| Landmarks
There are few geographical place names marked on maps in Hampshire
that relate to yews. Two Yew Hills, a Yew Tree Heath and a Yew
Tree Copse: there are many more oak and ash landmark names than
yews in existence.
A Yew Hill is at Compton, south west of Winchester and the hill
is topped by a fenced copse of yews. This copse is marked on
the 1872 OS map and seems not to have changed in size since.
The trees are not ancient; the largest girth I found was little
more than 10'0''. However the locality was rich in yews, large
trees can be found in hedgerows beside tracks leading to the
Hill, and also at a Yew Tree Cottage and a Yew Tree Farm nearby.
So whilst the copse was a sterile thicket of yew rather lacking
in interest, the adjacent hedgerows and buildings had far more
character.
Another Yew Hill is found near Kings Somborne, west of Winchester.
See Peter Andrew’s article on the Ancient Yew Group website
for more details of this hill and the fascinating yew trees associated
with the nearby John of Gaunt’s medieval deer park close
to King Somborne.
Yew Tree Heath is in the New Forest. On the first series OS
1'' map, circa 1800, a single yew tree is actually named on the
map in one location. By 1872 maps indicate this one tree had
become ‘Yew Tree Heath’ and so it remains known.
Today this heath looks one of the most open, barren parts of
the New Forest. If yews once existed here they appear to do so
no longer, hollies are present but not yew. As heathland, the
New Forest is typically scarce in yews. The exception being the
Sloden Inclosure a fascinating area with a history that implies
the veteran yews found here could have been introduced. They
certainly look in terminal decline.
Yew Tree Heath, bare of yews and, to be honest, of much other interest…
Yew Tree Copse was more interesting, it is a neglected wood SW
of Romsey; it even hosts a Yew Tree Cottage within it. This is
an ancient copse, it is remarkably similar in size and shape to
the wood shown on the very first Ordnance survey published before
1810 and named on the later the 1872 map. Today it looks little
different to many other ancient Hampshire woods; yews are present
as occasional woodland trees. The yews I found here were mature,
the largest a multi-stem female of 13' girth. There appeared to
be little sign of active woodland management, it looks more a scene
of benign neglect; but an intriguing wood nevertheless. It is an
ancient wood in terms that Oliver Rackham would recognise; its
understory is typical of hazel coppice with an oak, ash, and maple
canopy.
Roads named after yew trees
I found 22 roads in Hants bearing ‘yew’ in their
title eg Yew Tree Road, and there are another 4 related names,
ie Ewhurst Rd., Ewhurst Close, a Ewshot Lane and an Iford
Court. The majority of these roads are 20th century constructions,
as the frequent use of the suffix: Drive; Court; Close, Place
or Gardens tends to indicate. The older roads, which can be confirmed
by their presence on first series OS Maps, are very few: I could
only verify six with any real confidence, Ewhurst Road and Ewshot
Lane, both leading to the settlements mentioned above; and also
3 Yew Tree Lanes, and a Yew Tree Road. These latter Lanes and
road proved of most interest, they also bear properties linked
to yews; either yew tree cottages, a farm or a pub.
It is apparent that most yew tree road names are relatively
recent, due to the huge growth in house and road building in
the 20th century. Nevertheless, it was interesting to discover
that yews are still being used to name our places. But do large
yew trees grow in these modern roads?
Yew Tree Avenue, Cowplain. Not aptly named
As I had noted when visiting both Ewshot and Ewhurst, the use
of the yew name is not a reliable guide to the presence of the
tree. I now discovered that in suburban locations the use of
road names could also be misleading. Groups of road names often
appear in built up areas for no apparent reason, presumably because
some agent chooses a generic name to embellish a number of very
similar streets. Consequently in Cowplain, near Waterlooville,
a Yew Tree Avenue is beside a Willow Tree Avenue; Cherry Tree
Avenue; Rowan Avenue; and also a Pine Tree Gdns and a Conifer
Close. There is no relevance to the presence of any of these
trees, except perhaps for some Prunus species planted in gardens
in Cherry Tree Avenue. This habit is not new. The Victorians
were probably the first builders to regularly name a succession
of streets in our cities after a common theme, as street names
commemorating battles in the Crimea still testify.
Fortunately, in a significant number of cases, in about a third
of the streets I have so far visited, it is reassuring to note
that mature yew trees do indeed survive in yew entitled streets
and I think it very probable that these yews would have been
the spur to the naming of the road. Since many of our suburban
developments are generally lacking in character, it seems highly
likely that, when building a new road, a property developer looks
for some local clues to name their estate, so the presence of
a notable tree species in the vicinity is probably sufficient
for the roads to be so entitled.
In fact the trees I found surviving in roads were never ancient
but were invariably mature, the largest girthed tree I found is
a 12' specimen in a hedgerow at Fair Oak, opposite the entrance
to a modern Yew Tree Close. Significantly such trees appear to
be valued by their local residents. Whilst measuring such yews
in a road at Horndean, a house owner came out because she thought
I was sizing up the tree to fell it.
A 1984 road in Horndean, with 2 mature yews that are appreciated
by residents
Most notably of all, in one specific location near Swanwick,
a prominent yew of almost 11' girth with an impressive canopy
has clearly lent its name to two old houses and two very recent
roads; a Yew Tree Drive and a Yew Tree Court. The houses date
back to 1759 but how old their names are is not known. But this
yew has formed a distinctive local landmark for many years and
today is still being appreciated. It remains an impressive tree;
I will refer to this location again in this article.
A fine roadside yew, girth 10'11" at Swanwick in a prominent
location
Yew Tree Cottages
Searching for house names isn’t easy; after a struggle
to find helpful websites I was finally directed to a local authority
intranet database of addresses which proved invaluable. I also
made use of ‘Hampshire Treasures’ a publicly
accessible database that categorises mainly older properties
and a range of other historic features, such as listed buildings,
ancient monuments etc in Hampshire.
Incidentally, this database gave me a diverting insight into
the popularity of house names. Rose Cottage (368 occurrences),
unsurprisingly seems to be the most common name. Also popular
are: Cherry Tree Cottage (174); Ivy Cottage (112) Oak
Cottage (97) Willow Cottage (69) and Holly Cottage (67). However,
Yew names appear to more popular than most
I eventually located over 200 yew named cottages and I visited
many of them.As I carried out this fieldwork I began to realise
that even useful databases have their weaknesses; they always need
updating to correct omissions, new names and mistakes. But one
simple solution was obvious: ask the owners of Yew Tree Cottages
if they know of others in the area. They often do, as they occasionally
get misdirected mail. (Don’t we all?). As a result I discovered
yet more yew entitled dwellings. However, as I found out by visiting,
these properties did not always display yew trees.
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