From that time Winchelsea slowly declined till there
remains only the exquisite ghost we see to-day.
One comes up out of the Marsh into Winchelsea to-day through the
Strand Gate of the time of Edward I., and presently finds oneself in
the beautiful and spacious square in which stands the lovely fragment
of the church of St Thomas of Canterbury.
This extraordinarily lovely building dates from the fourteenth
century. As we see it, it is but a fragment, consisting of the chancel
and two side chapels, but as originally planned it would seem to have
been a cruciform building of chancel, choir with side chapels, a
central tower, transept and nave. It is doubtful, however, whether
the nave was ever built, the ruins of the transepts and of two piers
of the tower only remain.
I say it was doubtful whether this nave was ever built. It has been
asserted, it is true, that it was burnt by the French either in 1380
or in 1449, but it seems more probable that it was never completed
owing to the devastation of the Black Death of 1348-9, though certain
discoveries made of late would seem to endorse the older theory.
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