The Greater Ridgeway - A Walker's Guidebook
The Greater Ridgeway
Price
£12.95
Stage 6: Heytesbury to Coulston Hill
Start: Heytesbury
Finish: Coulston Hill
Distance: 21.6km (13.5 miles)
OS: Landranger 184 Salisbury & The Plain
Route Features: Easy country
Information: Tourist Information Centres: Warminster (01985 218548); Westbury (01373 827158)
Heytesbury can be reached by frequent buses between Warminster and Salisbury. The village of Edington at the bottom of Coulston Hill has a less frequent service that runs between Devizes and Westbury. As this section stays mostly up on Salisbury Plain, lengthy diversions are needed if you wish to visit a pub. Central Warminster is about 1.5km (1 mile) off the route after the army camp, and Westbury is about the same from Beggar’s Knoll, a point just off the Imber Range Path before the White Horse. Both towns offer shops, hostelries and transport galore. Edington, about 1km (0.6 miles) downhill, has a pub as well as buses. There is a small shop near the army camp in Warminster.
Continue along the High St to pass the church and then the Red Lion. Take the next R along Chapel Road. Turn R along Newtown and then go immediately L up a metalled drive. Go through a farmyard to a stile. Cross the A36 to a fence and narrow steps opposite. Bear L uphill through a gap in the trees to a field. Turn L to walk round the field edge and uphill to a major cross-path: the Imber Range Path. Turn L.
Salisbury Plain has probably altered very little since the 1600s when John Evelyn thought it a ‘goodly plaine... and one of the most delightful prospects of nature’. It still is, if you can ignore the gunfire heralding from somewhere just over the horizon. There’s a real sense of solitude and remoteness up here. The Plain is roughly 32km (20 miles) east–west and 19km (12 miles) north–south. It’s not very high – on average just 137m (450ft) above sea level – but it feels both lofty and remote. The Imber Range Path is a 48km (30-mile) circular walk around the perimeter of the Imber Range Military Firing and Training Area. The range is named after Imber village; closed by the army in 1943 and now used for street-fighting practice. The village church is still intact and hosts one service a year on a September Sunday.
The closure of the Plain by the military, and the restriction of access to Imber, has had one major consequence for the Greater Ridgeway path. If it were open, then the Wessex Ridgeway would undoubtedly run from here (or Battlesbury) straight across the Plain, through Imber and on to Gores Cross on the A360 between Tilshead and West Lavington. These routes are marked on the OS map, although we won’t join them until just after West Lavington.
The path runs through the centre of a wood. Go straight across the field ahead, passing to R of the tumulus on Cotley Hill. There are fine views over the Plain R and the hills ahead including Scratchbury, Middle and the wooded Battlesbury. From the tumulus bear R towards a white post in the distance. At a fence, turn R and then L at the corner, keeping the fence close L. Go through a gate L and turn R to walk on with fence R. This path winds round to a stile. Cross and go slightly L and then R over the field towards a stile to the R of centre on the earthworks of Scratchbury Hill ahead. If you can’t spot it, don’t panic, the exact position of the stile becomes more apparent the closer you get. Cross the stile and turn R to walk round the hillfort with fence close R.
Scratchbury and Battlesbury hillforts have much in common: they’re big; their defences are impressive; they are magnificently placed, overlooking the Wylye valley. Both were probably occupied in the Iron Age (100 BC to AD 60). The fact that they are so close together (only 1.5km/1 mile apart), and that there are two more only 6.4km (4 miles) away (at Bratton and Cley Hill), suggests that this was a pretty dangerous place to live. ‘Scratch’ is a West Country term for the devil, although how it relates to the hill is difficult to say.
When the fence turns R to go downhill to a farmhouse, keep L and follow the earthworks round L to a white post. Keep on along a grassy path towards the next white post, but just before it bear R down a clear track to the lower ramparts. Continue along the path which descends gradually to a fence and a stile R. Cross this and go downhill with fence L to a stile. Cross into the lane and turn L. Go straight up a clear path that heads to the R-hand edge of a wood. This path then winds round the contour of the hill bearing R and then L slightly down hill. When the fence L ends, continue straight on down to a wide concrete road. Turn R, then L up some steps and walk on with a low hedge to R. At a cross-path, go straight on uphill with fence L to a gate and stile. Walk on a little further and turn L to walk along the top of the lower ramparts. (You can walk along the upper ramparts but you’ll need to descend steeply at the other end.) Follow the ramparts around a half-circle of Battlesbury Hill.
Battlesbury is both large and impressive, enclosing nearly 10ha (24 acres) with double ramparts and ditches all round, and two extra ramparts to defend the flat land to the north. Battlesbury was possibly occupied by the Belgae into the first century bc. Whether it was still occupied when the Romans invaded is a matter of debate; a number of hastily buried bodies were found near the north-west gate, but it isn’t known if this resulted from a clash with the Romans. The place feels, even today, to have tremendous strategic importance.
When you get a view L over a sewage farm and Warminster army camp, the ramparts are broken by the entrance to the hillfort. Here bear L away from the ramparts towards a footpath post. Cross the stile and follow the path downhill along the L edge of a field. Just before a fenced reservoir, go L downhill to a road. Turn L along the road for about 1km. After passing a small shop L and a bus stop, turn first R (go straight on for central Warminster) along a road that passes some army housing to a T-junction. Turn L for about 400 m and then go R up a private drive for the golf course.
There was a thriving agricultural community here when the Romans came, although Warminster as such didn’t exist. By the time of King Alfred it was a royal borough. One hundred years later coins were minted here, and this probably ensured the success of the town market. The royal manor went on to be held by Edward the Confessor and passed to William. In 1156 the Crown sold the manor to Robert Maudit, whose family sold it in the sixteenth century to the Thynne family of Longleat. The Marquis of Bath is still the lord of the manor today. In the Middle Ages the town had a significant wool and cloth trade as well as a prosperous corn market. The Old Bell Hotel is a fourteenth-century coaching inn, and there are others. The town’s prosperity during the eighteenth century has left a rich heritage of houses and mullion-windowed cottages. Nowadays, however, the town is primarily famous for its army connections, most prominently with the Warminster Training Centre (formerly the School of Infantry) and ABRO (formerly the Reme Workshops).
Immediately after the sign for the West Wiltshire Golf Club, bear R along a narrow path that passes close to L of a garage. Follow this round to the edge of the golf course, keeping the fence and views down Kidnapper’s Hole to R. The path turns R to join a dirt track on Arn Hill Down, site of great UFO activity in the early 1960s.
Go straight on to leave the golf course. Continue in the same direction towards a prominent clump of trees. Pass a barn and go straight on with a fine view of Battlesbury hillfort R. At the next stand of trees (with a mast), don’t walk onto the firing range but go L with fence to R. This path passes some barns and goes on to a farm road. This bends L. After 100m, go R over a stile and immediately L downhill and then up (keep strictly to the L side of the field here). At the top field corner, turn R along a fenced drive.
For travellers (including those on passing trains), Westbury means only one thing: the White Horse cut into the hill just below Bratton Castle hillfort. It’s thought to be the oldest in Wiltshire, and popular opinion has it that the original was made to celebrate King Alfred’s victory over the Danes. The original faced right, and is said to have resembled an elongated dachshund with a saddle and a peculiar upturned tail. Some say it was Saxon, some that it was made in 1700. It was overcut by ‘Mr Gee’, steward to Lord Abingdon, who apparently thought the original rather primitive in style and put this, somewhat larger, one here instead. The present horse, made of concrete and not chalk, is nearly 55m (180ft) long and has an eye measuring 7.6m (25ft) round.
This track bends L and then R to a bridleway sign pointing L. We go straight on. (If you wish to follow the exact course of the Ramblers Association’s route, go L here, then R through some woods to a T-junction, and turn R to return to our route.) After passing a massive cement works chalk pit R, continue to a road. Here turn L (leaving the Imber path). Go downhill for about 150m and then R over a stile into a field (Continue down this road for Westbury in 1.5km.) Go directly down to the edge of the hill. Turn R to walk towards Westbury White Horse with fence close L, crossing two stiles before reaching some seats and a topograph on Westbury Hill.
Westbury is a small town, most notable nowadays for its transport links; many commute daily to London. In former times it was a small weaving and glove-making town, and before that a residence of the Kings of Wessex. From Westbury Hill the Blue Circle Cement Works dominate the town. Kimmeridge Clay from the quarry we passed earlier is brought here as slurry by pipeline. This clay is quite rich in fossils; the Westbury Pliosaur was unearthed here in 1980. This creature, some 150 million years old and 6–7m (19.7–23ft) long, has been described as a fearsome beast with huge eyes and massive teeth: the reptilian equivalent of today’s toothed whales or sharks. It now resides in Bristol Museum.
At Bratton Camp or Castle, Salisbury Plain reaches its highest point at 230m (755ft). The hillfort, built some time between 300 bc and ad 43, covers just over 10ha (25 acres) within double banks and ditches on three sides, and occupies a splendidly imperious position. Following the Battle of Ashdown (see Walk 11, Scutchamer Knob to Mongewell), the Vikings left Wessex and settled in the north and east. But then they fought back, and in January ad 878, Wessex was overrun and King Alfred’s troops forced to retreat to Athelney in the Somerset fens, where he raised a new army. After grouping at Iley Oak (Warminster) in May that year, he fought the Vikings at the Battle of Ethandun. The Saxons overwhelmed the Danes and chased them to Chippenham. After a two-week siege, the Vikings sued for peace. Their leader, King Guthrum, accepted Christianity and, at the close of 878, their army returned east to settle. The Battle of Ethandun therefore turned the tide for both Alfred and Wessex, and Alfred became the most powerful ruler in Britain. It is generally accepted that the site of the Battle of Ethandun is just up the hill from the village of Edington, either on the slopes of Bratton Castle or on neighbouring Edington Hill.
Bratton, some 4.8km north-east of Westbury, contains a number of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century houses, and a Baptist chapel of 1667. All the villages along this northern escarpment of Salisbury Plain have wells or springs; Bratton’s Cat’s Well is named after St Catherine, and is a rectangular ‘dipping well’, with steps leading down to standing water. The Well of the White Horse, or Bridewell springs, is between Westbury and Bratton just below the White Horse. The name may mean ‘bride’s spring’; perhaps drinking the waters stimulates some good old-fashioned fecundity. Local legend has it that when Bratton church clock strikes midnight, the White Horse goes down to Bridewell springs to drink. The problem is that Bratton church doesn’t have a clock...
Continue on to the edge of Bratton Camp. Go past two benches (don’t go into the camp enclosure) and on in this general direction along any of the rather indistinct grassy paths to the drive for the site car park. Bear L along the drive to the road and site entrance sign. Here turn R along a gravel road to some old buildings at White Horse Farm. At a T-junction, turn L and walk on for 3km. At the next T-junction, turn R to reach the MOD hut, then go almost back on yourself to take a grassy path between the two gravel roads. This goes uphill and bends R to reach some barns. Just before the barns, turn R to a lane. (Turn L here for Edington.)
The village of Edington is just over 1km down in the valley, and has a pub, as well as buses to Westbury or Devizes. It also has a fine priory church of St Mary, St Katherine and All Saints, founded in 1332 as a priest college by William of Edington, Lord Chancellor of England and Bishop of Winchester. It later became a monastery for the Augustinian Order of Bonhommes. In the fifteenth century, the Bishop of Salisbury, the Venerable William Ayscough, was a close advisor to the much-berated Henry VI. When a popular uprising against the king occurred in 1450 (‘Jack Cade’s rebellion’), Ayscough became a target; he was dragged from the church into the fields around Edington Hill and murdered.
Turn R, then shortly after, L to a fence before a field. Turn R, go through a gap and walk up the L-hand side of the field. This path bends L with a hedge to L and winds its way round to cross a stile. There are a series of cross-paths; head towards a prominent by-way sign and turn R to walk over Coulston Hill. (Turn L here for Edington.)
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