De Shurland Lodge History

CHAPTER ONE Masonry in Sheppey Masonry in Sheppey appears to have had its beginnings towards the end of the eighteenth century, for records show that Adam’s lodge, No. 158, was granted its warrant in 1778, although in such a small town as Sheerness then was, having only about 5,000 inhabitants, chiefly Dockyard employees and servicemen who were constantly on the move, it must have been extremely difficult for a lodge to function very successfully, and indeed, for a time this fine old lodge was forced to close down. However, with the coming of the Napoleonic Wars and the consequent arrival in the area of increased naval and military personnel, many of whom were, no doubt, members of the Craft. There followed a time of greater Masonic activity. Meetings were held in various convenient places both by Adam’s Lodge and by service lodges, the premises most frequently used being the “Marquis of Granby”, which was in the precincts of the barracks itself, the “Bell and Lion” and the “Masons’ Arms”.

As time went on the population of Sheerness greatly increased until, by the time De Shurland Lodge was founded in 1866, there were probably more than 15,000 inhabitants, and the town itself had spread past the limits of Blue Town to the marshes beyond, to form the newer areas of Mile Town and Marine Town; the street names of the latter being those well-known names of the Crimean War which were then so fresh in people’s memories, just as the name, Banks Terrace in Mile Town, commemorates the great part played in the development of the Dockyard and Sheerness itself by that great engineer, Sir Edward Banks, the builder of London and Waterloo bridges. A further boost to the island’s development came in 1860 when the railway was extended to Sheerness from Sittingbourne, crossing the Swale by a new toll bridge, so that we 3