Horton Tower

‘A megalomaniac folly,’ Pevsner calls Horton Tower. Megalomaniac maybe, but not a folly, because it did have a practical use when built by Humphrey Sturt of Horton Manor 200 years ago. A keen huntsman, he wanted to follow his hounds when he was too old to ride, so he watched them from the tower on a ridge above the village. At the time it was, at 43 metres, the highest non-religious building in England. Also, follies are meant to be attractive, but the brick-built tower, resembling a stubby space shuttle, fails this test as well.

 The tower was the location for the cockfighting scene in the 1967 film of Far from the Madding Crowd and today houses mobile phone antennae.

Nearest postcode: BH21 7EP
OS reference: SU030067
What3words: risk.reckon.helpfully