THE DOVER ROAD
HISTORIES OF THE ROADS
—BY—
Charles G. Harper.
THE BRIGHTON ROAD: The Classic Highway to the South.
THE GREAT NORTH ROAD: London to York.
THE GREAT NORTH ROAD: York to Edinburgh.
THE DOVER ROAD: Annals of an Ancient Turnpike.
THE BATH ROAD: History, Fashion and Frivolity on an old Highway.
THE MANCHESTER AND GLASGOW ROAD: London to Manchester.
THE MANCHESTER ROAD: Manchester to Glasgow.
THE HOLYHEAD ROAD: London to Birmingham.
THE HOLYHEAD ROAD: Birmingham to Holyhead.
THE HASTINGS ROAD: And The “Happy Springs of Tunbridge.”
THE OXFORD, GLOUCESTER AND MILFORD HAVEN ROAD: London to Gloucester.
THE OXFORD, GLOUCESTER AND MILFORD HAVEN ROAD: Gloucester to Milford Haven.
THE NORWICH ROAD: An East Anglian Highway.
THE NEWMARKET, BURY, THETFORD AND CROMER ROAD.
THE EXETER ROAD: The West of England Highway.
THE PORTSMOUTH ROAD.
THE CAMBRIDGE, KING’S LYNN AND ELY ROAD.
MERCERY LANE, CANTERBURY.
The
DOVER ROAD
Annals of an Ancient Turnpike
By CHARLES G. HARPER
Illustrated by the Author and from Old Prints
and Portraits
Hartford, Connecticut
EDWIN VALENTINE MITCHELL
First Published 1895.
Second and Revised Edition 1922.
Manufactured in England by C. Tinling & Co., Ltd.
53, Victoria Street, Liverpool,
and 187, Fleet Street, London.
PREFACE
It has been said, by whom I know not, that “prefaces to books are likesigns to public-houses; they are intended to give one an idea of the kindof entertainment to be found within.” But this preface is not to be likethose; for it would require an essay in itself to give a comprehensiveidea of the Dover Road, in all its implications. A road is not merely somany miles of highway, more or less well-maintained. It is not onlysomething in the surveyor’s way; but history as well. It is life, touchedat every point.
The Dover Road—the highway between London and that most significant ofapproaches to the Continent of Europe—would have been something muchmore in its mere name had it not been for the accident of London: one ofthe greatest accidents. It would have been considered a part of the greatroad to Chester and to Holyhead: the route diagonally across England, fromsea to sea, which really in the first instance it was.
For the Dover Road is actually the initial limb of the Watling Street: