LET’S be honest, there are many who loath France and the French and others who adore everything across the Channel. The real problem started in 1066 when William the Conqueror took over the country and implanted his henchmen to run everything.

In Hampshire alone Hugh de Port, who came from Port-en-Bessin, got his hands on more than 50 manors. He answered to Bishop Odo of Bayeux, where that tapestry has miraculously survived to repay visit after visit.

Port-en-Bessin is today a pleasant fishing port to hang about or visit by boat if you are that way inclined. Its impressive outer harbour gives way to two basins controlled by tide-gates where yachties can safely relax after crossing the Channel.

Situated between Omaha and Gold beaches, it was a strategic port in D-Day operations and targeted by Royal Marine commandoes of the 4th Special Service Brigade. Other key parts of the coast were Riva Bella Ouistreham and the nearby site of Pegasus Bridge at Bénouville.

Although there are numerous other traces of the last war in France –milestones marking the route forces took in liberating the country, plaques honouring Englishmen and Americans who liberated villages and Resistance fighters, a café in Etel Brittany where the Germans surrendered and much else – much older contacts between the two countries are widespread.

There are clues in the surprisingly large number of documents held by the Hampshire Record Office, some written in French, albeit in a Norman dialect. One came from Richard I, who only spent six months of his reign in England and conducted most of his business abroad.

In 1190, in Nonancourt, now in the Department of Eure, he answered a request from merchants in Winchester demanding better trading conditions. In response he signed a document, still held by HRO, “exempting them from pleading outside the city walls” and other burdens. One of the witnesses to the deed was the Archbishop of Rouen.

One Bishop of Winchester, Jean de Pontoise (1282-1304), who was briefly chancellor of the University of Oxford, named his Paris estate after the cathedral city, though you would never suspect it. Its present name is Le Kremlin-Bicȇtre, the prefix coming from the fact that after Napoleon’s Russian campaign many veterans convalesced in a hospital there, and the suffix from ‘Winchester’ via ‘Vinchestre’ and ‘Bichestre’.

There are many other links with the county, especially its religious houses. Of the 96 English priories held after 1066 by French mother-houses (called ‘alien’), Hampshire had more than any other county. Hayling Island was owned by the abbey of Jumièges, St Florent Saumur had a priory at Andover, St Vigor Cerisy one at Monk Sherborne.

Ellingham was under St Sauveur Vicomte, whilst Tiron Chartres had priories at Andwell, Hamble and on the Isle of Wight (St Cross).

In these ‘twinned places’ you may find a reference to Hampshire in a church or local museum. But you are unlikely to get a warm welcome by dropping into a café in, say, St Florent beside the Loire and saying: “J’habite à Andover” – though it’s worth a try – and you should first read Andover Priory by Martin Coppen and the late Richard Jones, a rare bit of readable scholarship available from: ahaspublications.andover@gmail.com.

None of these alien priories were true convents in which monks chose their superiors. They had to be appointed by French abbots. Predictably, it was a situation that irritated locals – trying to settle a dispute with a landlord or bishop in a nearby ‘castle’ was one thing. Having to refer to a Norman or Breton monk across the water was another. It was a great relief in the early 1400s when these links were broken and the revenue from holdings were spread round.

It was a sign that the English were unraveling the co-habitation that followed the Norman invasion. Rather like a long-drawn-out divorce settlement, the Hundred Years War sorted out who really was King of France, though the English crown only finally gave up its claim in 1802.

HRO holds a number of documents giving orders for prayers to be said for success in the war, like one of 1359 in the register of William Edington, Bishop of Winchester (see Volume 8 in the Hampshire Record Series).

Unfortunately, these prayers were not answered.: in fact, in Chartres on Easter Monday 1360 a freak hailstorm struck an encampment of 10,000 English soldiers readying for battle. Lightning killed some, others were struck by huge hailstones, and tents were torn apart. Unbelievably, it is reckoned that in half an hour 1,000 men and 6,000 horses lost their lives.

The army was so weakened that Edward believed that God was giving him a message and negotiated a treaty. It (temporarily) renounced his claim to the French crown, gave Normandy and other territories back to the French and only kept Aquitaine for the English.

This led to nine years of truce. Another period of peace followed in 1389-1415, after which war resumed. Henry V left from Southampton on the road to Agincourt in north-east France (not far from Le Touquet). The place of the battle is hardly worth a visit though the modern commune of Azincourt, with a population of little more than 300, has a museum. It is in the shape of a longbow – very French!

Calais of course is the main port of entry to France and was governed by the English until 1558. Once again HRO has records that help to tell the tale. Lucrative sinecures were often in the hands of local worthies, like the Tudor diplomat William Sandys (later 1st Baron Sandys), seated at The Vyne, Sherborne St John, and Treasurer of Calais.

There is so much more that poring over a map and trawling Wikipedia can suggest for a really interesting holiday across the water. But one place that stands out for those who want to appreciate the real significance of ‘1066 and all that’ is the city of Caen, easily reached via the ferry from Portsmouth to Ouistreham.

Caen was the power base of William the Conqueror, 7th Duke of Normandy. Merely walking round the surviving castle says as much about the power of the Normans as anything else. It was started in 1060 and continued by William’s son, Henry Beauclerc – Henry I of England. In its final form it still dominates the centre of a city with a population of 400,000.

The site is on open access and covers more than 12 acres, with 800 metres of ramparts. In 1182 it was large enough to accommodate more than 1,000 Norman knights, who gathered here to celebrate Christmas.

Allied bombing in 1944 destroyed huge parts of the castle, though the Exchequer Hall survived. Like many a disaster, there was a silver lining. During the 1960s archaeologist Michel de Bouard and his colleagues were able for the first time to carry out major excavations. They uncovered remains of the Conqueror’s palace, and a low-walled imprint of a huge dungeon built by Henry I.

The Conqueror’s palace had a great hall, private apartments and a chapel dedicated to St George, which was bombed in 1944. As a symbol of oppression and imprisonment, the dungeon had been destroyed much earlier, during the French Revolution.

In 1989 Hampshire County Council signed an accord with Lower Normandy, to foster trade and cultural inks. Like EU membership, it did not last, but even without formal links the heritage of the two countries will always be there to explore.

For more on Hampshire, visit: www.hampshirearchivestrust.co.uk, and www.hantsfieldclub.org.uk.

barryshurlock@gmail.com