Talk:Rochester, Kent

Population?

Any clues as to how many people? 219.77.100.155 (talk) 22:39, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

The Dutch Raid

I've removed the reference to 'the last successful invasion of British soil' (the Dutch landed in Sheppey and killed a few sheep - hardly a successful invasion, and nothing to do with Rochester anyway) but I query whether the Dutch raid should be mentioned at all in an article on Rochester. Wouldn't it be better dealt with under the River Medway or Chatham Dockyard? JMB196 (talk) 23:34, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

You are wrong. de Ruyter took Sheerness fort 10 Jun 1667 - and Sheppey does count. (source Pepys diaries) They also were unopposed when they put landing parties ashore at Grain. The question about whether it should be mentioned in a Rochester article is more interesting. The action took place in Upnor Reach, and off the Frindsbury peninsula- which would be in the parish of Frindsbury Extra, Frindbury parish was in the City of Rochester as was Strood. Rochester was involved in that its citizen fled. When one speaks of Rochester-upon-Medway, then all these locations were within the limits. It is relevant to Rochester when one considers the after affects which included the construction of Fort Clarence and Fort Borstal. -- ClemRutter (talk) 00:21, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Bob Marshall-Andrews QC MP

I've removed the external link for Bob, he is no longer the city's MP (following the 2010 general election) and the link was broken in any case. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 11:35, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

The broken link reason is fine- the other reason would have needed discussion --ClemRutter (talk) 12:29, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Parishes

There is a discrepancy in the section "Parishes". The WP page says:

There were three parishes within the city of Rochester, St Margaret's, St Nicholas' and the Cathedral.

and yet the Rochester Cathedral Website says:

Owing to the fact that Rochester Cathedral is not a parish church ...[1]

both can't be right. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 12:49, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

The diocesan website lists three parishes: St Justus, St Margaret and St Peter[2]. St Justus is the new church on the Tideway estate. St Margaret's and St Peter's form a joint parish (St Peter with St Margaret) with the vicar based at the new church of St Peter in Delce Road. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 12:59, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

History

There are a few issues with the early history that don't quite make sense.

... but there was no bridge in AD 43.

At what date was Durobrivae recorded? The first bridge was built very soon after the invasion, and if the name dates from much after AD 44 there would be a bridge there.

Again, without knowing the date at which Durobrivae was first recorded then

... it is assumed that Rochester was a fortified Roman town, but no evidence has been found of such fort.

doesn't quite tie up with:

   * 190+: Systematic earthen fortifications were established.
   * 225+: These were replaced by stone, which are still extant.

Finally, the landing place of Hengist and Horsa is disputed. As well as Ebbsfleet, there is a claim for Castle Rough near Milton Regis. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:22, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

New page

The three WikiProjects boxes above all request that the history is moved to a new page. The ToDo list requests the replacement of bullet points with prose, suitable wikified. I have started work to do this by taking a snapshot of the existing history into sandbox2 and will launch it as a new page once I feel it is in basic shape.

If anyone has any comments pertinent to this please leave them on my talk page. If I am treading on anyone's toes or there are other good reasons I've not thought about, please let me know as soon as possible and I'll endeavour to accomodate changes. Ditto if anyone thinks this is a bad idea, but please be constructive! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 18:15, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Support:--ClemRutter (talk) 22:53, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

New page created. It still needs a lot of work but is at least readable as prose. I'll trim the history section in this page later, unless someone wants to do it for me first! Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:42, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Trim done. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 17:15, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Cleanup tag

I've removed the old cleanup tag for the following reasons:

• It was dated November 2007, the page has changed significantly since then.
• The tag is being considered for deletion.
• There were no specific reasons given.

If anyone disgrees, please feel free to revert or, preferably, select a more appropriate tag. See also the top of this talk page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Martin of Sheffield (talk • contribs) 12:26, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

City status?

I was surprised to read the information about Rochester's present non-status as a city. It is my understanding that any English town with a Church of England cathedral is considered to be a city. Is this not actually the case (at least these days)? Afterwriting (talk) 13:37, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

No, never has been. City status is given by royal charter, and in Rochester's case predates the CoE by the best part of a millenium. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 15:12, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification on this point. But your inference that the "CofE" only came into being in the 16th century is not that of the church itself, which asserts that it is (both theologically and legally) the continuation of the English Church prior to the English Reformation. Afterwriting (talk) 16:21, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

I've just looked at the City_status_in_the_United_Kingdom article which seems to support my belief that, at least from the beginnings of the English Reformation period until the 20th century, that being a cathedral town did in fact grant city status. Afterwriting (talk) 16:32, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Section 1.1.1 first sentance: "In the 16th century, a town was recognised as a city by the English Crown if it had a diocesan cathedral within its limits. This association between having a cathedral and being called a city was established when Henry VIII founded dioceses (each having a cathedral in the see city) in six English towns and also granted them city status by issuing letters patent". So the status is granted by the letters patent or recognition by the Crown. The Crown chose to give city status to those towns which had a diocesan cathedral. The cathedral of itself does not confer city status.

The Official website of the Church of England[3] refers to the roots as going back to Roman times, but then continues: "The religious settlement that eventually emerged in the reign of Elizabeth I gave the Church of England the distinctive identity that it has retained to this day. It resulted in a Church that consciously retained a large amount of continuity with the Church of the Patristic and Medieval periods in terms of its use of the catholic creeds, its pattern of ministry, its buildings and aspects of its liturgy, but which also embodied Protestant insights in its theology and in the overall shape of its liturgical practice. The way that this is often expressed is by saying that the Church of England is both 'catholic and reformed.'" The CoE appears to regard itself as having a distict identity only from Elizabeth's time. Over the years I have heard the "Church in England" and the "English Church" to refer to the pre-reformation era. All these terms are anachronistic though, at the time people simply referred to it as "The Church" or "Holy Mother Church". See Chaucer or Langland for example. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 17:01, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

(1) The essential point is that cathedral towns were granted city status and this appears to be the basis on which the letters patent were issued . So my original comments on this matter were factually correct until more recent times. (2) The Church of England's "distinctive identity" as it developed after the English Reformation is a separate issue from that of its origins and history. The Preface to the Book of Common Prayer makes it clear that the church considers itself to be the continuation of the Patristic and Medieval church in England. The Reformation in England did not create a "new" church but "reformed" an already existing one. This is also what the Church of England website's comments affirm. Nothing in the church's formularies suggests that it only came into being in the 16th century - just the opposite in fact. Afterwriting (talk) 15:05, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Move from Kent to Medway

There has been a proposal to move Rochester, Kent to Rochester, Medway in accordance with WP:UKPLACE. This has led to objections.

WP:UKPLACE states (slightly edited):

Where possible, articles on places in the United Kingdom use [[placename]].

Disambiguation should never be to post town, former postal county or postcode district.

For localities requiring disambiguation:

• (1) The usual convention is to use [[placename, ceremonial county]]. For example, Halling, Kent.
• (2) When the city and the county use variants of the same name (and disambiguation is required) disambiguate with England for clarity throughout the English-speaking world; thus Lincoln, England, not Lincoln, Lincolnshire.
• (3) For localities unambiguously located within a town/city settlement (according to reliable, external sources) [[placename, town/city]] is used. For example, within the borough of Milton Keynes, for localities in the defined new city area [[placename, Milton Keynes]] is used, as with Bradwell, Milton Keynes. Localities within the borough but outside the city area continue to be disambiguated by ceremonial county, as with Olney, Buckinghamshire.
• (4) When further disambiguation is required district/unitary is used. Example: two Belmonts in London become Belmont, Sutton and Belmont, Harrow. If there are two places of the same name in the same district/unitary then parishes, wards, or lowercase compass directions are used as appropriate to identify the relative locations. Example: two Woolstons in Shropshire unitary authority become Woolston, north Shropshire and Woolston, south Shropshire.

Martin of Sheffield (talk) 10:33, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

This discussion has moved to Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_UK_geography#Medway_or_Kent. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 12:20, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

coFWD and Rochester People

Rochester People still appear to be active and so I've reversed user Scattyjan's deletion. coFWD was listed as a level 2 heading under Culture thus making Dickens onwards into subsections of it. I've brought both these groups together under a single heading, they are of minor significance but worth recording. To avoid edit warring, could editors (perhaps including Scattyjan) care to comment here please. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:36, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

It looks like spam to me- no merit in keeping. If any of these guys disagrees they come over to my place and discuss it over a glass of wine --ClemRutter (talk) 15:44, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

@Martin, if you are around the towns it would be great to meet up and you could share some of my paper resources. --ClemRutter (talk) 15:44, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

2014 edit

Basically a nice bit of work- and one in progress. It does illustate just how much work needs to be done. I looked at Lincoln, England(C) and then Norwich(B) for a comparison. We complain we are hindered by not knowing where the boundaries are- but have no Demography section, Industry is weak and there is nothing on climate in spite of the Gravesend climate being the most benign in the land The elephant in the room is the lack Governance or any political information, the 2014 Rochester& Strood Election finally brought the area to international attention setting two turning points and many records, Bob Marshall=Andrew tenure as MP was also notable and indeed Anne Kerr (politician) as the MP who was beaten up by the Chicago police.

I'll hold back just now and do pick up a couple of pieces when you are taking a breather. -- Clem Rutter (talk) 16:33, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Weather box

User:Martinevans123 User:PaleCloudedWhite I do not think that a settlement should have a weather box referenced to a weather station outside the area concerned, rather weather boxes should only be used if the weather station is inside the area covered by the article. Hence countries and regions could justifiably have one, but not villages nor many towns. The one in this article should be removed, perhaps leaving a link to a page which justifiably includes one. SovalValtos (talk) 12:43, 24 June 2015 (UTC)

No. That is the weather in Rochester calculated from a station just outside the border. That is how it is done- Kent weather is notable, Gravesend and thus parts of Strood do obtain the UK records on a almost daily basis, but that is frequently ammended when the weekly reporting station at Brogdale tops them. The fact is that most UK climate statistics (Towns etc) are extrapolated from out of area recordings and Rochester is no different.-- Clem Rutter (talk) 06:56, 29 June 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

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Notable People

@Roger 8 Roger: Your edits are destroying formatting and not replacing it with a consistent style. The first two entries are in your preferred style, then there is a random line you've cut off, then two entries in the old style, two in the new, one in the old and finally one in the new. This hotchpotch is unacceptable. If you wish to change the list to "list guidelines" (which?) seek consensus to do so, but don't mess up the existing system and then wander off. See MOS:DEFLIST, the existing list is in an acceptable style. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 08:48, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

I was in the middle of re-arranging the whole list. It was not sensible to do it all in one hit because what was, and now is again, there was such a muddle. By doing two edits I thought it was obvious I was working through the whole list. Do you really believe that what is there now is better than the usual list structure that is common in numerous articles? See WP:LISTPEOPLE, or better, see Dartford for a neat tidy list of notable residents. What is the point, for example, of a three line ramble about Dickens with a few of his works referenced by commercial websites? His own article is linked for anyone who wants to know more, which is the point of only listing people with their own article - they are notable enough. Short lists with basic facts with no titles is all that is needed, which also avoids any hint of undue weight and personal preference seeping in (as to who deserves more detail). Roger 8 Roger (talk) 09:30, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

It can help prevent premature reversions if one places {{in use|date=July 2023}} or {{Under construction}} banners on the article.SovalValtos (talk) 09:42, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Maybe consider {{in use}}? I'd seen your revert to 08:53 and this mish-mash had been around 50 minutes so it looked like you had just gone on to pastures new leaving others to comply with the instruction "section needs a re-write to comply with list guidelines". Whilst I'm not entirely sure I agree with you, I am certain that WP:RF is a priority and the intermediate mess wasn't helpful. Have you come across WP:BRD? If you'd come to the talk page after the first revert then any interested parties could decide on the best way forward. If you want to go ahead and change the format to a perceived better way please do so, but I would strongly recommend either using "In use" to let readers and editors know what is happening, or else do the job in one hit. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 09:53, 28 July 2023 (UTC)

To both, yes, thanks, I will try to use some sort of 'in progress' marker next time. Yes, 50 minutes was perhaps a lengthy gap. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 01:53, 29 July 2023 (UTC)