Portsmouth and Southsea: the back story

About Portsmouth and Southsea: the back story

By the ULTIMATE Brighton Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

Portsmouth grew on Portsea Island around one of the finest natural harbours in England. Its dockyard built and served the Navy for centuries, its walls and towers guarded the harbour mouth, and in the nineteenth century the seaside suburb of Southsea grew up beside the common.

Portsmouth is England’s island city. Portsea Island sits between Portsmouth Harbour to the west and Langstone Harbour to the east, joined to the mainland by road and rail bridges, with Portsdown Hill rising beyond. Everything here has been shaped by the sea and by the Navy.

An island and a harbour

The harbour made Portsmouth. In 1545 Henry VIII’s warship the Mary Rose sank outside it while defending England from invasion; she was raised in 1982 and now lies in her own museum in the Historic Dockyard, beside HMS Victory and HMS Warrior. Charles Dickens was born in the city, and the house is a museum.

Check opening times and trains on the official sites before you travel.

Guarding the harbour mouth

Old Portsmouth, at the south-west tip of the island, still keeps the defences that watched the harbour entrance: the Round Tower, Point Battery and the Hotwalls, whose old arches are now artists’ studios and a café. Southsea Common owes its open space to the military, who kept it clear in the early nineteenth century as a field of fire from the harbour defences. Southsea Castle stands on the shore beyond it.

Southsea, the resort

Victorian Southsea grew into a seaside resort around the common. Canoe Lake, laid out as a park in 1886, still has its boating lake and the remaining walls of Lumps Fort beside it. Victoria Park in the city centre keeps a restored 1878 fountain and a row of naval monuments.

Stage and song

The Kings Theatre on Albert Road opened in 1907 and has been one of the leading theatres of the south coast ever since. Portsmouth Guildhall has hosted The Beatles and, famously, the first live airing of Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon; along Albert Road, the 400-capacity Wedgewood Rooms has launched bands on their way to festival headlines.

Portsmouth today

Today Portsmouth is still the home of the Royal Navy, and a city of museums, waterfront walks and a lively university quarter. Gunwharf Quays and the Spinnaker Tower stand on the old ordnance wharf, and the ferries for the Isle of Wight, France and Spain leave from the harbour.

Our advice: give the Historic Dockyard a day of its own, then spend the next morning in Old Portsmouth and walk the seafront to Southsea Castle and Canoe Lake.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Portsmouth and Southsea: the back story before you go.