Let us now take on the remaining four counties in the South- east, namely Sussex, Essex, Surrey and Middlesex.

Firstly, Sussex. According to the "Early English Annals" Aelle at the head of the groups of Saxon adventurers landed in 477 somewhere near Selsey Bill and slowly made his way eastwards along the coast until British resistance was finally and mercilessly broken with the capture of the old Roman garrison town of Pevensby in 491.

His kingdom remained a coastal settlement, hemmed in by natural bounderies; it was so isolated and remote from contact with the outside world that it remained heathen until a hundred years after its neighbour Kent had been converted. According to Bede, Aelle was the first 'Bretwalda' to dominate the country south of the Humber, but this can only be recognition of his military abilities and can have no territorial significance; we certainly know nothing of his successors for the next two centuries.

Next is Essex. The origins of this kingdom are not clear. The district with its heavy clay had not been colonised much by the Romans and did not prove attractive to early settlers. Its population was therefore scanty and its developement late. One important point, however, we know; its association was with Kent across the Thames estuary and not with East Anglia to the north. By the early seventh century it had worked its way into prominence.

Surrey and Middlesex may well have been component parts of one unit of settlement on both sides of the Thames. Surrey, by derivation the 'southern district' (Suthrige) considered in relation to Middlesex, and was colonised by the Saxons whoexpanded there from north Kent. Of Middlesex we know little or nothing. It is somewhat surprising to find that London, with its superb situation and established importance was apparently ignored and did not form the core of a strong kingdom. Instead Surrey came under the control first of Kent and later in 568 of Wessex, whilst Middlesex became dependant on Essex. Probably the campaigning in Mount Bado, whatever its date, ends the first phase in the history of the south-eastern district. The resistance of the Britons in the west indicated the limit of the invaders' available resources for the purpose of the conquest and threafter they tended to fall back upon their bases, concentrate on colonization instead of campaining, summon their countryfolk to their sides and go their own ways, regardless of any further co-operative effort, to found their kingly dynasties and their territorial states.

I now come further north to the Wash and the Eastern Midlands and South-western Districts.The Wash and the magnificent river system connected with it made it easy for groups of Angles and Saxons to make their way into the country. There is no written evidence of their activities.However, they left behind them the largest collections of archaeological remains so far discovered. And not only the largest but also the very earliest, so that we can properly surmise that inroads occured long before the close of the fifth century and probably at the same time as the immigration by way of the Thames. With the rivers radiating in all directions the invaders spread out from the Wash like a fan. The Fenlands, which had been in Roman and prehistoric times a fertile and populace district, were not settled, at all events permanently, for it seems likely that, as in Frisia, the land was beginning to sink below sea- level and become an uncultivable swamp. It as, however, a simple matter to move inland along the rivers to drier gravel soils.

Apart from the short advance north of the Wash along the Witham to colonize South Lindsey in Lincolnshire, the efforts of the invaders succeeded in laying the foundations of three kingdoms.The River Witham has its beginnings at Grantham, passing through Lincoln and terminating into the Wash at Boston, my hometown.It was said that the Romans utilised the roads they built to transport goods but the argument is that if this was so the animals in which they used for motive power would have to had carried a large percentage of cargo in fodder, making it an uneconomical proposition. The rivers, therefore became the mode of transport in the main in tranporting grain from the fields to the garrisons or settlements.

East Anglia -- Here a number of independant folks made their homes and in the course of time united themselves into some sort of confederation. It must have been quite loosely organized, for the establishment and consolidation of the royal dynasty were not enough to make the North Folk and the South Folk forget their differences; they were placed under separate bishoprics after they were converted, and they retained their own forms of administration to such an extent that in the distant future they became separate dhires of Norfolk and Suffolk. The kingdom of East Anglia reached its highest importance under Redwald, whom Bede hailed as 'Bretwalda' after 616 A.D. If the treasure of Sutton Hoo burial ship belonged to him, there would seem to be very justification for such a title.

Mercia-- Driving their way along the Welland, Wreak and Soar, the invaders at last reached the Middle Trent, which was to become the heart of the Mercian kingdom with Tamworth at its royal headquarters and Lichfield and Repton the centres of its ecclesiastical organisation. It is very probable that in this region they met and mingled with the Angles who had entered the country by the Humber and come southwards along the Trent valley, peopling north Lindsey on the way. It is a moot question, which outnumbers others, those from the Fens or those from the Humber; the answer depends largely upon how much significance is attached to the political events that happened later. However this may be, during the unbroken silence of many generations the colonists lived a hard life on the heavy clay land of the Midlands and, unless they trekked elsewhere, there was nothing to be done but to tackle the formidable task of clearing the forests and draining the marshes. That was sufficient to take up all their energies; history knows little or nothing of them before the appearance of their first authentic king, Penda, in 632.