Boulogne and from Bellême, bade their defiance to the King and people of England.
Tunbridge castle.
Attack on the castle.
Position of Tunbridge.
It was not however deemed good to march at once
upon the immediate centre of the rebellion. A glance
at the map will show that it was better policy not
to make the attack on Rochester while both the other
rebel strongholds, Tunbridge and Pevensey, remained
unsubdued. The former of these, a border-post of Kent
and Sussex, guarding the upper course of the stream
that flows by Rochester, would, if won for the King,
put a strong barrier between Rochester and Pevensey.
The march on Rochester therefore took a roundabout
course, and this part of the war opened by an attack
on Tunbridge which was the first exploit of the Red
King's English army. At a point on the Medway about
four miles within the Kentish border, at the foot of the
high ground reaching northward from the actual frontier
of the two ancient kingdoms, the winding river receives
the waters of several smaller streams, and forms a group
of low islands and peninsulas. On the slightly rising
ground to the north, commanding the stream and its
bridge, a mound had risen, fenced by a ditch on the
exposed side to the north. This ancient fortress had
grown into the castle of Gilbert the son of Richard,
called of Clare and of Tunbridge, the son of the famous
Count Gilbert of the early days of the Conqueror.[1]
As Tunbridge now stands, the outer defences of the
castle stand between the mound and the river, and the
- ↑ It is somewhat singular that, though Richard appears in Domesday as "Ricardus de Tonebrige" as well as "Ricardus filius Gisleberti comitis" (14 et al.), and though his "leva" or "lowy" (see Ellis, i. 212) is often spoken of, yet Tunbridge castle itself is not entered. See on Richard of Bienfaite, Clare, or Tunbridge, N. C. vol. ii. p. 196; iv. 579. A singular story is told in the Continuation of William of Jumièges (viii. 15), how Tunbridge was granted in exchange for Brionne, and measured by the rope. See Appendix S.
