Whatcombe

1890: The Hants Antiquary and Naturalist reproduced this article that appeared in The Hampshire Independent on October 5th 1889. “Still more interesting are a group of venerable yews at Watcombe, a lone farm on a road from Hungerford to Wantage and Oxford – the site of a cell or grange, belonging in pre-Reformation days to the Benedictine Monastery of Hurley, to which house it was given by Geoffrey de Mandeville about 1086, and mentioned in the Pipe Rolls as being under the charge of a provost in 1166. These yews are in the shape of a cloister court, and are planted in double rows, forming alleys or covered ways between them, with a pond in the centre. This enclosure has “for time out of mind” been known by the country people as “Paradise,” derived probably from the form of the enclosed portion of the forecourt of the basilica, which was called the “Paradise,” and from the surrounding porticos the cloister took its origin………….A sturdy pair of yews, a little to the rear of “Paradise” at Watcombe, are known as “Adam and Eve”…………..singularly enough, these trees are of male and female species………while the foliage of “Adam” is of a darker shade than his companion “Eve”. The former measures somewhat over 9ft. in circumference, and the latter 10ft. Standing alone at some distance in the background, farthest removed from “Paradise,” is the “Serpent,” or “Devil,” emblematic, it is said, of the evil influence he exercised in causing the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the garden. This tree, the hollow trunk of which is now nearly reduced to a shell, but carries a flourishing head over 20ft in circumference. It has a lateral opening, and five or six persons could comfortably obtain shelter within the central cavity.”
Lowe 1897 (The Yew trees of Great Britain and Ireland): “At Watcombe (Whatcombe) a lone farm on the road from Hungerford to Wantage, there is, says a writer to the Times (1890), “a very interesting group of venerable yews, on the site of a cell or grange, with a church attached, belonging to a pre-Reformation days to the Benedictine Monastery of Hurley, to which house it may have been given by Geoffrey de Mabdeville about 1086, and mentioned in Pipe Rolls as being the charge of a provost in 1156.”
In 1981 Allen Meredith writes: “At Watcombe I found the much celebrated yews called Adam and Eve. Both of these trees are now near a modern building. One measured 12ft at 3ft from the ground, the other 11ft 2ins at 4ft. They stood between house and pond, only 5 feet apart, the larger on the left as we look at them from the pond; they are both quite separate fromthe other trees which surround the pond. The yews can be seen in columns, some actually meeting each other at the base of the trunks. Leaving Adam and Eve I approached the yews on the left of the pond. The 1st measured 7ft 11ins, the 2nd 6ft 6ins. Next a small yew with trunk cut off, another yew 6ft girth and nearby another with trunk cut off. Other trees, particularly those which formed part of the yew avenue measured on average 5ft in girth, in fact three measured 5ft, another 4ft 7ins, another 4ft 8ins, another 4ft 2ins. All these yews according to old records are well over 100 years old, so growth rate in some cases appears to have been very slow. Adam and Eve have both been damaged through the loss of large limbs but despite this appear to be quite healthy.”