Transactions of the Hastings Commissioners
In commencing the story of 1849 there are reasons present to my mind why I should give the first place to the resuscitation of the Hastings News after being defunct for a brief season and for causes already explained, The said journal originated and edited by Mr. W. Ransom—was the first paper established in the borough that has continued to the present time, for, although the founding of two separate journals had been previously attempted, they had but a very short existence; thus showing that they were unsatisfactorily managed or that Hastings was not ready for a weekly supply of literature and news. There was much in the tone of the News with which the present writer was in accord, and there is much also in the following extract that will be endorsed by advocates for municipal élections to be effected on non-political lines. In its issue of Jan, 6th, the News says :—
“We have again the pleasure of presenting the Hastings and St. Leonards public with a paper which they may call their own; and we trust that they will ever find pleasure in giving it that title. That the interregnum in the existence of this journal was a matter of regret to the inhabitants of these towns we think we may honestly assert; and we rejoice to find the result justify our expectations that they can and will appreciate a journal which has for its object—not the aggrandisement of a party—not the carrying out of a commercial speculation; but which aims, with a single heart, though perhaps with a feeble hand, at advancing the interests and conducing to the well-being of the whole community. . . . A town without a journal is, in one sense, a town unrepresented; since its inhabitants are without a voice in public movements. The past existence of this journal has at least effected one result to which we can appeal with confidence—our ancient town and her modern companion once screwed up into a narrow niche in the columns of the county press, with hardly room to breathe, much less to speak, have now suddenly risen to sufficient importance to be deemed worthy of more than a mere local habitation and a name allowed them in those columns wherein they were wont to 'hide their diminished heads.' A reporter has ceased to be a phenomenon in the towns."
During the three months interregnum referred to by the News, a special edition of the Sussex Advertiser was issued under the title of the Hastings and St. Leonards Chronicle, and the present writer—who had been for.several years in the habit of sending news paragraphs and literary morsels to that and another county journal—was consulted by the late G. P. Bacon on the propriety or otherwise of bringing out such special edition. Not knowing that the News was likely to be re-issued and opining that the borough, with its Literary Institute and two Mechanics' Institutions was bemeaning itself by not having a local paper, he, with whom the Lewes journalist held consultation readily fell in with the proposal, and promised to lend an ‘even more hearty support to the suggested special than he had hitherto done to the original, of which, as a county paper, he had been the local agent. He was then asked by Mr. Bacon to undertake the duties of local sub-editor and reporter, as well as sole agent, but which he declined on the ground of being at the time a pedagogue, bandmaster and shopkeeper, he had as many heats in the fire as could be properly managed. "Who then shall I get as a local reporter?” was the next question, and it was quickly answered, “Get Mr, Dittar, late reporter of the News; he being now disengaged, will be the man for you.” 'Will you see him and get him to come to Lewes?' "Yes!" That gentleman went to Lewes and accepted the post, but when the News re-appeared, he transferred his services to his old love. The Chronicle has, however existed side by side with the News since then - for some years as a fourpenny, and afterwards as a penny paper under the several reporterial or editorial labours of Messrs. Tyrie, Bates, Tendall, Cogswell, and Hutchings, whilst the News has kept very fairly to first principles enunciated as above under the literary work of the Ransoms, Pittar, Cogswell, Tendall, Simpson and others. These principles are further set forth in the re-issue editorial of the News, from which we make another extract. It says:-
“In the course we have marked out for ourselves, we intend studiously to avoid party politics, by which term we mean the advocacy of any measure. because it may happen to be the battle-cry or the bantling of this or that party without regard to its intrinsic merits. . . We shall endeavour to keep as far distant from that Radicalism which consists of eradication, as from that Conservatism which by its rigidity engenders revolution. . . These are points of view from which measures of social regulation may be regarded that suggest consideration of infinitely greater importance to the well-being of a people than the success of a party."
That the honour or privilege of being a Hastings Commissioner when the government of the town was divided between them and the newer body of Councilmen was not severely coveted may be inferred from the fact that there were no fewer than 23 persons disqualified by non-attendance. There were two of the parish of St. Clement — namely, Edward Lloyd Robinson, a draper of George street, and Henry Sinden, a butcher of High street. The disqualified men of the Castle parish were Richard Bayley, jun., of Castle street; John Benjamin Moor, of the Pelham Arcade (who died in the following year, aged 65); and Edmund Elford, organist and music seller. The disqualified of All Saints parish were 18 in number, including Charles Rolfe, of High Wickham, and John Snaith, of All Saints street. Mr. Rolfe, a native of Cranbrook, was a retired innkeeper from Newbury, in Berkshire. He had just recently died (Jan. 30) suddenly from the rupture of a blood vessel on the chest, aged 56 years. Mr. Snaith, originally from France, was a gardener, and died a quarter of 8 century later at the age of a centenarian all but two months.
At the present time (1897) when the townspeople are within a few months of seeing the ugly railway arch near the Alexandra Park transformed into something more respectable as well as more convenient, it may be of interest to know how it came to be built. At the Commissioner's meeting on June 25th, with Mr. Matthew Kelland presiding, an application was received from the South-Eastern Railway Company to divert the public road called Ore Lane in the Castle parish a length of 400 feet by turning the same near the late Ashyard about -
