Author Topic: Rochester ---- Town or City.  (Read 9819 times)

Offline MartinR

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #16 on: May 03, 2020, 10:58:04 PM »

Offline Mike Gunnill

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #15 on: April 29, 2020, 09:31:15 AM »
Quote


This picture was taken for the Daily Telegraph. On Rochester High Street, two weeks before they decided who was getting city-status. The council had gone ahead and rebranded their dustcarts. Very upset when they didn't get the status back. They were even more upset with the picture in DT.


Mike


I found it fummy how they never bothered to try and keep City of Rochester and then thought they could get City of Medway, what a joke


Dear  pr1uk
[/size]
It really was bad management. At the time of my picture, Medway Council had convinced themselves, they were going to get city status. Their actions were seen by the status officials, as great insult and must have marked their card for future applications.  An old editor of the local newspapers explained in a simple manner, " they looked at the map of Kent for the town of Medway, and couldn't find it! [/size][size=78%]"[/size]

I guess all the dust-carts had be repainted!

Mike
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Offline pr1uk

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #14 on: April 29, 2020, 07:33:55 AM »
Quote


This picture was taken for the Daily Telegraph. On Rochester High Street, two weeks before they decided who was getting city-status. The council had gone ahead and rebranded their dustcarts. Very upset when they didn't get the status back. They were even more upset with the picture in DT.


Mike


I found it fummy how they never bothered to try and keep City of Rochester and then thought they could get City of Medway, what a joke

Offline MartinR

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #13 on: April 28, 2020, 04:24:30 PM »
The terms "time immemorial" and "ancient prescriptive right" have precise meanings in common law.  Rochester had every right to the status by "ancient prescriptive right".

Offline Dave Smith

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #12 on: April 28, 2020, 11:10:24 AM »
Thank you MartinR for that most interesting explanation of city. Pity Rochester has lost the status but it seems it shouldn't have had that in the first place, just because it had a cathedral. I, like most people I'm sure, associated city with cathedral. Truro always seemed an anomaly to me for although it had a cathedral, it was such a small town- & certainly wasn't fortified as far as I'm aware.

Offline MartinR

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #11 on: April 27, 2020, 10:53:42 PM »
Nah, that's the Mudway, as anyone launching a dinghy at low tide can confirm. ;D

Offline Smiffy

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #10 on: April 27, 2020, 10:40:44 PM »
City of Medway? I thought the Medway was a river.

Offline Mike Gunnill

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #9 on: April 27, 2020, 09:25:51 PM »
What exactly happened that Rochester lost it`s city status. May have been discussed on old forum ?


This picture was taken for the Daily Telegraph. On Rochester High Street, two weeks before they decided who was getting city-status. The council had gone ahead and rebranded their dustcarts. Very upset when they didn't get the status back. They were even more upset with the picture in DT.


Mike
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Offline MartinR

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #8 on: April 27, 2020, 08:46:27 PM »
The origin of City status is a bit more convoluted than simply having a cathedral.  A city was originally a 'civitas' or fortified settlement.  Rochester doesn't appear to be on the list of 28 cities included by Nennius in his C9 history.  However before "time immemorial" (3 September 1189) Rochester had aquired city status.  These original cities had the status by "ancient prescriptive right" and not by a formal legal process.
Henry VIII founded six new dioceses and granted the enclosing town city status by letters patent.  It is the grant of letters patent by the crown which confers city status, not the creation of the cathedral.  In passing both Bath and Westminster lost their cathedrals, but managed to retain their city status.  The next new diocese to be created was Ripon, which did not become a city (officially) until 30 years after the cathedral.  Southwell acquired a cathedral, but never obtained city status since there was no borough corporation whereas in 1889 Birmingham became a city but had no Anglican cathedral until 1905.
In the 1972 reorganisation Rochester  received unique letters patent to allow the former city area to call itself the "City of Rochester" even though there was no council or mayor.  However when the Borough of Medway became Rochester-upon-Medway the city status was transferred to the whole borough and the historic city lost its claim based on the special letters patent from 1972.  Subsequently with the abolition of R-u-M the transferred status was lost.  Currently the 1972 letters are not recognised as being in force, so bye-bye to the City.



Longpockets

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #7 on: April 27, 2020, 07:26:08 PM »
Stuart,


I think Rochester had large cash reserves as well, if I remember correctly, their council Tax was insignificant if not non existent.

Offline stuartwaters

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #6 on: April 27, 2020, 01:57:20 PM »
In my mind, Rochester has always been a City, for the simple reason that it has a cathedral. Medway Council was created after a referendum of the good citizens of the former Rochester City Council and Gillingham Borough Council. The first referendum didn't give the government the answer they wanted (we had the audacity to vote NO). So, we had another for which there was little publicity and next to no campaigning and of the small number who bothered to vote, well, the government got their way.


Once the "merger" happened, Medway Council inherited Gillingham Council 's large cash surplus. The merger itself was actually more a takeover.
"I did not say the French would not come, I said they will not come by sea" - Admiral Sir John Jervis, 1st Earl St Vincent.

Offline pr1uk

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #5 on: April 27, 2020, 11:38:01 AM »
It was down to the council they were even reminded that the City of Rochester would be lost, but the council chose not to keep the Wardens and give themselves a higher pay rise. To me it is still the City of Rochester and that's from the Rochester side of the Bridge to Star hill.

Offline castle261

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #4 on: April 27, 2020, 10:54:02 AM »
Thank you gentlemen - a worthy explanation.

Offline MartinR

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #3 on: April 27, 2020, 09:31:24 AM »
Just to add to Longpockets: other areas where a city was being subsumed appointed Charter Trustees to maintain the old corporation for ceremonial purposes.  For some reason* this was rejected by the nascent Medway Borough Council and no such trustees were appointed, hence there was no body politic to hold the charter.

*Take your pick from:
  • Incompetance
  • A desire to have only one identity
  • Gillingham (and possibly Chatham) not wanting Rochester to appear more important

Longpockets

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Re: Rochester ---- Town or City.
« Reply #2 on: April 27, 2020, 08:47:36 AM »
From memory at or around the time the Medway Unitary Authority was formed and application for city status needed to be raised and it was not done.


This should explain https://www.city-of-rochester.org.uk/articles-item/rochester-city-status/