The Statutory Forest Boundary – traditionally known as the Perambulation (because it was walked) – was defined in stones in 1832.   These beautifully carved boundary stones have, over time become hidden and lost.

In 1997 Glynn Bullock MBE, Forest Warden for Forestry England, along with former colleague Dave Clark, started a project to locate and document as many of the 218 boundary stones in the Forest of Dean as possible.

Since then many missing stones have been found, some having been confused for grave stones, moved or repurposed.  Some of the more unusual are recorded in a booklet written in 2011 which includes stone No 10 which was found in a chicken shed being used as a roost, stone No 39 was found in the bed of a stream at Breams Eaves and stone No 42 was found supporting a water butt.

Glynn said: “During our centenary year, in which we are celebrating 100 years of Forestry it would be fantastic if we could find all the missing stones.”

One such stone was located earlier this year when a home owner in Whitecroft, contacted Glynn as she found a boundary stone whilst gardening.

Home owners Peggy Römer and Nathan Stockill said: “We recently moved to the Forest and in all the house paperwork we found a Forestry Commission booklet on “The Statutory Forest of Dean” and it’s Boundary stones. After a look through, we noticed that one of these stones, No.37, appeared to be in our garden but was lost. Well it’s not lost anymore.”

Glynn, along with Forest Warden colleague Kevin Davis, visited Peggy and Nathan to help lift the stone above ground and reset it.

This discovery is by no means the end of this story as 55 remain missing. If you think you have a missing stone in your garden email [email protected]