Freshwater, Isle of Wight
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Freshwater is a village and parish at the western end of the Isle of Wight.
Freshwater Bay is a small cove on the south coast of the Island which also gives its name to the nearby part of the village of Freshwater.
The "Arch Rock" was a well-known local landmark but fell down in 1994. The neighboring "Stag Rock" is so named because supposedly a stag leaped to the rock from the cliff to escape during a hunt. Another huge slab fell off the cliff fact in 1968, and is now known as the "Mermaid Rock".
The renowned scientist Robert Hooke (1635-1703) was born in Freshwater in 1635. His father John Hooke was the curate of All Saints, in Freshwater. When Hooke's father died in 1643, Hooke left Freshwater for London to be apprenticed to portrait painter Peter Lely. After that, he went to Westminister School and then Oxford.
George Morland, a famous painter, lived in Freshwater in a structure known as the "Cabin" around 1800.
Alfred Lord Tennyson lived at nearby Farringford House (on the road between Freshwater and Alum Bay). Tennyson lived at Farringford from 1853 until the end of his life in 1892. Tennyson wrote of Farringford:
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- “Where, far from noise and smoke of town
- I watch the twilight falling brown,
- All round a careless-ordered garden,
- Close to the ridge of a noble down.”
- “Where, far from noise and smoke of town
Tennyson rented Farringford in 1853, and then bought it in 1858. He found that there were too many star struck tourists who pestered him in Farringford, so he moved to Aldworth on a hill known as Blackdown between Lurgashall and Fernhurst, about 2 km south of Haslemere in West Sussex in 1869. However, he came back to Farringford to spend the winters.
The hills above Freshwater are named after Tennyson. There is also a hill in the area called Hooke Hill, named for Robert Hooke.
On a nearby hill of High Down is a Cornish granite cross erected in 1897 in tribute to Tennyson, “by the people of Freshwater, and other friends in England and America.” Lady Tennyson is buried in the graveyard of the Freshwater church, which dates to the 12th century. There is also a memorial to Tennyson's son, Lionel Tennyson, who died of malaria in 1886.
Dimbola Lodge, the home of Julia Margaret Cameron, now a photographic museum, is in (the village of) Freshwater Bay.
In 1960, Dekyi Tseri, mother of the current Dalai Lama stayed at the guest house of Sir Basil Gould's widow Cecily in Freshwater for six weeks. Tseri, known to Tibetans as "Amala", meaning "The Great Mother", was recuperating after a throat operation to remove a benign polyp performed at St. Mary's Hospital in London.
Freshwater is the home of Island Samba band FAT Samba. It hosts the Freshwater and Totland Carnival every year. It is also the site of the West Wight Sports Centre.
[edit] Village Attractions
These are attractions within the immediate area, not necessarily within the boundaries of the village.
1. Farringford House, home of poet Alfred Lord Tennyson.
2. Dimbola Lodge, home of photographer Julia Margaret Cameron.
4. Freshwater Bay Golf Course.
5. Afton Down, the site of the Isle of Wight Festival 1970.
6. The Needles Old Battery, a Victorian fort and post Second World War rocket testing site.
7. The Needles Lighthouse and chalk rocks.
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