Heart on a hill

This is always a favourite sight from the M6 motorway when we are going home. It means the worst bit of the journey is over and the beautiful scenery is starting.

There are many legends: I was told that it was planted by a farmer who wanted a local girl to marry him.

But according to BBC Cumbria there are lots of tales about its origins: some say it was planted as a memorial to a young soldier killed in the first world war, others say it was the farmer's way of expressing his love for his wife.

Another tale from the BBC has it that it is the place where two ill-fated lovers met for the final time. They were the offspring of two local farming families who forbade them from their affair, refusing to let them marry.

The pair arranged to meet for the final time where the wood stands now - on their meeting he ran her through with his sword, before turning it on himself.

The families of the dead lovers were so distraught at the tragedy that they had caused, they planted the wood as a memorial to their love.

More prosacially, a former owner investigated further. Going to Kendal Archives, she was shown maps with the wood mentioned on them. One of them - the tithe map from 1841 - showed the wood with the name Broken Gill Plantation and planted with pine trees, rather than the current crop of deciduous trees.

"The shape of the wood is also easy to explain" says Hilary, "It's the way the trees are grown that make it look heart-shaped".

The trees grow between two walls, in a wedge-shaped piece of land making it look a bit like a heart. It's a combination of the its shape and original name that Hilary believes has caused the confusion, with Broken Gill being confused with Broken Heart and with it "being a bit heart-shaped" it has all run together to give rise to all the stories.

And with fiction been stranger than truth, Hilary says "I think the stories will last longer than the truth".

Personally, I much prefer the stories!

IN SONG
American folk singer Kristina Olsen wrote a song called Heart Hill based on one of the many stories told about Heart Wood Words and Music