What was its fate in the Dark Age that followed the failure of the Roman administration we do not know; but with the advent of St Augustine Rochester at once received a Bishop.  It was, indeed, the first post in St Augustine’s advance from Canterbury, King Ethelbert himself building there a church in 597 in honour of St Andrew.  It thus became a spiritual as well as a material fortress.  Of its fate after the Battle of Hastings we know little, but it submitted without resistance and came into the hands of that Odo of Bayeaux who gave so much trouble to William Rufus.

It is now that we see Rochester suddenly appear in its true greatness.  Odo, expelled by William, had on the Conqueror’s death returned and successfully obtained of Rufus his estates, among them the Castle of Rochester, which he had built.  In 1088, however, he was once more in rebellion against the Crown on behalf of the Conqueror’s eldest brother, Robert of Normandy.  Rufus struck him first at Pevensey, which was the Norman gate of England.  He took it but unwisely released Odo, on his oath to give up Rochester Castle and leave the country.  Rochester was then in the hands of Eustace of Boulogne, sworn friend of Duke Robert, and when Odo appeared with the King’s Guard before the Castle, demanding its surrender, he, understanding everything, captured his own lord and the king’s guard also and brought them in.  Rufus then turned to his English subjects and demanded their assistance, for his Barons were then, as they have invariably been throughout English history, against the Crown, which truly represented and defended the people.  They flocked to the Royal Standard, and after six weeks’ siege, plague and famine ravaging the garrison, Odo surrendered and was imprisoned at Tonbridge, and later expelled the kingdom.  As this great rascal Bishop came out of Rochester Castle, the English youths sang out “Rope and Cord!  Rope and Cord for the traitor Bishop.”  But Odo was too near to the king.

That was the first time we know of in which Rochester stood like the gage of England; the second was in the Barons’ wars.  When King John, in 1215, had taken Rochester and notably discomfited the rascal Barony, they immediately invited Louis of France to assist them.  He set sail with some seven hundred vessels, landed at Sandwich, and retook Rochester, which had been so badly damaged that it could not defend itself.  Forty-eight years later, in 1264, Henry III. being king, Simon de Montfort coming into Kent, burnt the wooden bridge over the Medway which was too strongly held by the loyal inhabitants of Rochester for him to capture, took the city by storm, sacked the Cathedral and the Priory, and laid siege to the Castle.  He failed, and Lewes could not give him what Rochester had denied.