal area for salt production. It is sheltered and there is plenty of low-lying marshes that may be enclosed to make salt pans. Salt production in this area can be traced from at least the Iron Age, through medieval times, till the latter half of the 18th century, when it went into decline, disappearing altogether by the second quarter of the 19th century (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 83).

Finds of briquetage, in particular on the west coast of Hayling Island, were numerous in the 1960s though many of the relevant areas are not currently accessible for monitoring and collection of material.

Findspot west of Farlington Marshes

Farlington Marshes was initially drained and enclosed in the 18th C. and fully enclosed by a concrete seawall in the 1970s, effectively cutting them off from erosion and depositional processes of the harbour itself.

They’re a rich source of archaeological remains from the Palaeolithic period to Post Medieval (1600 – 1900 ACE). This point indicates assemblages of Bronze Age and Iron age artefacts again; including pottery sherds, briquetage, flints, and arrowheads. The eastern side of the coast is characterised by deep and very soft muds, particularly in the channel separating Farlington from North Binness Island, and is now inaccessible to the public and dangerous.

Romano - British period of Hayling Island

Romano-British finds occur, from the south coast of Langstone, along the Farlington Marshes, North and South Binness Island, Long Island, and west of Hayling Island. Romano-British finds across this area are mainly Roman pottery and some, diagnostically Romano-British briquetage.

Fragments of pottery, mostly of the 1st or 2nd century ACE, are noted from the western shore of Hayling Island, where they are associated with areas of burning, briquetage, and spread of brick and tile, including what appeared to be wasters (failed bricks that are discarded or “wasted”), indicating the presence of brick or tile kilns in the area. A few Roman coins are reported from several places on Hayling Island, including a group of four from the foreshore to the south-west of the road bridge to Hayling. At least two of these were 4th-century bronze issues of the House of Constantine.

Romano British period of Farlington Marshes

In the 1980s, 1st-2nd century pottery sherds, briquetage, burnt flint, and flint tools were found and retained by B Hooper, off Oyster Island; a small island south of Farlington Marshes which is inaccessible today.

There are several findspots of Romano British archaeological remains around Farlington Marshes. The finds in this area are similar to the Hayling Island collections, including pottery fragments, briquetage, and spreads of brick and tile.

Based on this evidence, it can be suggested that the salt working on the harbour margins seems to have been an important activity in the Romano-British period, as it continued to be in Portsmouth and Chichester Harbours at this time (Bradley 1992). It is quite likely that existing saltworks would have continued in use, possibly even into the Middle Ages, but the fact that most evidence comes from the intertidal zones, and is therefore in a highly mobile environment, makes any detailed discussion of the evidence or its dating very difficult for archaeologists.

Long Island Logboat

In September 2003 a logboat was excavated and raised from the shore of Long Island. Due to the high number of knots in the wood, the boat was thought to have been hollowed from a fast grown, sub-standard oak. The boat was removed and given to the Mary Rose Trust for conservation before being donated to the Portsmouth Museums Service. A radiocarbon date of AD 500 +/- 100 was obtained for the boat, making it one of only two Saxon logboats to be recorded in the Solent (Whitewright, 2010). You can see the logboat on display at the Portsmouth Museum.

Portsea Island Saltwork site

There is a large saltworks noted on this site in 1830, on the east coast of Portsea Island. There are few archaeological records from this Portsea side of the harbour, probably due to increased urban activity along this coast from the early 19th century onwards. A hoard of decorated copper alloy rings and a palstave (type of axe) was found near St James’ Hospital, and occasional finds of Iron Age pottery are reported here. During the Medieval period, salterns situated on the north side of the creek at Great Salterns are probably those also mentioned in the Domesday book from 1086 (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 40).

The eastern coast of Portsea Island forms the western edge of Langstone Harbour and this area covers the south-western corner of the harbour from Fort Cumberland, across the inlet at Eastney, and along the western shore as far as the Great Salterns Pier. Large areas of the former harbour have been reclaimed, initially for salt working, with the earliest reclamations probably begun in the medieval period. With the demise of salt working, much of the reclaimed land has become rough pasture (ibid: 55).

The 'Oyster Catcher's House

Oyster Island is a small, roughly circular mound situated off the southern tip of Farlington Marshes. It comprises a small, raised shingle-covered mound, 120m in diameter, joined to Farlington at low tide by a 250m long shingle bar (today inaccessible to the public). It is reported that the island was built up to accommodate the building on it and is therefore, in part, artificial (Bryant, 1967: 8). The so-called Oyster Catcher’s house only remains as a number of wooden posts and a circular structure, that was built on the island in 1819 by the Russel family as part of their oyster business.

Oyster culture (the growing of oysters) is recorded from at least the 14th century and some former salterns sites were reused as oyster beds. Oyster farming continued through the post-medieval period and has recently been re-initiated in the Broom Channel, to the west of Farlington Marsh (IFCA pers. comms). One of the more important individual endeavours to this industry was undertaken by Harry Lobb. The South of England Oyster Fishery was established in Langstone to develop a ‘scientific’ oyster farm (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 78). In 1865, Harry Lobb, an entrepreneurial British businessman, went to France to study the system, returning to set up the South of England Oyster Company with the intention of developing breeding oyster beds based on the French system in northwest and southwest Hayling Island (ibid:85).

During this work, a  walkover survey along the west of Hayling Island was carried out by CITiZAN and the author in October, 2021. We not only found evidence for the Oyster farm structure(s) here, but there are still oysters attached on the lower sides of ceramic tiles, used to “culture” the oysters by Harry Lobe, which should be 120 years old.

Langstone swing-bridge

The swing bridge of 1867, made of wood on massive iron columns, which carried the railway from Langstone to Hayling Island, is a notable feature of the north-eastern corner of the harbour. In 1954 weight restrictions on the road bridge were increased allowing heavy loads to be brought onto the island by train. It also meant bus passengers had to alight, walk across the bridge and re-join the bus on the other side. This continued until 1956 when a stronger road bridge was built. The expense, along with an estimate of ￡400,000 to rebuild the railway bridge, led to the decision to close the line, with the last public train running on 2nd November 1963.

The initial phase of this construction plan was part of the ill-fated Portsmouth to Arundel canal project opened in 1822 but failed to attract much trade. Hayling Islanders did not see the canal as a good thing at all, as it meant digging a channel across the two thousand year old wadeway from Langstone village to Hayling (also see point 14). Originally this was intended for pilgrims on their way to Northney’s Roman Temple where they sought rites and potions, some say early Christian worship. The wadeway is still clearly visible today, although there are areas where later construction works have cut through the feature making it impossible to use. Due to the quantity of archaeological evidence on Hayling Island from a range of periods, speculation has variously dated the Wadeway as Bronze Age, Iron Age, Roman or medieval (Satchell, 2014: 132).

Graffiti on walls in The Black Hole Fort Cumberland

Adjacent to the current main entrance to the Fort - the larger of two rooms under the stairs to the right was marked on the 1861 plan as ‘The Black Hole’, used for solitary confinement for Royal Marine prisoners. The smaller room under the left-hand stair is also called a Black Hole on the same plan. The prisoners have left evidence of their stays in the form of graffiti – in some cases, they’ve marked off the days as they passed, with closely-grouped scored marks on the brickwork, and the numbers 30, 60, and even 90 appear. More elaborate graffiti appear on the roof of the vault to the left – two-masted ships can be seen and a number of names, including Keenan. To the right there is more deeply-cut graffiti, including “Damn this B Hole”, CPO (Chief Petty Officer) Smith complaining of “Bad Quarters” with the number 32 – for 1832? Lastly, we have “Lord keep (?) my transgressions and take away mine iniquity”, a misquotation from Job 7:21, carved by a Royal Marine.

 https://citizan.org.uk/interactive-coastal-map/82735/ 

Brick Sluices

A number of reasonably sized timber structures are distributed around the shoreline of the harbour. Some of these structures are certainly fairly modern, and some are hard to date firmly without funded radiocarbon work. Those timbers were researched and recorded during the seven years project, and their functions are varied. Including fish traps, an oyster farm, remnants of a jetty, and barge guideposts are present as well as a series of undefined timbers.

The South of England Oyster Fishery was established in Langstone to develop a ‘scientific’ oyster farm. These timbers probably form parts of the oyster pens. There are two large brick-built ‘drains’ associated with these timbers. This brick arched structures with brick ‘wings’ on them, thought to be sluices for the farm.

If you walk in a low-tidal period on the west of Hayling Island, there are a lot of exposed timbers to see stretching out into the harbour. There are three parallel strips lying on the mud, located only around two hundred meters south of this point. This is an unidentified site, which seems like an old walkway infrastructure or jetty. Further work by CITiZAN may be able to give this some more context.

Glory Hole

An arc of 41 wooden posts up to 40cm high enclosing gravel banks and a small tidal pool. Probably the remains of a small harbour marked on 1st edition OS, now almost completely covered by housing estate to south. The posts are near low tide and form an arc from west to east. These were noted by Allen & Gardiner (2001). There appear to be less posts in 2016 than surveyed by Allen and Gardiner in the late '90's, possibly because of coverage by seaweed or gravel. This is a very low energy environment, so there is little risk from erosion, although pedestrian and small boat use could damage the remaining posts. Building of Eastney Fort rifle ranges shooting over the site would suggest it was disused by c1900.

 https://citizan.org.uk/interactive-coastal-map/82067/ 

Sea Lock

This point is the remains of Sea Lock on the Portsea Canal. The sea lock at Eastney Lake is a notable feature in the south-west corner. This lock was part of the ill-fated Portsmouth to Arundel Canal project opened in 1822 but failed to attract much trade. The lock quickly began to leak and was closed in 1927 (Moore, 1984).

The 196 timbers in this area, whose ground level heights ranged from +0.098m to +1.949m OD, are arranged in three groups. The southern group consists of guideposts for the entry to the sea lock entrance to the Portsea section of the canal. The middle group of posts forms two parallel lines with two areas projecting south in the middle of the run. It is possible that these are the remnants of a landing jetty. The age of this structure is unknown. 

Farlington Marshes Starfish Decoy site

Langstone Harbour was used as starfish decoy site to misdirect German bombers away from Portsmouth and the naval docks during the war, as well as being a base for many landing craft and barges before D-Day.

This point is a WWII decoy site at Farlington Marshes. It was built as part of the 'N-series' of naval decoys to deflect enemy bombing from Portsmouth Harbour and also functioned as part of the 'C-series' of civil decoys for the city of Portsmouth. The site operated as a 'Permanent Starfish' decoy where a series of controlled fires were lit during an air raid to replicate a military or urban area targeted by bombs. The site is referenced as being in use between August 1941 and March 1942. Aerial photography from 1981 shows evidence of a trapezoidal, ditched feature containing 6-7 crossing linear ditches running from north to south, which measures 200 metres from east to west from SU 6851 0414. A possible firebreak with two further internal firebreaks surrounds Seamus Pond. There is no trace of a control building, but there are 1-2 military buildings located in the south of the peninsula that date from the Second World War and are possibly connected with the decoy site.

Farlington Control No.2

The remains of Farlington Control No2, a control bunker associated with the nearby Naval Bombing Decoy, Civil Decoy, and Permanent Starfish sites on Farlington Marshes (see record 1459702). This control bunker would have controlled the fires and electric lights that were used to imitate Portsmouth and its harbour and to provide the illusion of the city under attack. This control bunker is still present intact today but heavily vegetated. The remains of another Control Point can be seen on Hayling Island (see the first image of this point, also see https://www.citizan.org.uk/interactive-coastal-map/84610/)

Eroding Anti-aircraft gun emplacement

Eroding Anti-aircraft gun emplacement on Eastney Spit opposite Hayling Island (likely for a 3.7 or 4.2 inch gun). Originally visible from the air in 1946 (Britain from Above) already slipping down the beach due to erosion. Later covered by car-park and has been re-exposed since 2015 and now largely destroyed.

Mulberry Harbour

This point is the remains of a concrete section of Mulberry Harbour. During WWII, Langstone Harbour and Hayling Island were used as sites for the construction of components of the ‘Mulberry Harbours’ – the artificial harbours created by the Allies to enable them to land their forces in Normandy on D-Day.

Because of the lack of big port facilities in Normandy, it was decided that artificial harbours were needed in order to quickly offload the heavy and bulky crucial cargo needed to support a successful invasion. A key part of the Mulberry Harbours was the outer breakwater, created by sinking old ships and concrete Phoenix caissons in lines. The large concrete Phoenix structures had hollow chambers inside, and thus could be floated in order to move them, but when water was let into the internal chambers, they would sink onto the sea bottom. Once built, the Phoenixes were sunk nearby until they were needed. These were constructed on the coast of Hayling Island, on the stretch of beach at the harbour entrance.

 https://www.historyhit.com/locations/langstone-harbour-and-hayling-island/ 

Modern post alignment

As we already mentioned, there are many timber structural remains along the west coastline of Hayling Island. Most of them have been recorded, but also, new structures located in tidal zone are continuing to be discovered since the 1990s project. This is also one of the most attractive shorelines of this area, and well worth a walk at low-tide.

This timber structure was surveyed by P Murphy 16th February 2015 ( https://www.citizan.org.uk/interactive-coastal-map/#zoom=10&lat=6585599.69924&lon=-112194.30068&layers=B00000TF ). It composed of whole timbers. Deposits of estuarine clay, with intercalated grey stony deposits are visible around this location. To the north is a degraded sea wall. The shingle is moving shoreward here, over salt marsh. Why not see if you can spot something new and let us know.

Uncertain period timbers

The fish traps are much more difficult to date without the use of radiometric techniques such as radiocarbon dating. Lines of stakes along the water’s margin are a common form of net and basket fastenings and parallels are known in many estuaries and harbour locations.

This array of 385 timbers, whose heights ranged from +0.228 to +1.468m OD, resembles other lines of timber stakes along the coast of Hayling Island although it is a sinuous curve and bifurcates in the middle of its run (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 78). The stakes at the coastal end of the line are slender but reasonably substantial at around 150mm to 250mm diameter. The timbers at the seaward end of the structure are mostly smaller, in the 100mm to 150mm size range. Most of the timbers are roundwood standing about 100 to 150mm above the surface of the mud. It may be another form of fish trap (ibid).

This type of timber structure, that have not been identified period or function, is well distributed along the west of Hayling island. Basically, every two minutes’ walk you will encounter one. It is an interesting low-tidal walking route if you have waterproof boots and choose the right time to go there. Always check before undertaking a walk around Langstone Harbour and you can find out how here: https://www.citizan.org.uk/media/medialibrary/2015/09/CITiZAN_Health_and_Safety.pdf.

Two more of these ephemeral strucutres have been photted during the fieldwork carried out for this research. They are located a bit further south from the fish trap introduced above.

One of those two has metal and concrete remains with the timber, which needs further analyse to identify the purpose and function and whether, in fact, they are two features. The second is a possible old walkway structure.

Complex fish trap on the west coast of Hayling Island

Amongst the most intriguing of the harbour’s various timber structures are six lines of timbers that run out into the harbour from the west coast of Hayling Island (timber structures t7, t8, t10, t11, t12, t13 in Allen & Gardiner, 2000). The date of construction of these structures is unknown, as is their function. They are located in a very sheltered part of the harbour. At high tide the water remains shallow, not exceeding 2m depth, this constrains the maximum wave sizes that may occur under stormy conditions. The minimum distance across the mudflats from the relatively deep water of the Langstone Channel to the timber structures is c 800m, and in places reaching distances as much as 1.5km (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 57).

This is another timber structure that is supposed to be a fish trap. It is a complex arrangement of 159 stakes-placed into the mud projecting out from the west coast of Hayling Island whose heights ranged from–0.006 to +1.065m OD. There are some sub-structures, or divisions, in the middle of the run of timbers. It is updated as well.

The Withern

There are several wrecks sunken in the Langstone Harbour. Because of the location of them are inaccessible, only brief information has been introduced here.

The Withern was a bucket dredger which was lost four cables north of Ferry House in 1926. The wreck lies on one side with a north-south aspect. The northern end of the shipwreck terminated approximately 2m to the east of the isolated marker buoy (Allen & Gardiner, 2000: 124). The remaining structure is becoming heavily degraded, it is lying on its starboard side which has become crushed beneath its own weight.

In 2019, Langstone Harbour Authority contracted Shoreline Survey Limited to execute a multibeam bathymetric survey of the Withern wreck. The eastern face of the Withern would now appear to be collapsed. There is little information available of the Withern prior to its loss in 1926. It is clear from the multibeam data that the Withern has collapsed and degraded significantly but appears to be three possible main coincidental features in the multibeam data.

 http://www.shorelinesurveys.com/feature/ 

The Irishman

The Irishman was a paddle tug which detonated a magnetic mine on May 8th, 1941 and sank (Maritime Archaeology Trust). She sank with the loss of all hands. She now lies badly broken adjacent to an isolated danger market buoy near Sword Point. During the survey of the seven-year project in 1990s, an estimate of the extent of remaining debris was produced although only limited survey was possible in respect of the confused and scattered nature of the site.

The wreck site lay to the north of the marker buoy and breaks the surface at low water. It predominately consists of substantial amounts of bent and twisted metal around a structure spread over an area of at least 30m, with elements of the wreckage rising over 2m from the seabed. 

There is another shipwreck in Langstone to the north. The Excelsior is a well-preserved barge that still has its hull structure and main deck intact. From the 1990s survey, the detail of the measurement has been obtained. The shipwreck lay with her bows to the north along a north-south aspect. The length of the ship measured 22m with an elevation from the seabed of 2.5m at its highest point. The width between the port and bow quarters measured 3.4m while the width of amidships was calculated at 3.5m. The ship had a rounded stern, 1m deep by 3.4m wide. There was no evidence of cargo in the hold although a thorough investigation was not undertaken.