Alex Vincent – författare

Sussex is rich in remains of the prehistoric eras, from the earliest Palaeolithic (Old Stone Age) era when stone tools were first developed by ancient hominids, through the other Stone Age eras (Mesolithic and Neolithic), to the Bronze and Iron Ages up to the Roman invasion of Britain. Many features can still be seen today, including barrows and other tumuli, hillforts and earthworks, flint mines, many on or just below the South Downs, tracks and ancient woodlands, and the legacy of the human inhabitants of Sussex from this time includes burials, stone tools, weapons and jewellery. In this book author Alex Vincent surveys prehistoric Sussex. Alongside well-known sites such as Cissbury and Chanctonbury Rings, the hillforts prominent on the ridge of the South Downs, and the Devil’s Jumps Bronze Age barrows, is a Bronze Age burial mound in Berwick churchyard which may have been used for plague victims in the medieval period. Fully illustrated throughout, this fascinating picture of the prehistoric era in Sussex will be of interest to all those who live in this corner of south-east England or have known it well over the years.

A tide mill or tidal mill is worked by harnessing the ebb and flow of the sea. They were situated on tidal river estuaries, away from the waves but near to the sea, and comprised of a mill, outbuildings, a dyke, dam or causeway and millpond beyond. Tide mills date from Saxon times, or even the Roman period. Most are now gone, but some can still be traced today as ruins, scanty remains and earthworks. Some are in use as homes, while in some cases only the millpond survives, often in use as a nature reserve, marina or yacht basin. It is said that Chichester Harbour has the largest concentration of tide mills in the country and at Eling, near Southampton, in Hampshire, a tide mill survives in working order to produce flour today. The old Flood Mill at Deptford was rebuilt as a steam flour mill, where only the Mumford’s Mill still stands. That at Faversham became Twymans Mill, which still stands today and is now a block of flats.In Tide Mills of Southern England author Alex Vincent surveys the lost tide mills and their remains in the southern counties of Hampshire, the Isle of Wight, Sussex and Kent, including parts of London that were originally Kent such as Greenwich and Deptford. This fascinating picture of an important but often forgotten part of the industrial heritage of southern England will be of interest to all those who live in this corner of the country or have known it well over the years, as well as those interested in the uses of renewable technology in centuries past.

Throughout England there are thousands of lost or deserted villages. Most were abandoned after the Black Death or other plague epidemics, but some were lost to coastal erosion or the encroaching sea, while others were resettled elsewhere when the livelihood upon which the village relied disappeared and some were even deliberately moved in later centuries on the whim of country house owners.In this book author Alex Vincent surveys the lost villages of Sussex. By examining old records and maps, the history of excavations in the area, local archaeological archives and records and the evidence of remaining buildings, ruins and old earthworks, he has recorded over 140 deserted, shrunken and shifted villages in East and West Sussex. He explores what remains on these sites currently, including their churches, which often stand alone today; now isolated farmhouses; ruins; fragments in later buildings and the sites of old houses and streets that are often just bumps in a field; pest houses and mass graves of plague victims; the importance of place names as a record of previous inhabitation; lost industries; and many more markers of a vanished world.This fascinating picture of an important but often forgotten part of the history of Sussex over the centuries will be of interest to all those who live in this corner of south-east England or have known it well.