Facts about Gosport
General Info
Gosport (/ˈɡɒspɔːrt/ GOS-port) is a town and non-metropolitan borough on the south coast of Hampshire, South East England. At the 2011 Census, its population was 91,544.[3] Gosport is situated on a peninsula on the western side of Portsmouth Harbour, opposite the city of Portsmouth, to which it is linked by the Gosport Ferry.
History
The Rowner area of the peninsula was settled by the Anglo-Saxons, and is mentioned in the Anglo Saxon Chronicle as Rughenor (“rough bank or slope”). Both Rowner and Alverstoke, the name coming from the point where the River Alver entered the Solent at Stokes Bay, were included in the Domesday Book. Rowner was the earliest known settlement of the peninsula, with many Mesolithic finds and a hunting camp being found, and tumuli on the peninsula investigated. Bronze Age items found in a 1960s construction in HMS Sultan included a hoard of axe heads and torcs. A three-celled dwelling unearthed during construction of the Rowner naval Estate in the 1970s points to a settled landscape. Next to the River Alver which passes the southern and western edge of Rowner is a Norman motte and bailey, the first fortification of the peninsula, giving a vantage point over the Solent, Stokes Bay, Lee-on-the-Solent and the Isle of Wight.
