Spectral Static: The Horsingdon Transmissions 2023, No.10: Hollow Hills

Otherwise considered a naturally-occurring rock formation, those local to Winscombe Wood (which lies not far from the Ebury Way and sits on the boundary of Horsingdon and Trentford) refer to this curious woodland stone edifice as ‘the Fairy Hill’, and have avoided the place for decades. Local legendry also holds that somewhere within the structure lies a secret entrance to a network of caves or tunnels which burrow deep into the hidden places of the earth.

A particularly sinister body of lore surrounds the location, including the following account of an event which supposedly occurred in the mid-1920s: a young family, it is said, were enjoying a picnic at the base of the Fairy Hill one Summer’s day, when they were suddenly disturbed from their repast by the sound of stone scraping up stone, which ceased almost as abruptly as it started. At which point the assembled company realised that one of their number - a toddler around the age of two or three - was unaccountably missing. After a panicked search, a discovery was made within the hollow of the Fairy Hill…only it was not the missing child: what was found, instead, was a mewling, stunted, sallow and wizened thing dressed in the absent child’s clothing. 

What eventually became of the…changeling?…the tale does not tell. However, horrid legends such as this -  as well as the spate of actual disappearances of children in and around Winscombe Wood in the early 1970s - attest to why locals avoid the area.