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Watermillock

Nearest town: Penrith

Site type: churchyard

Access: Public

Church name: All Saints

Diocese: Carlisle

County: Cumbria

Country: England

Grid ref: NY43542250

Lost yew site: No

Date visited: 12-Jun-16

Recorded by: Toby Hindson

Protection & responsibility: Parochial Church Council

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

Notes: Toby Hindson: The present church was built in 1881 on the site of a former church consecrated in 1558, a significant time after it was built. The previous church, on a nearby site, was destroyed by the Scots shortly after 1474. These trees fall into the gap between these two dates, and will have had some age when they were planted. This would make them certainly about 500 years old, not significantly less, and no older than 550 years. The trees were first recorded by Graham Wilkinson in 1997. In 2009 Edwin Pretty noted this as a very exposed location, explaining the low vigour of the trees. Also in the churchyard are two younger yews on the road boundary that are clearly late Victorian plantings, as well as several sapling yews among the other trees on the side track boundary. There is a large Taxus aurea south of the church and two small Irish yews.

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