The Cinque Ports.

The most recent Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, H.M. Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother 1900 - 2002

© PE Blanche 2002 The Standard of The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, H.M. Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother flutters at half-mast over Walmer Castle. It was taken down following her funeral on April 9,2002 and will not be used again.

The Cinque Ports were first mentioned in a Royal Charter of 1155 and for certain privileges maintained ships that could be called upon by the Crown in times of strife. It seems that often the ships and men from these Towns would often carry on fighting after peace had been reached and for many years got away with what amounted to open piracy around the Kent and Sussex coast. One book I have read on the subject, "The Channel" by Shirley Harrison, refers to the Cinque Ports as a "legalized mafia". As there was no Navy in those days and the ships from the Cinque Ports served this function, there was usually nothing the Crown could do to control these situations, which often got out of hand.

According to the original Charter, the members of the Cinque Ports had the right to:

"soc and sac, tol and team, bloowit and fledwit, pillory tumbril infangentheof, outfangentheof, mundbryce waives and strays, flotsam and jetsam and ligan".

I hope that no-one asks me for a translation but basically it really meant that the sailors from these Ports could do what they wanted, when they wanted and this included wrecking, grounding and plundering other ships. An extremely good foundation for the smuggling that eventually became the vocation of many of the men from around this part of the coast and these Towns in particular.

In addition, the Towns had the rights to dispense their own justice through their own Courts and send representatives to hold the canopy over a new Monarch during the Coronation Ceremony.

The five original towns that formed the Cinque Ports were Sandwich, Dover, Hythe, Romney and Hastings. Two more Towns, Rye and Winchelsea, were attached to Hastings as members and when Hastings use as a port declined, they were both given special status of "Ancient Towns". Other Towns were given the status of "limbs" because of their close association with original member Towns. One of these "limbs" was Fordwich which, although several miles from the sea, was linked to Sandwich because the River Stour was navigable to this point in the Middle Ages. The strength and value of the Cinque Ports began to decline in the 14th Century when many of the harbours belonging to these ports began to silt up. As the Port at Sandwich silted up, then the onward access to Fordwich was also lost.
However, as this process of the silting up of some of the Ports happened, other Towns rose to prominence and became "limbs" of the Cinque Port Towns where their access to the sea was still available. One of these towns was Deal, as if Deal ever needed any excuse to foster more pirates and cutthroats! Obviously, the final blow to the power once held by the Cinque Ports was the eventual formation of a real and full-time Navy.

(As a note here I should add that this silting up of the ports and land in Southern Kent has been continuing for years. At the same time the land around Reculver and Herne Bay on the North Kent coast has been gradually eroding. Perhaps if the English and French Governments were to have waited a few hundred more years then the expense of the Channel Tunnel could have been avoided!)

A very prestigious title that has been held by many well-known individuals over the years is Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. I do not know how the title came about but can only suppose it may have been created to try and administer a little law to the lawless! I will try and find out more information about this particular issue. I do know that the title was held by Wellington until his death in 1852, when it was taken over by W.H. Smith, M.P. The most recent Lord Warden was H.M. Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, who inherited the title from Sir Robert Menzies, the former Prime Minister of Australia, in 1978. Sir Winston Churchill also once held this title.

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