Fortfications

Near the middle of the fourteenth century the town received considerable annoyance from the French, its ships and boats were taken, and the fishery frequently interrupted. Again, in the year 1545 the French made their appearance on this coast, and landed near Hove with the intention to burn Brighthelmston and Shoreham, but the country having been alarmed by the beacons fixed for the purpose, a force was collected on the Downs sufficient to intimidate the invaders, who consequently departed.

The town having been thus harassed by frequent alarms, resolved to erect a fortification, which might in future afford them some protection, and a parcel of land on the Cliff, fronting Black Lion Street, and Ship Street, was chosen, to erect a storehouse for armour and ammunition, which was designated the blockhouse; the walls of this blockhouse were eight feet in thickness, and eighteen feet high, the building was circular, and fifteen feet in diameter; in the walls were arched apartments, for powder, and other ammunition; and in front, facing the sea, a battery, containing four pieces of ordnance, called "the Gun Garden"; on the east of the blockhouse stood the Town house, with a dungeon beneath it, for the confinement of malefactors, and having a turret in which the town clock was fixed; at this period, in the reign of Elizabeth, were also erected four ponderous gates of stone, leading from the Cliff to that part of the town, which lay under it; these were named the East Gate, at the lower end of East Street; the Porter's Gate, which stood next the East Gate, which was much smaller than the other; the Middle Gate, opposite Middle Street, which was called the gate of all nations; and the West Gate, which stood at the end of West Street. There was also built a wall, fifteen feet high, and four hundred feet long, where the Cliff was most easy of ascent; the Blockhouse was built at the expense of the town, but the gates and walls were at the expense of government. The Blockhouse was washed away by the sea, on the 19th of November 1786, and not a vestige of the wall or gates now remains.

— , Saunders, , The Stranger's Guide in Brighton; Being a Complete Companion to that Fashionable Place, and the Rides and Drives in Its Vicinity., , 1838