Literary Connections, a Tongham walk through local literary history

After a hard life eating and drinking, we all need a good ramble to walk off those calories. Tongham is ideally situated to take advantage of the Surrey Hills, Blackwater Valley path, Basingstoke Canal towpath and the old Tongham railway line. This is number one in a series of blogs to give you some different ideas for walks around Tongham.

Tongham Village Hall, where we regularly hold wine tastings, was built for those engaging in physical activities or for social, moral, cultural or literary purposes. This walk manages to combine the first and last of these objectives. It will surprise many residents of Tongham that there is such a wealth of literary connections just south of the village and in this age of the car it is so easy to miss out on so many of the local beauty spots and points of interest around us.

The walk I took and describe below is about 7 miles long and may take about 3 hours. The highlights are Waverley Abbey, Crooksbury Hill and Moor Park. There is a possible picnic spot at Waverley Abbey or on Crooksbury Hill. Refreshments might be taken at the Barley Mow Pub in Sands. I found this route suitable for walking a dog, mainly on lead but there are a few points where you could let the dog have a run.

Tongham Village Hall

1. Start out from Tongham Village Hall which is located at No 75 The Street in Tongham, and head uphill along The Street in a southerly direction towards the Hog’s Back. At the top of the hill continue onto the Hog’s Back going down into Runfold.

Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World (1932) mentions both Tongham and the Hog’s Back in Chapter 18 when describing the Savage and his abandoned Air-Lighthouse (used to guide helicopters) on Puttenham Common. Huxley was born in Godalming and was a keen cyclist around the Surrey Hills.

Freeman Wills Croft wrote the detective novel The Hog’s Back Mystery (1933) set in the area just south of the Hog’s Back (Seale, Hampton, Sands, Puttenham, Binscombe etc). It is a good read that stands the test of time if you like Whodunits. Croft lived in Blackheath near Guildford.

Charles Ludwig Dodgson (Lewis Carroll of Alice in Wonderland fame) would visit his family in Guilford and often walked across the Hog’s Back and into Farnham. He is buried in Mount Cemetery near Guildford.

Mike Hawthorn's two children's books

Musician-singer-songwriter Richard Thompson wrote the song MGB-GT which contains a line in which he claims to have driven at 110mph along the old Hog’s Back.

As we pass into Runfold we join the Pilgrim’s Way which went from Winchester (St Swithin) to Canterbury (Thomas a Becket). Amongst the first to trace the route was Hilaire Belloc (The Old Road 1904). A prolific writer, he was perhaps best known for his Cautionary Tales. This part of the Pilgrim’s Way is not part of the route for Chaucer’s pilgrims who just travelled from London to Canterbury.

2. Continue down the Hog’s Back and then follow it to the right into Guildford Road and then along here until you reach Crooksbury Road just before Barfield School.

Footpath near Barfield School

Barfield School has had houses named after Mike Hawthorn, Jane Austen and J.K.Rowling.  Mike Hawthorn attended the school and is best known as Britain’s first motor racing World Champion but he also wrote four books including two children’s fiction books. Jane Austen certainly passed by here from Chawton and up onto the Hog’s Back in 1813; she wrote about the fine views.

3. Turn left into Crooksbury Road but shortly turn right up a footpath along the perimeter of the school. Keep right along the footpaths eventually turning sharp right at some steps and then follow the North Downs Way through the woods and onto Compton Way. Turn right into Compton Way and follow it as it turns left downhill. Shortly, turn left into the driveway of Moor Park House.

Moor Park House

Moor Park House was the home of Jonathan Swift who wrote Gulliver’s Travels. In his time at Moor Park he wrote two books. He had a female acquaintance called Stella, hence the name of the cottage at the far end of this section of the walk.

Another writer who passed by here was William Cobbett best known for his 1830 book Rural Rides where he describes the early nineteenth century countryside and gives free of his opinions about many things, hence his nickname Peter Porcupine.

Footpath after Moor Park House

Stella's Cottage

4. Follow the footpath past Moor Park House and all the way along past pill boxes, the nature reserve and Mother Ludlam’s Cave to Stella’s Cottage. Turn right into Camp Road and then straight on into Waverley Lane. Follow the road around to the right and then turn immediately left into the grounds of Waverley Abbey. Go into Waverley Abbey and spend some time there.

At the entrance it states that Waverley Abbey was the inspiration for Sir Walter Scott’s novel Waverley. This is somewhat misleading as the novel is not about the local area or an abbey at all. It probably inspired him to come up with the name for the main character Edward Waverley. The monks themselves wrote the Annals of Waverley which describes their life and famous visits such as that of King John in 1208.

Old Bridge by Waverley Abbey

Part of the Waverley Abbey Ruins

5. Retrace your steps back to the road and follow the B3001 Waverley Lane around to the right towards Godalming. Be careful here as the pavement does not continue very far and you will need to walk in the road. After a couple of hundred yards turn left up a footpath. Follow this footpath past a number of houses until you reach Crooksbury Road. Cross the road and follow a footpath to the left.

Arthur Conan-Doyle lived in Hindhead and set the Sherlock Holmes’ story The Solitary Cyclist (1903) around Crooksbury Hill.

6. Keep going uphill and slightly to the left until you reach the memorial trig point at the top of Crooksbury Hill. Admire the absolutely stunning views and then turn around and head on down the hill and eventually towards the right until you get to Smuggler’s Way. Turn left into Smuggler’s Way and continue down to the Barley Mow Pub.

The Barley Mow pub in Sands

Was The Barley Mow the pub where Sherlock Holmes had a punch-up in The Solitary Cyclist? I think The Donkey is more likely but who knows?

7. Turn right out of the pub into Sands Road but soon turn left into Sand’s Recreation Ground. Cross the Rec into the far right corner and exit by the side of the golf course into Binton Lane. As you exit look to the left at Jan Smut’s memorial stone which is hidden in the undergrowth.

Smuts Memorial Stone

Jan Smuts was a soldier and Prime Minister of South Africa. He wrote the preamble to the United Nations Charter and an unpublished work on Walt Whitman. The memorial dates from 1958 and was put there by old local soldiers who admired him as an enemy and as an ally. His only connection with the area is that he stayed a short time at the home of his private secretary’s parents in Sands.

8. Go along Binton Lane until you reach the cross roads with Seale Lane and Thundery Hill. Take care along this stretch as again there is no pavement beside the road.

Binton Lane

Thundery Hill is named after the Norse god Thor and reminds us of the pre-Christian era legends. Local village Thursley is also named after him, as is the day of the week – Thursday.

9. Go up Thundery Hill and back up to the Hog’s Back and then retrace your steps back to the Village Hall.

This blog post, map and directions are for guidance purposes only. Please use an Ordnance Survey map to plan out you own route using this blog for ideas on possible points of interest. The suggested route does not necessarily indicate a right of way. Wear suitable footwear and high visibility clothing and take great care when crossing roads or walking on the side of roads without pavements. No responsibility is taken by the writer for anyone undertaking these walks.