MEM24556 - Post-medieval drive in Yearnor Wood (Monument)

A drive from the tunnels north of Ashley Combe runs through the woods above the cliffs before turning up Culbone Combe to join another drive (MEM24555) at Culbone Lodge. It was surveyed in 2017-8. It possibly dates to the 1840s.

A drive from the tunnels north of Ashley Combe (Drive 3) runs through the woods above the cliffs for c. 1.2 kilometres then turns up Culbone Combe to join Drive 2 (MEM24555) at Culbone Lodge, west of the church. Much of this drive is now inaccessible due to fallen trees and landslips, although it can be reached fairly easily from the current coast path in two places: west of the tunnels and between Culbone and Ashley Combe. The Ordnance Survey 1st Edition map [1] shows a retaining wall on the upslope side from the tunnels for some 440 metres. This retaining wall appears to survive in good condition where the drive survives and can be reached at SS 85242 48299, just to the west of the tunnels, and at SS 85242 48299, where the drive is characterised by a level path, 2 metres wide, with a retaining drystone wall, built of horizontally laid, small stone blocks and 1.2 metres high on the upslope side, and a stony bank 2.4 metres wide and 0.5 metres high on the downslope side. Below this bank is a level, semicircular platform, 10 metres east to west, 4 metres north to south and 0.8 metres high, similar to Viewpoint 1 (MEM24553). The 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map [1] shows most but not all of the 19th Century drives and paths between Ashley Combe and Culbone; the tunnels are also depicted on the map. Documentary evidence suggests that the drives were laid out in the 1840s and perhaps largely completed by the early 1850s, when Lord King travelled abroad following his wife’s death in 1852. [2]