Shoreham Harbour

Shoreham-by-Sea (shortened to Shoreham) is a small town, port and seaside resort, also being the major settlement in the Adur District of West Sussex in South East England. Shoreham-by-Sea railway station is located less than a mile from the town centre and London Gatwick Airport is 23 miles away. Shoreham has a population of 17,537 according to the 2001 census, and is historically part of Sussex.

The town is bordered to its north by the South Downs, to its west by the Adur valley and to its south by the River Adur and Shoreham Beach on the English Channel. The town lies in the middle of the ribbon of urban development along the coast between the city of Brighton & Hove and the town of Worthing. Shoreham civil parish covers an area of 984.88ha and has a population of 19,175 (2001 census).
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History

Old Shoreham dates back to pre-Roman times. The church of St. Nicholas is in part of Anglo-Saxon date. The name of the town has an Old English origin.[2] The town and port of New Shoreham was established by the Norman conquerors towards the end of the 11th century. The original name of the river was Sore, which is an old name occurring in medieval times, it was also known locally (into recent times) simply as the Shoreham River. Dryden penned the name Adur to support his theory that the Roman 'Portus Adurni' was situated near the mouth of the river, unfortunately it was taken up by map makers and it has remained to the present day.

St Mary de Haura Church (St Mary of the Harbour) was built in the decade following 1103 (the Domesday Book was dated 1086), and around this time the town was laid out on a grid pattern that, in essence, survives in the town centre. The Church is only half the size of the original - the former nave was ruinous at the time of the Civil War although remnants of the original west facade survive in the Churchyard to some height.

The severe storms of the 14th and 15th centuries wreaked much damage along this part of the south coast and that part of the town which lay to the south of High Street (which originally ran through the middle of the town) was swept away. It included the Hospital of St John. The original harbour by Old Shoreham (once the site of the Grammar School playing fields) then silted up and the mouth of the river moved in time eastwards, and once met the sea as far east as Portslade.

The rise of Brighton, Hove and Worthing - in particular the arrival of the railway in 1840 - prepared the way for Shoreham's rise as a Victorian sea port, with several shipyards and an active coasting trade. Shoreham Harbour remains in commercial operation.

Shoreham Beach

Shoreham Beach, to the south of the town, is a shingle bank thrown up over the centuries by the sea through the process of longshore drift as an extension to Lancing parish in the west. This blocks the southerly flow of the River Adur which turns east at this point to discharge into the English Channel further along the coast at a point that has varied considerably over time. Once the harbour mouth was stabilised it was defended by Shoreham Fort. Converted railway carriages became summer homes around the turn of the century, and Bungalow Town, as it was then known, became home for a short time to the early UK film industry. Shoreham Beach officially became part of Shoreham-by-Sea in 1910. Much housing in the area was cleared for defence reasons during the Second World War and most of what remained after the war is now gone, replaced by modern houses.[4] The Church of the Good Shepherd, built in 1913, still stands. Along the Adur mud flats adjacent to Shoreham Beach sits (and at high tides floats) an extraordinary collection of house boats – converted barges, tugs, mine sweepers etc. The seaside shingle bank of Shoreham beach extends further east past the harbour mouth, forming the southern boundary of the commercial harbour in Southwick, Portslade and Hove. The Monarch's Way long-distance footpath, commemorating the flight of Charles II to France after the Battle of Worcester, follows the beach westwards from Hove past Portslade and Southwick, terminating by the harbour mouth's east breakwater.

Landscape & Wildlife

Transversed by the River Adur and with the downs and the sea nearby, the area supports a diverse wildlife flora and fauna. The mudflats support wading birds and gulls, including the Ringed Plover which attempts to breed on the coastal shingle. The Pied Wagtail is common in the town in the winter months. Insect fauna includes dragonflies over the flood plains of the river. The south and west facing downs attract at least 32 species of butterflies including a nationally important population of the Chalkhill Blue Butterfly on Mill Hill. The underlying rock is chalk on the downs, with alluvium in the old river channels. The Adur district is fortunate to have a large variety of habitats in a small area, including natural chalk downs and butterfly meadows, freshwater and reed beds, salt marsh and estuary, brackish water lagoons, woodland, shingle seashore, chalk platform undersea and large expanses of sand.

Farmers' Market

Shoreham-by-Sea is home to the largest Farmers' Market in Sussex and one of the largest in the South of England, it is held in East Street on the second Saturday of each month and usually has in excess of 60 stall holders.

Transport

Shoreham Airport, located in Lancing to the west of the main town, is now in private ownership. It is the oldest licensed airport in the UK, the Art Deco terminal building is listed as of historical interest and has also been used as a set for the filming of one of Agatha Christie's classic Poirot stories, Lord Edgware Dies, a Crimewatch type reconstruction in 2000 by Meridian television, an episode of the BBC TV Series Tenko as well as scenes from the film of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code.

The town is also served by Shoreham-by-Sea railway station, located on the West Coastway Line.

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