Extracts from books relating to the history and present state of Rochester.
Edward Hasted, The history and topographical survey of the county of Kent, volume 2 (Canterbury, 1782), pages 1–64. The signs <+> and <e> refer to the additions and errata at the back of the book.
Edward Hasted, The history and topographical survey of the county of Kent, second edition, volume 4 (Canterbury, 1798), pages 45–191. Text printed grey is derived from the previous edition; text printed black is significantly different or altogether new. The sign <+> refers to the additions at the back of the book.
Rochester described by William Henry Ireland, for a book published by George Virtue, A new and complete history of the county of Kent (1828–30). (Apparently this was meant to be the first in a series of books called ‘England’s topographer’, but that plan, if it existed, was not followed through with.) Ireland’s contribution is a dismal piece of work, thoughtlessly patched together, without any adequate acknowledgment, from Hasted (1798), Wildash (1817), and one or other edition of the Kentish traveller’s companion. There is very little in the way of original information: ‘he does not appear to have set his foot in the County, but at some of its fashionable watering-places’ (Smith 1837:13).
The second file contains three plates – one of Rochester Bridge, two of Rochester Castle – engraved from drawings by George Shepherd, Henry Gastineau, and William Henry Bartlett respectively. Unlike the letterpress, the illustrations in this book are of high quality: Virtue employed good artists and good engravers. (I note, by the way, that the entire collection of plates made for this book, 124 items in all, was reprinted separately as A. J. Cassell (publ.), A treasury of Kent prints (Sheerness, 1972).)
This is the introduction to a directory of Rochester, Chatham, and environs, published at Chatham in 1838. It seems to be the work of the publisher, who names himself on the title-page as ‘I. G. Wright, Chatham Hill’, but of whom I can discover nothing more. Unsurprisingly, much of the text derives, errors and all, from Wildash (1833); but the author, whoever he was, was well-informed about recent developments, and to that extent the book is useful.
The frontispiece, ‘Drawn on Stone by Geo. L. Lee’, is a feeble copy of George Shepherd’s view of Rochester Bridge, published by Virtue in July 1828 (Ireland 1828–30, vol. 4, opp. p. 315).