Brightling

This year alone, Brightling miners will use modern drill and blast techniques to recover at least 100,000 tonnes of the mineral rock from seams several feet thick; making the UK not only largely self-sufficient, but able to export gypsum-based products to more than 50 countries overseas.

South Downs gypsum mining unearths fortune in heart of 1066 country Virginia Matthews 2010

Far less well-known though is the long-established deep-mining operation centred on the High Weald village of Brightling; just a stone's throw from the scene of William the Conqueror's victory at Battle and now the country's largest resource of calcium sulphate or gypsum.

South Downs gypsum mining unearths fortune in heart of 1066 country Virginia Matthews 2010

Needle, standing on Brightling Down, 646 feet high, is visible from most of the eminences in this part of Sussex.

Highways & Byways in Sussex E.V. Lucas

Four miles west of Robertsbridge, up hill and down, is Brightling, whose

Highways & Byways in Sussex E.V. Lucas

In the east, similarly elevated, is seen the Brightling

Highways & Byways in Sussex E.V. Lucas

But whether it is true that when the Brightling choir dissatisfied him he presented the church with nine bassoons, I cannot say.

Highways & Byways in Sussex E.V. Lucas

In Brightling church is a bust to John Fuller, with the motto: "Utile nihil quod non honestum."

Highways & Byways in Sussex E.V. Lucas

We poured into the village on the red edge of dawn, Sir John horsed, in half-armour, his pennon flying; behind him thirty stout Brightling knaves, five abreast; behind them four wool-wains, and behind them four trumpets to triumph over the jest, blowing: _Our King went forth to Normandie_.

Puck of Pook's Hill Rudyard Kipling 1900

'We rode to Brightling, and past Sir John's lodges, where the keepers would have shot at us for deer-stealers, and we had Sir John down into his Justice's chair, and when we had told him our tale and showed him the cow-hide which Sebastian wore still girt about him, he laughed till the tears ran.

Puck of Pook's Hill Rudyard Kipling 1900

John Pelham's sledge-hammers at Brightling would strike in like a pack

Puck of Pook's Hill Rudyard Kipling 1900