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italianguy · Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 14 Location: Italiya

Grovely Wood Folklore

Grovely Wood lurks behind Wilton village which is three miles from Salisbury and eight from Stonehenge. Formerly the capital of Wessex, Wilton has been overshadowed by Salisbury and its own superstitious past is largely unknown beyond its own confines. But behind Wilton House and the carpet factory lie some intriguing stories. As well as its Oak Apple Festival where villagers from

nearby Great Wishford can legally gather firewood on the 29th May, Grovely Wood hides several dark secrets that can cause a chill even when you’re stood amongst its spectacular carpet of bluebells which sprout in April.

One such story is that of the Grovely witches which only endures with a handful of locals. However, anyone standing in the wood on a still afternoon or evening when the wind agitates the tops of the trees can often feel an unsettling presence. If you walk into Grovely Wood from the Wilton end (via a small stretch of forest and then a dirt track) you will pass a gate and find yourself on the ancient Roman Road. Ten minutes walk along the road you will find four, large gnarly trees in a row to your left and about fifty yards off the road. They are quite an eerie site as they differ from any other tree growing in that part of the wood. Their origin is said to hark back to 1737 when a virulent outbreak of smallpox in Wilton was responsible for 136 burials. Four of these were never interred on consecrated ground. These bodies belonged to four sisters accused of witchcraft. The Handsel sisters were four Danish itinerants that the villagers blamed for the contagion and it wasn’t long before the population were convinced of their alliance with the devil. The sisters were unceremoniously marched to Grovely Wood and murdered. None of them were given an official hearing and, unlike the witch trials of a century earlier, they were not burnt at the stake as was customary. Their skulls were caved in with commonplace implements and they were buried far enough from one other so they could not ‘insinuate’ with each other as they had in Wilton market square. Some say the gnarly trees were planted to mark the graves, others say the trees sprung mysteriously from the unmarked graves so the village would never forget their murder. Whatever the truth, sightings of the witches have been recorded since that time and anybody visiting the gnarly trees should investigate the rear of the first tree which has a hollow where offerings and money are still left. Remove these at your peril.

The story behind the other Grovely Wood spectre is a little more sketchy. The Woodsman or ‘Burcombe Woodsman’ is a swarthy figure that is said to appear after the crack of a twig. His presence is attributed to two stories: the murder of a poacher who was hung from a tree for his nefarious activities and a watercolour artist, lodging at Burcombe, who was accidentally shot in the wood during a deer cull. The only picture of the Woodsman was taken by local photographer, Richard Albany, in 2000 where a figure can be quite clearly seen stood at the base of a tree. The tree in question? One of the gnarly trees said to grow from the witches’ graves. A case of one superstition feeding another?

So if you ever visit Grovely Wood and traverse the Roman Road remember that the ghastly have trodden there as well as the God-fearing.