Trees of Significance on English Heritage Sites

The Royal Oak at Boscobel in Shropshire is among the country's best-known historic trees, not least because of its frequent adoption as a public house name. Tradition has it that it was in the branches of this tree that Charles II was successfully concealed during his flight from defeat at the battle of Worcester in 1651, an event which within a few years attracted renown to Boscobel and the Royal Oak itself. Contemporary sources say the tree was a recently lopped pollard which explains how it acted as a hide with its lush and dense new growth. Descriptions that date back to 1706 claim the Royal Oak had been killed by people hacking away at the tree. It was also reported growing 'close by the side' was a 'young thriving plant from one of its acorns'. By the time of a 1791 description only the younger tree is noted, then reckoned to be about 80 years old, and later accounts suggest that it was about this time that the last portion of the stock and roots of the original Royal Oak were grubbed up, to be converted into souvenirs. Evidence suggests that it was the younger of the two trees noted in the later 18th century which has remained to this day at Boscobel as the Royal Oak.