Persecution prevailing at this juncture in many parts of Europe, numbers fled to this island as to an asylum, and many settled in this town, bringing with them industry, and an attachment to maritime affairs; or soon learning them here.  The number of its inhabitants being thus increased, its trade became proportionably greater:  so that in 1579, a record now subsisting says, “There are in the said town of Brighthelmston of fishing-boats four-score in number, and of able mariners four hundred in number, with ten thousand fishing-nets, besides many other necessaries belonging to their mystery."[3] And the descendants of many of these French, Dutch, and Spanish families still reside here.[4]

    [3] It is a melancholy reflection to compare the present state
        of the fishery with its prosperity in 1579, or in more modern
        periods.  Within the recollection of the editor, there were 60
        boats employed in catching mackerel, and in a propitious season,
        that species of fish has produced in Billingsgate market a sum of
        L10,000, with which the town was enriched.  In the autumn, 20 of
        these boats were fitted out for the herring voyage, and one boat
        has been known to land during the season from 20 to 30 lasts of
        herrings, each last containing 10,000 fish, computing 132 to the
        100.

    [4] The families of Mighell and Wichelo are all that appear to
        remain as of Spanish origin.

From this record we likewise learn, that the town was fortified to the sea by a flint wall, and that the fort, called the Block-house, had been then lately erected.  The east-gate of this wall, in a line with the Block-house was actually standing last year, and has been since taken down to open a more convenient entrance to a battery lately built.[5]

    [5] The kindness of a friend has enabled me to supply this work,
        with a view of the town taken from the sea in 1743, when the
        wall, Block house, and East gate were partly standing.

The town at present consists of six principal streets, many lanes, and some spaces surrounded with houses, called by the inhabitants squares.  The great plenty of flint stones on the shore, and in the corn-fields near the town, enabled them to build the walls of their houses with that material, when in their most impoverished state; and their present method of ornamenting the windows and doors with the admirable brick which they burn for their own use, has a very pleasing effect.  The town improves daily, as the inhabitants, encouraged by the late great resort of company, seem disposed to expend the whole of what they acquire in the erecting of new buildings, or making the old ones convenient.  And should the increase of these, in the next seven years, be equal to what it has been in the last, it is probable there will be but few towns in England, that will excel this in commodious buildings.[6]