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These young trees look like poplars.
©Trish Steel
Dist:0.1km<br/>Spectacular fields of oilseed rape on both sides of the road stretch far into the distance. The crop has almost completely come into full flower during the first week in May. The road ahead leads to the A31.
©John Lamper
Dist:0.2km<br/>Both fields, divided by a scrubby hedge are winter sown cereal crops.
©Trish Steel
Dist:0.4km<br/>
©Alex McGregor
Dist:0.6km<br/>A close-up of the finial of the finger-post (see [[500361]]), giving location and grid reference details. It looks, from the bolts below the 'R' and 'T', that the top has been snapped off at some point and re-affixed.
©Chris Downer
Dist:0.6km<br/>The post was used as a marker for illiterate guards who were escorting prisoners from Dorchester Prison to Portsmouth, from where they then went for a long cruise to Botany Bay, Australia. Approximately 0.5km back down the minor road from where this photograph was taken is Botany Bay Farm. Here can still be found the remains of part of a substantially built barn, which doubled as a cell where the prisoners were held on their first overnight stop.
©John Lamper
Dist:0.6km<br/>
©Nigel Chadwick
Dist:0.6km<br/>This signpost is often damaged and often repaired. Along the years, it has often contained spelling errors – such as this one referring to the Winterbournes rather than the Winterbornes; a previous version referred to Winterborne Anderson which should be plain Anderson. A little way down the turning to the south is Botany Bay Barn, which until quite recently still had shackles attached to its posts, a reminder of the junction's place as the first night's stop on the deportees' route from Dorchester prison to the docks at (?)Portsmouth/Poole. It is said that this is why this post is red – the prison officers, like the majority, were illiterate, so by painting the post red, they knew this was the turning for the barn. For a close-up of the finial, see [[1752516]].
©Chris Downer
Dist:0.6km<br/>
©Alex McGregor
Dist:0.6km<br/>Expected to walk about 18 miles a day, felons sentenced to transportation had to walk from the court to the nearest port of embarkation to Australia. Arrangements were made with farmers for the prisoners to spend the night in a barn along the way. The escorting soldiers/wardens were often illiterate and so the turn off from the route was marked with a red painted finger post.
©Trish Steel
Dist:0.7km<br/>
©Nigel Chadwick
Dist:0.7km<br/>
©Alex McGregor
Dist:0.8km<br/>
©Alex McGregor
Dist:0.9km<br/>
©Alex McGregor
Dist:0.9km<br/>C15 font.
©Mike Searle

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