Rye Once Was Haven for Writers

On a stormy night in January, 1726, a ship carrying King George I from Hanover to London ran aground near the town of Rye on England’s south coast.

News of the king’s unexpected arrival traveled quickly to the town’s mayor, James Lamb, who rode down to the shore and escorted the king back to Rye. For the next four nights, the monarch slept in Lamb’s elegant red-brick manor at the top of Mermaid Street.

Unlike King George, the first time I visited Rye was for one night. Immediately I regretted the brevity of my stay.

No sooner had I left than I longed to return and wander the cobblestone streets of this ancient town, where I could enjoy England’s seaside, countryside and history all in one place.

Rye sits on a hill overlooking vast Romney Marsh, a luxuriant flatland of grassy fields and grazing sheep. Its narrow lanes bustle by day, yet fall silent and brooding at night, lit eerily by the glow of street lamps and the moon on the sea beyond.

Although Rye’s glory days as a major seaport are long over, it is one of the best-preserved towns in England.

Rye is two hours by train from London. At the next opportunity I returned, this time for several days. I wasn’t the first to find the town so irresistible.

For the past 100 years, British and American writers and poets have flocked to Rye and Romney Marsh. Henry James came to England in 1876, took up residence in the old Lamb House in 1898 and stayed for 16 years.

His contemporaries, H. G. Wells, Stephen Crane, Joseph Conrad and Ford Madox Ford, lived nearby. British writer E. F. Fenson moved into Lamb House shortly after James’ death, and American poet Conrad Aiken lived in Jeakes House on Mermaid Street from 1924 to 1947.

Although Rye’s isolated setting has made it a sanctuary for the creative spirit, the town has not always been so tranquil. The sea once flanked Rye on three sides, and for centuries it was one of the most important ports on the south coast of England.

During the 1700s, Rye was the favored lair of smugglers. The notorious Hawkhurst gang, which terrorized even the king’s customs agents, made its headquarters at the Mermaid Inn on Mermaid Street.

After a successful nighttime raid they would often sit by the windows of the inn, loaded pistols before them on the table, drinking and carousing.

As late as 1823 the tides still lapped the cliffs of Rye. Gradually, however, the three rivers that empty into Rye Harbor piled up its silt and left Rye aground, three miles from the English Channel.

Yet the town has not lost its watch on the sea. From the lookout at the end of High Street, you can see out to the harbor, and, on a clear day, across the Channel to the French coastal towns of Boulogne and Dieppe.

James wrote some of his most celebrated novels at Rye, including “The Ambassadors” and “The Golden Bowl.”

James had coveted Lamb House since seeing a watercolor of it at the home of a friend in London. When he later learned that a long-term lease was available, he snapped it up.

Lamb House quickly became a center for literary hobnobbing.

Crane, author of “The Red Badge of Courage,” lived out on Romney Marsh at Brede’s Place, while British author Ford--who later moved to Paris and became a patriarch to the writers of the Lost Generation of the 1920s--had a house in the nearby town of Winchelsea. There he collaborated on two novels with Conrad.

Callers from London often would take a morning train down to Rye, arriving at Lamb House in time for lunch. After the meal, James would lead his coterie on a jaunt across the marsh and among the grazing sheep to Winchelsea.

One morning I decided to hike the same path, with the help of a map I had picked up at the Martello Bookshop on High Street. After three pleasant hours of zigzagging across grassy fields I arrived at Winchelsea.

It didn’t take long to find a village tea shop, where I rested over cakes and hot cups of Earl Grey tea before catching the bus back to Rye.

If you want to understand what drew Henry James and his literary colleagues to Rye, spend some time wandering its narrow streets.

Along Cinque Ports Street parts of the old town wall still stand. Four stone gates once guarded the corners of Rye, but only one remains, the 14th-Century Land Gate.

The two barrel-shaped towers and stone archway of this massive portal once were fitted with a drawbridge; during high tide it was the only entrance into the town.

The clock above the arch was installed in 1863 as a memorial to Prince Albert, Queen Victoria’s beloved consort. It broke down in 1940, but was repaired in 1981 to celebrate the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana. But you would still be wise not to set your watch by it.

In the center of Church Square at the highest point of the town is St. Mary the Virgin, one of the most glorious churches in this part of England. The buttresses seem to float out from its exterior walls.

Two rows of high arches grace the interior, and in the early afternoon the sun streams in through the stained-glass windows and sets the chancel aglow.

Construction of St. Mary’s began early in the 11th Century and continued for at least 100 years. Much of the original structure was destroyed in 1377, when the French sacked Rye, burned most of the town to the ground and carried the church bells off to France.

Some of the town’s inhabitants, suspected of putting up too feeble a resistance, were condemned as traitors and hanged. The following year a party of men from Rye and Winchelsea launched a retaliatory raid on the French and recaptured the bells.

In time St. Mary’s was rebuilt. Set into one of its interior arches are the giant coal-black pipes of the church organ. One morning I wandered in and found the organist at practice. I sat down, mesmerized, as he played Albinoni’s haunting “Adagio” and set every molecule in the cathedral vibrating.

A short walk from Church Square will take you to the end of Watchbell Street, which looks out over the cliffs to Strand Quay. This was the center of trade during the prosperous Elizabethan Era.

Once the sea reached to the edge of the quay, but today the wharf is touched only by the banks of the River Tillingham.

Finally, Traders Pass takes you to Mermaid Street where the medieval, black-timbered Mermaid Inn, former haunt of smugglers, has been left to a peaceful existence as a hotel and restaurant.

At the top of Mermaid Street is the red-brick facade of Lamb House. During the summer season the first floor and garden are open to the public.

Some of James’ books, letters and other possessions are on display there. Among them is a copy of the lease James signed when the coveted house first fell into his hands.

The night before I had to leave Rye, just before going to bed, I felt myself drawn again to Mermaid Street.

The fog had settled over the darkened, ancient lane, now lit only dimly by a street lamp. As I stood alone, the cobblestone pressing hard into my feet, I found my imagination drifting back through the centuries. Suddenly I heard a sound in the distance.

Was it the wind? Perhaps. But then again, could it have been the Hawkhurst gang, laughing and shouting, making their way up Mermaid Street?