Rye and Winchelsea were well represented at Walmer Castle on Thursday, July 10 when the King met representatives from the fourteen Cinque Ports in a celebration of service to the community. The Rye contingent was led by Mayor Andy Stuart accompanied by his wife Niki, Deputy Town Clerk Jessica Neame and two chosen volunteers from the town. Winchelsea Mayor Peter Cosstick was also supported by an equivalent team.
The Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports Sir George Zambellas welcomed His Majesty to Walmer Castle.
The visit was King Charles’ first to Kent since the coronation two years ago. At the castle, the official residence of the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, His Majesty met the mayors, town clerks and local volunteers in The Queen Mother’s Garden, named after his grandmother. She held the title of Lord Warden from 1978 to 2002. It has a bench with a life-sized model corgi sitting on it.
The Right Worshipful the Mayor of Rye, Andy Stuart, was presented to the King. “It is a tremendous honour to be mayor of Rye and I was thrilled to be invited to meet the King with the Mayoress Niki, Deputy Town Clerk Jessica, Pat Hughes and Simon Parsons, also representing Rye.”
“If welcoming the Queen to Rye last year was one of the highlights of my first term as mayor, meeting the King will certainly be a highlight of my second term.”
Jessica Neame, Deputy Town Clerk for Rye reflected: “I was honoured to represent Rye Town Council at Walmer Castle last Thursday. It is likely a once-in-a-lifetime privilege to meet the reigning monarch. King Charles was a pleasure to chat to and showed much interest in Rye and the surrounding area. Hopefully, we may have persuaded him to visit sometime!”
Two representatives from Rye were chosen for the amazing work they do for their town, Simon Parsons and Pat Hughes.
Simon from the Heritage Centre, explains how he felt about the day. “It was an honour to meet and talk with King Charles III but the greatest pride I felt was that the Mayor of Rye, Andy Stuart, chose to nominate me. There are, of course, so many hard-working and deserving community heroes in Rye but to have the work that my team of volunteers, staff and trustees has done to resurrect and strengthen the Heritage Centre over the last five years acknowledged in such a significant way means so much. Thank you, Andy. “
‘Pat the Bus’, as she is affectionately known, from the Rye and District Community Transport, was also honoured to be there. “I thought it was a marvellous occasion and I thoroughly enjoyed the whole day. I think the King is remarkable because he shows such interest in everyone he meets. Despite the heat he gave everyone his full attention.”
Pat Alston, founder of Romney Tweed, gifted the King a sunglasses case. “It was a wonderful surprise and a great honour to be asked by George to provide a Romney Tweed glasses case for His Majesty in the Cinque Ports tweed we had designed for Mike Boyce before his sad passing in 2022. Rosie Green, our weaver, handwove and “finished” a new piece of cloth for the visit of The King. The colours in the design, which is woven in a Prince of Wales check, reflect the Coat of Arms of the Warden of the Cinque Ports. The glasses case was made up by Sara Roberts, a local seamstress, who has made practically all our products of the past.
“The setting of The Queen Mother’s Garden was absolutely beautiful. To be there and share the excitement of the various Cinque Ports was an enormous privilege and I enjoyed being in the New Romney group and extending my friendship with the mayor and his wife.
“When The King came to our group and I presented the glasses case, he asked if it was for him and said he had already been given a winkle, and we agreed he now had something to put it in. I explained that the yarn for the cloth came from the local Romney sheep, which have grazed on the Romney Marsh since the seventh century. He asked if wool from another breed had been mixed with it and I replied that it was PURE Romney. We then talked about the qualities of the wool, the fact that the grass was so good on the Romney Marsh, and you could tell from the fleece whether the sheep had been ill or not, and the King went on to say that that depended on the soil and in fact everything came together. He mentioned his work at Dumfries House, which I had visited in 2016. He asked if we did knitting and I had to say ‘No’, pointing at my tweed dress as an example of another tweed.”
Peter Cosstick, mayor of Winchelsea, was proud to represent his town: “It was a very memorable and happy day. In attendance were me and Mayoress Debbie Cosstick, Town Clerk Jennifer Sutherland, Melissa Mungovan, the Lead Nurse of Demelza East Sussex, and Jo Barry, Operations Manger of Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat. It was a great honour and privilege for us to represent Winchelsea, to be presented to and to meet King Charles in such a wonderful location for this truly remarkable historic occasion.
He said he would remember the day for a long time. “All of us agreed that we will cherish this memory for many, many years to come, since this was probably a ‘once in a lifetime’ experience. More importantly, it was great to see all the representatives of the Cinque Ports Confederation together with those individuals receiving well-deserved recognition for all their amazing work in supporting their local communities in so many different ways. Our thanks go out to the Lord Warden and his team for making this event a huge success.”
The King, following in the footsteps of his father and grandmother, was presented with a Gold Winkle. Winkle Club Chairman Christian Burton told Rye News: “It was a great honour to be able to present a Gold Winkle to the King: I didn’t even know it was him until the news was leaked the day before. I had been a little nervous beforehand but there was no need as King Charles seemed to put us at ease as he arrived. After I had been introduced by Becca, the mayor of Hastings, I said, ‘Your Highness: as Chairman of Hastings Winkle Club I am proud to present you with this Gold Winkle to signify Honorary Membership of the Club.’ The King replied saying, ‘Oh wow! Is that mine? I don’t feel I deserve it!’ Sir George, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, interjected ‘Winkle Up Sir!’ The few other Members present duly “Winkled Up”, showing their Winkles to the King.”
As well as visiting Walmer Castle, the king also visited RNLI Walmer where he met two volunteers from RNLI Rye Harbour. More on that in next week’s Rye News.
Image Credits: Kt bruce .
Congratulations to all the volunteers and so pleased Simon Parsons was chosen, it’s well deserved and I don’t think without him we’d be still successfully running the Rye Town Mode, not only his vision of how we move forward but his managing of the 23 volunteers and that ain’t easy! Congratulations mate!