A watching brief on groundworks for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link just west of Whitehill Road recorded the remains of an Early Bronze Age barrow (2000 – 1500 BC). The barrow consisted of a double ring ditch on the eastern side of the disused Gravesend West Railway cutting. No evidence was found for an overlying earth mound, which probably has been removed through a combination of ploughing and the construction of the railway cutting which had also removed part of the western side of the outer ditch. This ditch would have enclosed an area of 17m in diameter. A 2m berm separated the outer and inner ditches. No central burial was found although within the centre circle four postholes were found which may have been associated with the barrow. Cutting through the backfill of the inner ditch on the south side of the barrow was a poorly preserved flexed inhumation burial with head to the west. Around the neck area was an amber necklace. Parallel sites indicate that this burial may date to around 1600 BC.

The fill of the ditches was dated using Optical Stimulated Luminescence and gave the following dates: Basal fill 15,000 BC; middle fill 5,600 BC; top fill 6,100 BC. These dates are obviously far too early. (1 & 2)

Description from record TQ 56 NE 99:
A double ring ditch recorded on the eastern side of the disused railway. The ditches were truncated and only survived where they were cut into the underlying chalk. The outer ditch measured 17m in diameter and varied in width from 0.45m to 1.45m and 0.15m and 0.42m deep. The inner ditch measured 11m diameter and was between 0.58m and 1.00m wide and survived between 0.16m and 0.32m deep. No stratigraphic relationship was evidence between the two ditches, due in part to the non-existence of any overlying mound. The fills of the ditches were identical. In the base of both ditches and the central area were a series of possible postholes. The only finds were some possible worked flint and 344g of burnt flint. No central burial was recovered. (3)

Additional bibliography. (4)

The excavation found a central post hole. This may have been for marking out the circuit of the ditch during initial construction, or for a central post marking the location of the mound. It is thought that the outer ditch of the barrow is a later addition, possibly associated with the secondary burial, and so representing a reuse of the earlier mound. The burial was C14 dated to 1620-1440 cal BC, a post-Beaker date. The barrow itself may then date to the Late Neolithic, given the apparent time that had passed between construction and the secondary burial, indicated by the level of silting within the original ditch. (5)

<1> Museum of London Archaeology Service, 2000, Channel Tunnel Rail Link Contracts 330 & 350 Watching Brief ARC 330 98 Interim Report (Volume 1 of 2) (Unpublished document). SKE12773.

<2> Museum of London Archaeology Service, 2000, Channel Tunnel Rail Link Contracts 330 & 350 Watching Brief ARC 330 98 Interim Report (Volume 2 of 2)
Channel Tunnel Rail Link Contracts 330 & 350 Watching Brief ARC 330 98 Interim Report (Volume 2of 2) (Unpublished document). Ske12774.

<2> Oxford Wessex Archaeology Joint Venture, 2006, Radiocarbon dates from Section 1 of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, Kent (Unpublished document). SKE16490.

<3> Museum of London Archaeology Service, August 2001, Area 330 (Zone 1) Whitehill Barrow (ARC WHR 99) Archaeological Post Excavation report (Unpublished document). SWX12888.

<4> Museum of London Archaeology Service, 2000, Channel Tunnel Rail Link Contracts 330 & 350 Watching Brief ARC 330 98 Interim Report (Volume 2 of 2)
Channel Tunnel Rail Link Contracts 330 & 350 Watching Brief ARC 330 98 Interim Report (Volume 2of 2) (Unpublished document). SKE12774.

<5> Oxford Wessex Archaeology Joint Venture, 2006, The Prehistoric Landscape at Whitehill Road Barrow, Longfield and New Barn, Kent (Unpublished document). SKE17841.