A real insight into a Southampton so close to a large shopping centre and yet totally overlooked by most. It has some of the most complete medieval city walls in the country including towers, gates and vaults. In the 1300s the sea came right up to the walls and gave both fortification and entrances for the merchants to unload their imported goods of wines and fine silks for the royal court.
Just inside the walls are wonderful streets of Georgian houses, so quiet and elegant and yet so close to a busy city. After lunch we walked the Titanic Trail seeing South Western House, a hotel where the rich would have stayed the night or two before they set sail on a maiden voyage and Canute Chambers, the offices of the White Star Line. The Grapes pub was a favourite for the crew and third class passengers, some of whom would have spent their last night here.
There were several memorials including the Titanic Crew Memorial in the ruins of the sympathetically restored Holyrood Church and a memorial at Ocean Dock, inside Dock Gate 4, to all 1500 who died. We finished the visit at the small St Julien’s Church dating back to 1197.
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