Open accessNational Trust land — free to wander
Newtown was a busy medieval port, and today it’s a hamlet. Aymer de Valence, Bishop-elect of Winchester, granted the town its charter in 1256, with streets named Gold Street and Silver Street, but French raids in 1377 wrecked the town, which never recovered. You can still trace the streets as green lanes and across the fields. The red-brick Old Town Hall, rebuilt in 1699, survives from Newtown’s days as a ‘rotten borough’ that elected two MPs until 1832, when it had barely two dozen voters. A masked group of women calling themselves Ferguson’s Gang saved the hall for the National Trust in 1933. Round the hamlet are the saltmarsh and creeks of Newtown Harbour, a national nature reserve, and the Isle of Wight Coastal Path goes past the hall.
