The Shippon Barn

Grassy mounds in the Wellhead Gardens are all that remain of the successive Saxon and Norman castles which are reputed to be among the earliest traces of a settlement in Bourne.

Tradition has it that the castle was the birthplace of Hereward the Wake, leader of the English resistance to William the Conqueror, but there is no firm historical evidence for such an assumption.

Materials salvaged from the fortifications of Bourne’s old castle that was finally destroyed in mediaeval times are thought to have been used in the construction of a nearby barn. The report of an archaeological excavation of the site in 1861 said that certain stones that had been incorporated in the end of the building were the exterior sections of the cross-bow slits that had once been part of the castle walls.

These stones can still be seen in the Shippon Barn as it is known today that stands close to the modern footpath across the Wellhead Gardens. The barn has been converted for community use in recent years and is now a meeting place for the local scouts and guides.

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