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The King of Limbs

Posted by: Blog Administrator on Mar 11, 2011

Tagged in: WWII , woodlands , wooded , Wiltshire , vistas , virgin , unique , travel , The King’s Way , sweet fern , SSSI , Site of Special Scientific Interest , Severn , Selwood , Saxon , Savernake Forest , Savernac , Safernoc , Royal Forest , river , Protector of Somerset , private , Prince Edward , primeval forest belt , origins , Old English , Norman , New Forest , Middle Ages , Melchet , Marquis of Ailesbury , Marlborough Castle , Marlborough , leased , King Athelstan , Jane Seymour , imprisoned , hunting , hereditary , hare , Grovely , gravel , grand avenue , gibbet , Forestry Commission , forest , entourage , England , Edward Seymour , Clevendon , Chute , Chippenham , Chase , Charter , Capability Brown , Brussels , Braydon , Arthur Mee , Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty , AONB , acorn

“There is no place in England quite like it. Savernake is an epitome of every phase of beauty in our countryside”

                                                                                                                      Arthur Mee 


If you travel down “The King’s Way” from Marlborough you will pass through Savernake Forest. Before WWII Savernake was ‘one of the largest areas of virgin forest land in England, having a continuous wooded area greater than the New Forest [2].



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Sally In The Wood

Posted by: Blog Administrator on Nov 12, 2010

Tagged in: woods , Wood , witch , Wiltshire , Warleigh Manor , Waller , victim , turnpike , The Reflection in the Pond , The Haunted Landscape , tale , supernatural , Somerset , skirmish , Sir Charles Hobhouse , Simone Brightste , Shaftesbury , Sarah Gibson , Sally King’s Lane , Sally in the Wood , Sally , Royalists , Roundheads , road accident , road , parish , origins , nature , murdered , memories , Maggie Dobson , Katy Jordan , Kathleen Wiltshire , Justice of the Peace , John Chandler , imprisoned , Home Wood.Monkton Farleigh , Henry Duncan Skrine , ghost , gamekeeper , evicted , enquiry , enemy , Dorset , Deputy Lieutenant of Somerset , dead man wood , Claverton , Civil War , Brown’s Folly , border , book , Battle of Lansdown , Bathford , Batheaston , baptised , Avon , ambushed , A363

 We recently had an enquiry regarding the origins of the road Sally In The Wood, which can in fact be found just over the border in the parish of Bathford, Somerset. It forms a section of the A363 as it journeys through Home Wood towards Bathford.


The explanations of the road name are both varied and intriguing, and as they are also closely related to the parish of Monkton Farleigh in Wiltshire, I thought I’d share them with you.

 OS 1st edition, 1887, Ref: 32/5
OS 1st edition, 1887, Ref: 32/5
Warleigh Manor can be seen in the top left corner, with the road Sally in the Wood running through Home Wood immediately to the right of the Manor.

John Chandler in his book ‘The Reflection in the Pond’, gives us three versions of the tale. The first is of a supernatural nature, and was published by Kathleen Wiltshire in 1984. It tells the story of a young couple who knocked down a girl dressed in white when she ran from trees across the road in front of their car. Another version, this time by Maggie Dobson and Simone Brightstein relate that Sally was murdered in the woods or imprisoned in nearby Brown’s Folly, or that she was an actual road accident victim. Interestingly, the name of the small section of woodland immediately below Home Wood is called 'Dead Man Wood'. Katy Jordan in her book ‘The Haunted Landscape’ mentions that Sally in the Woods does have the reputation of being an eerie place, where ‘no birds sing’, so you never know...
To find out more about the other versions of the tale, please 'read more'.







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