The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-05-25 00:00:00

THE SOUTH-EASTERN PORTS OF ENGLAND

Ramsgate, the easternmost of the south ports of
England, has been, like its neighbour Margate, a favourite
resort of pleasure-seekers since the establishment of
steam navigation; but in a commercial point of view it is
much more important than Margate, principally on
account of its fine harbour.

Before the establishment of any railways in Kent,
Ramsgate kept up a communication with Ostend and
other ports, for the conveyance of passengers ; but when
the South-Eastern Railway reached Dover, steam-packets
were placed upon an efficient footing to run from Dover
to Ostend, to the detriment of Ramsgate. When, how-
ever, the railway company extended their Canterbury
branch to Ramsgate, a new phase in the traffic presented
itself; the steam-boat company, in connexion with the
railway company, removed their Ostend steamers from
Dover, and placed them on the Ramsgate station ; and
now a well conducted competition is maintained from
Dover, and from Ramsgate to Ostend, in which every
effort is made to bring steaming up to its highest pitch of
efficiency.
Dover and Folkestone both exhibit the remarkable in-
fluence of railways upon steamers, which Ramsgate ex-
emplifies in a smaller degree. Dover enjoys the advan-
tage of being the great port for continental embarkation,
on account of its vicinity to the coast of France ; and cir-
cumstances seemed to place the town above all reach of
competition. But the inhabitants have had to open their
eyes to a fact which railways have disclosed to them—the
rise of Folkestone from an humble fishing village to an
important steam-boat station. When the South-Eastern
Company found some years back, that there was likely to
be some difficulty in placing an efficient steam-transit in
connexion with a railway at Dover ; they bought up
Folkestone harbour, cleared it out, built a pier, made a
first-class station and refreshment room, procured steam-
ers, and astonished the Dover people by establishing a
daily steam-conveyance from Folkestone to Boulogne
and back. It would be difficult to estimate the impor-
tance of this step. It made the Railway Company to a
certain degree independent of Dover ; while it gave the
inhabitants of that town a strong inducement to do their
best to retain their own trade, by accelerating the boats,
lowering the fees of embarkation, and removing a few of
those annoyances which no one experiences so largely as
a traveller.

We may run rapidly along the coast from Folkestone to
Portsmouth, without stopping along at its several ports :
for they are not connected much with passenger-voyaging.
Rye, poor old Rye, has become so much choked up with
sea-sand, that the harbour hardly knows itself. Hastings,
though a fine watering-place, has not much sea-traffic,
except for goods and fish : its steaming days have yet to
begin, Brighton has such shallow water, that she has had
to ask her sister Shoreham to aid in establishing a steam-
transit to Dieppe.—The Land we live in. [One of the
beautiful and fast sailing steamers, built for the South
Eastern Company, by our townsman, John Laird, Esq.,
sails now each tide (or twice a-day) to and from Folke-
stone and Boulogne, and often makes the passage in an
hour-and-three-quarters. The South Eastern Company
have lately purchased the harbour at Whitstable, on the
North-east coast of Kent ; are completely re-building it,
and it is fast becoming an important sea-port. Vessels
can get into the harbour frequently and discharge their
cargoes, and get off again to sea, while others cannot get
round the North and South Foreland. Very shortly
nearly the whole county of Kent will be supplied with
coal from this port.]