OS grid reference SZ3510696570 Country England Post town LYMINGTON Shire county Hampshire Dialling code 01590 | Region South East Sovereign state United Kingdom Postcode district SO41 District New Forest District UK parliament constituency New Forest West | |
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South Baddesley is a small village in the civil parish of Boldre in the New Forest National Park of Hampshire, England. It lies 2.3 miles (3.7 km) north-east from Lymington, its nearest town.
Contents
Map of South Baddesley, Lymington, UK
The Groaning Tree of Baddesley
In his Remarks on Forest Scenery, published in 1791, local author William Gilpin relates the history of "the groaning-tree of Badesly". He explains how around the year 1750 a local villager in South Baddesley frequently heard a sound like a "person in extreme agony" behind his house. He eventually discovered that the noise emanated from an elm tree. Within a few weeks the fame of the tree was such that people came from far and wide to listen to the tree, including Frederick, Prince of Wales and Princess Augusta. Many explanations were offered, both natural and supernatural for the phenomenon, but no adequate explanation could be found. The groaning continued, intermittently, for "eighteen or twenty months", until the owner decided to bore a hole in the trunk in an attempt to discover the cause. The tree never groaned again, and eventually the tree was deliberately uprooted, but nothing unusual was found.