The Gardens...

Is there a Larmer Tree?

The Larmer Tree was in fact a wych elm that stood for over 600 years before it finally expired around 1934. Why ‘Larmer’ nobody knows, but one theory is it evolved from ‘Lavermere’, a word meaning a border where rushes grow. So the actual Larmer Tree was likely to have been an early boundary marker and its size so impressed King John he regularly met his huntsmen there. It now marks the Dorset/Wiltshire border and also three local parishes of Farnham, Tollard Royal and Ashmore meet at the spot where the tree once stood. General Pitt-Rivers used the tree as the focal point when he decided to build the Larmer Tree Gardens in the 1880s. In the millenium year a new 'Larmer Tree' was planted by Rushmore Estate. The tree is doing well, but we will never know if it will it still be there in 2600!

Lt General Augustus Lane Fox Pitt-Rivers

A soldier in the Crimea, Malta and Ireland, Pitt-Rivers inherited the Rushmore Estate in 1880. The inheritance meant he could freely pursue his passions - archaeology and education. Regarded as the ‘Father of English Archaeology’ Pitt-Rivers set about creating museums in Oxford and Farnham, as well as the Larmer Tree Gardens which he used as a sweetener for the public he wanted to educate.

The Gardens became a Victorian theme park and were hired out for parties. The resident band, made up of workmen from the estate, played on the Garden Stage every Sunday. The drummer was sacked on one occasion for being drunk (some things never change!). Every year over 4,000 people gathered for a race meeting (where you now camp!) and it was at one of these events that Thomas Hardy danced with Pitt-Rivers’s niece Agnes Parks, whom he swiftly fell for. His last ever poem Concerning Agnes was about that very meeting.

As well as being entranced by Agnes, on arriving at the Gardens, Hardy declared: “This is the prettiest sight I ever saw in my life”.

After the General died the grounds fell into disrepair and opened only sporadically. The storms of 1987 and 1990 caused more damage but with help from English Heritage who classified the site as a ‘Garden of National Importance’ the gardens have been lovingly restored into what you see today.

To find out more about the Larmer Tree Gardens please visit their website at www.larmertree.co.uk.