Professional Course in Traditional Hand Hewing
On a February weekend, the Manifest Woodland Guild ran a professional course in hand-hewing – the ancient skill of converting a felled tree to a squared beam, using only axes.
Set in the context of Dragon Wood, the course was open to oak framers and other interested people, running over two days. The first day included active exploration of the Wood and presentation on its ecology, archaeology, history and ongoing woodsmanship by Hugh & Gabrielle Conway Morris. While the trees may still be in their winter sleep, the ground flora is getting busy – celandines and primroses are flowering, and bluebell shoots are carpeting the wood floor in green. We also discussed the medieval woodbank to the west, the old hollow way running north (much overgrown, but now mirrored in the public footpath a few yards to the east), and the old pond – perhaps an old retting place or soaking for oak bark?
The first afternoon then saw a demonstration of tree-felling by Joe Weaver of Wye Coppice. Joe felled two oak trees, both perfectly in line with his intended targets, laying them down on the woodland floor without disturbing so much as a hazel stool. The oaks were carefully selected to provide us with the timber we needed for the next day’s hewing, and also as part of a much-needed thinning programme, allowing other nearby young oaks the space to grow, and older oaks to flourish and become veteran trees in their turn.
The second day saw expert tuition from the inimitable twins John and Henry Russell, highly skilled hewers and traditional carpenters and oak framers. Kicking off the day with a fascinating presentation on historic evidence of hewing in pictures and as marks on timbers, we then took up our axes and hewed the logs felled yesterday: marking up ends and chalk lines along, felling axes to make the vertical notches and to rough out the faces, and then side axes to produce a finished surface. Henry rounded off the day with a demonstration of adzing and the forming of a chamfer. Dusk fell in the woods, the axes were silenced, and the course was over.
Manifest Woodland Guild would like to thank Heritage Crafts, the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, and the Small Woodland Owners Group, for generously supporting the course and providing invaluable publicity. Huge thanks go also to the Carpenters’ Fellowship for providing bursaries for participants, as well as equipment!
