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Brabourne

Nearest town: Folkestone

Site type: churchyard

Access: Public

Church name: St Mary the Virgin

Diocese: Canterbury

County: Kent

Country: England

Grid ref: TR10354168

Lost yew site: Yes

Date visited: 12-Apr-02

Recorded by: Tim Hills

Protection & responsibility: Conservation Area-Kent CC-Ashford DC

Yews recorded at this site: Ancient 4m-5m, Lost

Notes: This is the site of the largest ever documented yew. Hasted's 1799 History of Kent states that 'Mr. Evelyn, in his Discourse on Forest Trees, mentions a superannuated yew-tree growing in this churchyard, which being 58 feet 11 inches in circumference, bore near 20 feet diameter; and besides which there were goodly planks, and other considerable pieces of square and clear timber, which he observed to lie about it, which had been hewed and sawn out of some of the arms only, torn from it by impetuous winds. This tree has been many years since gone, and a fine stately young one now flourishes in the room of it. This might have been a new tree planted to replace the old, but we must be aware of the possibility that the present tree developed from a fragment of the old tree or as an internal root within the decaying shell. The caption with the 1907 postcard states 'old yew trees at Brabourne said to be 3000 years old'.