In 1912 Tom Sheppard, the curator of Hull’s municipal museum, published his famous ‘Lost Towns of the Yorkshire Coast’. This wonderfully entertaining book brought together a huge body of facts, pictures and anecdotes concerning the erosion of the Holderness coast.

This section of the web site looks at three coastal settlements in more detail.

follow the links to the left to see maps and pictures. 

Hornsea is a small town with its old centre near to the only remaining mere in Holderness and Yorkshires largest natural lake. Although already a thriving market town, it started to grow with the arrival of the railway in 1864.  The old coastal settlement of Hornsea Beck had by this time been washed away and Victorian expansion made Hornsea a coastal town and popular holiday resort. It was about this time that the first sea defences were constructed. These defences have been maintained and enlarged.

The town of Withernsea is a Victorian holiday resort built around small pre-existing settlements.  The railway connection to Hull was opened in 1854 and it soon became a popular holiday resort.  In 1875 the “Withernsea Improvement Company” built a concrete sea wall and an ornamental iron pier.  Unfortunately the pier was seriously damaged in 1880 by the coal barge  “Safron” and then the end was swept away by a storm in 1882. The concrete sea wall has recently been rebuilt.

The old settlement of Kilnsea has now been completely lost.  Sea defences were built here in 19xx to protect the Godwin Battery - a defensive gun emplacement and the rail-head for a light railway to further military installations on Spurn point. The sea defences are now crumbling and erosion is progressing rapidly.