The Forest of Ashdown

The Ashdown Forest is the largest area of open countryside in the Southeast of England, situated 30 miles to the South of London in the County of East Sussex. It is bordered by the villages of Forest Row and Hartfield to the north, Crowborough to the East, Maresfield to the South and Nutley in the West. Although it contains large areas of woodland the forest is mostly made up of open heathland covered in gorse, bracken and heather.

It gets its status as forest from the Normans to whom the word meant an area subject to forest law. Commoners had certain rights such as grazing, which carries on to this day. However it was illegal for them to hunt deer on pain of death, this was the right of the King.The forest was in effect a Royal Deer Park surrounded by a 35 kilometre long 'Pale' or ditch and embankment with fence to keep the deer enclosed within its boundaries.

Local place names still bear witness to this use such as in Hartfield, Hindleap, Chuck Hatch and Chelwood Gate. A Hatch was a small entrance for pedestrians through the Pale and a Gate was a larger one for wheeled vehicles. On many of the hills there are stands of Pine trees called Clumps. These were used by the Royal hunting parties to shelter until the deer were driven towards them out of the woods in the valley bottoms.

Today the forest is still used for agriculture but a million or more people also visit each year for recreational purposes.

                                   
  Cattle grazing below Friends Clump