Southwold
Coordinates: 52 ° 20 ' N , 1 ° 41' E
Southwold is an ancient town in the district of East Suffolk in Suffolk , East Anglia , England , situated at the mouth of the River Blyth .
history
Southwold is mentioned in the Domesday Book as an important fishing port and was granted town charter by Henry VII in 1489 . In the course of the following centuries, however, a gravel bank formed in the port entrance, which prevented further development into a more important port.
In 1659 a fire destroyed large parts of the city and also damaged the Church of St Edmund, whose origins date back to the 12th century. The fire left several open spaces in the city that were never built on again. Today these so-called "greens" give the city a friendly atmosphere.
On the "green" directly above the beach, the so-called Gun Hill, six eighteen- pound cannons are a reminder of the sea battle of Solebay , which was fought in 1672 between the English and French fleets on the one hand and the Dutch under Michiel de Ruyter on the other. The battle was bloody - numerous dead were washed ashore - but ultimately without result. The Southwold Museum has a collection of memorabilia from the event. The cannons do not come from the sea battle itself, but according to legend, they were captured by the Scots in the Battle of Culloden and given to the city by the Duke of Cumberland as a gift. The battle also found literary expression in “The Rings of Saturn. An English pilgrimage ”by the German writer WG Sebald , who emigrated to Norwich .
The Southwold Railway , a narrow-gauge railway , connected Southwold with Halesworth between 1879 and 1929 . There are plans to reactivate them; the route should run partly in the original, partly in a new track bed.
The Lighthouse Southwold (Southwold Lighthouse) was established in 1887 by Trinity House erected. It stands as a landmark in the city center. It replaced three local lighthouses that were acutely threatened by coastal erosion . He started operations in 1890. It was electrified in 1938 and has been unmanned ever since. Trinity House organizes tours of the lighthouse during the summer.
In 1890, the Adnams Sole Bay Brewery was rebuilt on the same site as it has been since 1660.
The Pier Southwold (Southwold Pier) was created in 1900, in 1934 almost completely destroyed by a storm and renovated extensively 2,001th While numerous comparable facilities on the English coasts are in disrepair, Southwold Pier enjoys a new popularity.
Another monument with a maritime theme is the Logger Girl Sybil from 1912 , originally from the town of Looe .
During World War II , the guns on Gun Hill resulted in Southwold being considered a "fortified city". Although the cannons were filled with concrete and not functional, Southwold was the target of numerous German bombings.
The city is also home to an unusual amber museum.
George Orwell
The writer George Orwell lived from time to time in Southwold at his parents' home. A plaque next to the door of today's fish and chip shop on the High Street reminds of this.
Between January and July 1922 he attended a drum school in Southwold to prepare for his service as a colonial administrator in India. In 1929 he returned sick and miserable (after the experiences he later wrote down in Down and Out in Paris and London ), and wrote Burmese Days .
In 1934 he spent ten months in the city after giving up his job as a teacher for health reasons. There he wrote A Clergyman's Daughter , which is partly set in a fictional Southwold.
His last visit to Southwold was in 1939.
Daughters and sons of the city
- Victor Breyer (1869–1960), French sports journalist and official
port
Southwold Harbor is south of the city on the River Blyth. It stretches nearly a mile upstream from the estuary and is used by numerous fishing boats and small excursion boats. Freshly caught fish is sold in many places, at the upstream end of the harbor is the restaurant The Harbor Inn .
The river can be crossed on foot or by bike via a footbridge near The Harbor Inn that leads to the nearby village of Walberswick . In summer, a rowboat serves as a ferry at the mouth of the River Blyth.
Beach
The beach is a mixture of sand and pebbles, the composition of which varies over the year. Currents along the coast cause the large stones that erupt from the cliffs to the north to be ground into pebbles along the beach. During the summer there is less stony material on the beach, so it is more sandy during this time.
Above the beach are two rows of nicely painted beach houses. In previous decades, many of them had humorous names, but this custom now seems to be gradually disappearing.
Others
The annual switching on of the Christmas lights takes place on the first Friday in December. Thousands of people flock to town to see Santa Claus turn on the lights from the town hall balcony.
During World War II there was a British Navy destroyer of the same name, HMS Southwold , which sank off Malta on March 24, 1942 .
Web links
- Official website
- Full Southwold website
- Population statistics on the Office for National Statistics website, NOMIS
- Southwold on the Ordnance Survey website
- Southwold at Vision of Britain
- Southwold Museum