Battle of Hastings
Geoffrey Clarke on netting the Poll Tax in Hastings.
The fishermen of Old Hastings are an independent lot, well accustomed to standing up for their rights. In the seventeenth century their forbears frequently clashed with the French over poaching and from the early 1800s, when the picturesque fishing port began attracting visitors as a health and holiday resort, they came into conflict with developers wanting their land for hotels and shops. After the Second World War a running battle was fought with a Town Council determined to modernist the town and secure a larger share of the south coast holiday-makers.
Although a state of armed truce was reached some seven years ago - partly because the Council had come to realise that the fishing community was a tourist attraction in itself – this was not before the fishermen had been pushed eastwards and the western end of their beach had been taken over to accommodate a boating pool a fun-fair and numerous stalls selling holiday delicacies such as fish and chips, eels and Hastings rock.
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