The Madonna Pond in Binsted Woods

Madonna Pond in Binsted Woods

I was talking with a friend recently about my mission to photograph Sussex history when the subject of the Madonna Pond came up. I'd never heard of it but after getting directions from Peter I set off with a friend on a mission to find it. As you can see above we were successful.

I immediately wanted to find out more about the area and it's history. Once again my friend Peter was able to shed more light on the story through a book written by Cressida Connolly called The Rare and the Beautiful. It documents the lives of three beautiful and wild sisters (Mary, Kathleen and Lorna) from the wealthy, socialite Garman family. They were born in the early twentieth century and inspired and seduced some of the greatest artists and writers of their time. Lorna was the youngest and most beautiful of the sisters and at 16 she married the wealthy landowner and publisher Ernest Wishart who lived at Binsted in Sussex.

Madonna Shrine

Through her seemingly long and happy marriage she had many affairs to which her husband turned a blind eye. In particular she had intense love affairs with the writer Laurie Lee and the painter Lucian Freud. When Lee went off to fight in the Spanish Civil war Lorna would send him money in the form of pound notes which had been steeped in Chanel No 5, her favourite perfume. Freud used her as his model for his paintings "Woman with a Tulip" and "Woman with a Daffodil".

Her affair with Laurie Lee was serious enough to cause Lee to leave London and move into a caravan conveniently near her at the Madonna Pond. When Lee died in 1997 he was still wearing her signet ring.

Lorna loved to wear beautiful and unusual clothes and go skinny dipping in the surrounding lakes and rivers. She thought nothing of driving through the night in her chocolate brown Bentley from Binsted up to London just to go clubbing. At night while all around her were asleep she would frequently ride her horse through the woods or up through the streets of Arundel. Also at night in her later years she would go into the woods alone and decorate a tree for Christmas so she could surprise her grandchildren. She also turned the Madonna Pond into an enchanted glade and put up lanterns and beads all around it. Lorna died in 2000 at the age of 89.

Binsted Woods

This area of Binsted Woods has also attracted the attention of paranormal investigators as there have been many reports of ghosts; horses act nervously and dogs growl whilst passing through this area. I would like to think that Lorna is still around and living the afterlife to the full just as she did during every one of her 89 years.