Withyham, Buckhurst Park and Five Hundred Acre Wood

The church of St Michael and All Angels contains much of interest relating to the ancient Sackville family. The name Withyham implies a Saxon settlement, but the church was not mentioned in the Domesday Book. It first appears in records from 1291. By 1400, it had a nave, north and south aisles, a chancel and a west tower. At the end of the north aisle was the original Sackville chapel, and there are records of burials in the chapel since 1451.

On the 16th of June 1663 the church was struck by lightning, which "came in at the steeple, melted the bells and went up the chancel where it tore the monuments of the Dorsets to pieces", according to an eyewitness. The church was rebuilt, and the melted bells were recast. By 1680, the Sackville Chapel had been restored.

It contains a grand memorial to Thomas Sackville, and a genealogy window showing the descent of the family from Harbrand de Sauqueville of Normandy, as well as the banners and hatchments of the Earls and Dukes of Dorset. There is also a simple tablet to Vita Sackville-West, author, poet and gardener, and wife of Sir Harold Nicolson of Sissinghurst, Kent. In 1922, she wrote a book, 'Knole and the Sackvilles' and her novels include 'All ~Passion Spent', written in 1931.

The church stands on a high bank. From the grassy space in front is a charming view of an English pastoral scene that has remained unchanged for a couple of centuries; gently rolling fields, a pond directly below, and the spire of Hartfield Church glinting above the distant woods. You pass through Withyham, little more than a few houses, a former post office and an attractive inn, The Dorset Arms, to enter Buckhurst Park with its beautiful beeches, lakes and parkland vistas.

The chimneys of Buckhurst Place are visible across the parkland. Little remains of the original home of the Sackvilles, which was largely destroyed in 1690. The new house, built on the site of an old hunting lodge, was enlarged by the 1st Duke of Sackville; Victorianised in 1894 and given a Luyten's wing in 1900.

From Buckhurst Park the route continues along the edge of Coppice Wood, which is a blaze of colour in spring, ranging from green and white wild garlic and wood anemone to the brilliant blue of native bluebells. Afterwards, the route passes through rolling farmland to the northern edges of Ashdown Forest, the greatest remaining wild area of south-east England. Its 14,000 acres of woodland and sandy heath with rough bracken, heather and scrub, forms a wild oasis in rich farmland.

From medieval times, the forest was used by commoners to graze their cattle and pigs, and to collect wood and peat for fuel. There has been a constant struggle between commoners and large landowners, who wanted to enclose the forest. In 1987, it was purchased by East Sussex County Council, and it is now administered by the Conservators of Ashdown Forest.

Many of the great trees were cut down to fuel the local iron industry, but there are still large areas of woodland, mainly birch trees with clumps of Scots pine. The forest is home to fallow deer, badgers, curlews, nightjars and nightingales.

The Ashdown Forest landscape will be familiar to all readers of AA Milne's 'Winnie the Pooh' books. The author lived in nearby Hartfield and his stories, and EH Shephard's famous illustrations, were both inspired by such parts of the forest as Five Hundred Acre ood. The walk runs through this wood's edge.

The route returns to Withyham along the Wealdway, a long distance footpath stretching 82 miles from Gravesend to Beachy Head. Notice the fine rectory on the right, just before the church. It is mainly Georgian, but dates partly from the 15th-century. It has an unusual verandah, which was added in 1809.