feature
Island Life - June/July 2010
Photo: St Catherines Lighthouse
June Elford visits Niton
I’m driving to Niton, a village snuggled
have pockets full of money and farmers
history of Niton told me there used to
down at the foot of Niton Down and
whose farming consists in ploughing
be a saying, “the women of Niton and
in the shadow of St. Catherine’s Hill.
the deep by night …”
the ladies of the Undercliff”.
In 1810 John Buller wrote “Niton is
This was when smuggling was
Over the centuries the village had
situated in a hollow, well ornamented
more profitable than hard toil and
different names, the earliest was
with fine trees; for though within a
the villagers kept to themselves,
Neeton, in 1181 it was written Neweton
mile of the sea, the coast is higher than
earning them a reputation of having a
and Nighton occurs in 1592 while
the village, and shelters it from the sea
“crabbed disposition.” This could have
Kokeritz says it simply means ‘New
breeze.”
originated from Niton sometimes being
Farm’.
The High Street bustles with shoppers
referred to as Crab Niton to distinguish
The author, Aubrey de Sélincourt,
and people visiting the library or
it from Knighton near Ashey as Niton’s
lived at Nutkins and his daughter Lesley
dropping into the post office for a
nearby coast was known for its sea
married Christopher Robin Milne,
chat and a cup of coffee. In 1801
crabs.
the son of A.A. Milne famous for his
three hundred people lived here and
In Victorian times wealthy incomers
‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ books. But I’m off
each of the stone-built cottages in the
built picturesque ‘seats’ like Mirables
to look for Edward Edwards, another
two streets had a garden, an orchard
and The Orchard in the Undercliff
famous inhabitant, who came to the
for making cider from apples and
and Princess Victoria visited the Royal
Island in 1883 and is buried in the
vegetables to keep a pig. The poet
Sandrock Hotel with her mother when
churchyard of the parish church, St.
Sidney Dobell wrote in 1860, “Here are
she was fifteen. Mary Stotesbury, who
John the Baptist, described by George
fishermen who never fish but always
held an exhibition last year on the
Brannon in 1824 as “a small, but very
68
Visit our new website - www.visitislandlife.com