Long Compton

Crimson poppies grow in the grass around this stone, and when cold winds blow over the hillside, their petals fall like drops of blood.

Then the elder tree nearby, laden with its black and bitter fruit, seems to mutter, And in the valley below, where lies Long Compton Village, the swallows circle the tower of the parish church.

They whirl and spin like dancing dervishes and scream out shrilly the tale of the hill and the stones that lie there.

The village people listen and nod and gladly repeat the story to curious strangers.

Some say the Druids, early Britain's pagan priests, carried them there for a temple.

Others claim they were tombs of the shepherds who once lived on the slope.

But most of the folk of Long Compton believe the hill is bewitched.

Only when the witch loses her power will the stones turn back into men.

It is of some interest to speculate upon the manner in which Shakespeare journeyed to London and the way he went.

Was he obliged to walk it, in the traditional manner of the poor countryman seeking his fortune in the great metropolis? Or did he make the journey by the carrier's cart? There are two principal roads by which he may have gone, by Newbold-on-Stour, Long Compton, Chapel House and Woodstock to Oxford, Beaconsfield and through High Wycombe and Uxbridge, ninety-five miles.

Or he might have chosen to go by Edington, Pillerton, Priors, Sunrising Hill, Roxton and Banbury, through Einhoe, Bicester, Aylesbury, Tring and Watford to London, ninety-two and three-quarter miles.

Such and one as he would probably first go to London by way of Oxford, for, like Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, he would doubtless think it a city of light.

It is of some interest to speculate upon the manner in which Shakespeare journeyed to London and the way he went.

Was he obliged to walk it, in the traditional manner of the poor countryman seeking his fortune in the great metropolis? Or did he make the journey by the carrier's cart? There are two principal roads by which he may have gone, by Newbold-on-Stour, Long Compton, Chapel House and Woodstock to Oxford, Beaconsfield and through High Wycombe and Uxbridge, ninety-five miles.

Or he might have chosen to go by Eddington, Pillerton, Priors, Sunrising Hill, Roxton and Banbury, through Einhoe, Bicester, Aylesbury, Tring and Watford to London, ninety-two and three-quarter miles.

Such an one as he would probably first go to London by way of Oxford for, like Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, he would doubtless think it a city of light.

Right, I'll get straight into it.

Are you ready for the story? It was somewhere between 7 and 8 o'clock on the evening of Wednesday the 15th of September 1875, when 79-year-old Anne Tennant left her cottage in the Warwickshire village of Long Compton.

She wasn't going far.

Anne had lived in Long Compton for most, if not all, of her life.

And this was the sort of small errand that required little thought.

She was simply going to a shop in the village to buy a loaf of bread, before returning home to her husband, John.

It was harvest time, and elsewhere, around Long Compton, the working day was coming to an end.

Men who'd spend the day out in the fields were making their way back towards the village, carrying the tools and things they had taken with them that morning.

Long Compton had a saying about its witches.

There were supposedly enough of them in the village to pull a wagon of hay up Long Compton Hill, and their influence was said to come and go like the full moon.

Above the village stood the ancient Rollwright stones, where another witch was believed to have turned a king and his army to stone.

While generations of local people told stories of bleeding elder trees, fairies emerging from holes in the earth, stones that walked at midnight, and women capable of changing themselves into animals.

I'm Tooby.

And welcome to The Whispering Woods this episode is all about.

the witches of Long Compton

it is indeed so this is the starter episode and the ones that come next will run sort of together now now obviously we are in season of the witch for those who didn't join us for the haunted episode so the next two weeks all of our episodes are about witches I love it because it's that season it's the harvest it's the witch season and then for the last week of September we'll be doing our sort of cornfield and harvest episodes and then Got some really good ones there.