Gravesend was granted, allowing the men of the town to operate boats between London and the town; these became known as the "Long Ferry". It became the preferred form of passage, because of the perils of road travel (see below). On Gravesend's river front are the remains of a Tudor fort built by command of King Henry VIII in 1543. On 21 March 1617, John Rolfe and Rebecca (aka Princess Pocahontas) with their two-year-old son, Thomas, boarded a ship in London bound for the Commonwealth of Virginia; the ship had only sailed as far as Gravesend before Rebecca fell fatally ill,
Transport in Kent Sheppey Light Railway, Westerham, Hundred of Hoo (passengers only), and Gravesend West. By the 1980s, the Channel Tunnel was being built and a new high-speed link was needed to access St Pancras, but the choice of route was contentious. Before it opened, Eurostar trains had conductor shoes fitted and ran on primarily the South Eastern Main Line and other third rail lines to London Waterloo. Phase 1 of High Speed 1 opened in 2003 to near Gravesend and the line fully opened in 2007. There are two stations on the rail link in Kent, Ebbsfleet International between Dartford and Gravesend