Following a proposal to develop agricultural land at Grange Farm for residential purposes, PCA was commissioned to produce an archaeological desk-based assessment as part of the planning process. The DBA determined that there was moderate to high potential for prehistoric and Roman activity at the site. Medieval activity was also anticipated here, where the ruins of the fourteenth-century chapel and refectory of the manorial centre of Grace (formerly Grench) Manor still survive. In accordance with planning policies, the area was archaeologically evaluated using trial trenches. The findings of the evaluation were sufficient to require open area excavation in the north and west, where archaeological potential was highest and also in smaller areas around Grace Manor. The site covered some nine hectares of which more than 2.5 hectares were investigated archaeologically.

The site lies to the north-east of the modern town of Gillingham, on a slightly elevated terrace at the edge of the North Downs, overlooking Gillingham Reach and the River Medway. Along with the other Medway towns, Gillingham was targeted during the Second World War on a number of occasions due to the presence of important rail and road infrastructure, alongside the naval docks at Chatham and other military facilities and strategically important industries such as the Shorts aircraft works in Rochester. It was heavily bombed in the summer of 1940, with considerable loss of life and damage to the town. A number of anti-aircraft guns were positioned around the town as a defence, one of which lay to the south east of the site.

Our excavations revealed a large and irregularly shaped feature, truncating archaeological deposits, which was interpreted as a bomb crater due to the recovery in nearby topsoil of thirty German incendiary bombs, discovered by detectorists during topsoil removal. These were removed and disposed of by Babtec, an ordnance removal company. For obvious reasons these bombs were treated as a hazard rather than ‘finds’ but they represent an important phase in the site’s history. They were probably B1E 1kg incendiary bombs (IWM 2018), which could be dropped by a German bomber such as the Heinkel 111 in their hundreds; over 24,000 incendiary bombs were dropped on the Medway region during the war. The land at Grange Farm would not have been a ‘target’ but simply hit as part of the indiscriminate and inaccurate nature of area bombing.

The Second World War activity was the final episode in the story of the site. The earliest indications of activity suggest sporadic visitation of the area from the Mesolithic through to the Bronze Age. Activity increased in the Late Iron Age and early post-conquest periods, with the establishment of agricultural enclosures. In the early second century a routeway was constructed through the site; the origin and trajectory of this route was not established, however, it is tempting to see it as linking the main route of Watling Street, the Roman road which ran from Durovernum Cantiacorum (Canterbury) to Londinium (London), only 2km to the south of the site, with the Medway marshes and associated river system to the north. This region was especially significant between the first and third centuries, with industries involved in the production and distribution of ceramics and salt.

Significantly, at some point probably in the fourth century, a square, stone-built mausoleum with tessellated floor was constructed; occupying a slight elevation in the land, this would presumably have been visible for some distance from the Medway to the north. This mausoleum contained the burial of a woman in a lead-lined coffin, which had apparently been disturbed in antiquity; despite this, fragments of gold and jewelled necklaces were recovered from demolition deposits. The later fourth and early fifth centuries saw the continuation of use of much of the enclosure system. The recovery of quantities of litharge point to silver working during this period. The mausoleum may have begun to fall into disrepair, and it is perhaps during this Late Roman period that the central grave was disturbed. Intriguingly, the structure remained standing into the twelfth century and, at some point before its final demise a tawny owl appears to have chosen the abandoned mausoleum as a place to roost. The land may well have been grazed or farmed from the sixth century until the establishment of Grench Manor in the mid 13th century.

The results of these excavations were published in PCA Monograph 24: ‘By the Medway Marsh: Excavations at Grange Farm, Gillingham, Kent 2003–2006’