Plan of Badshot Lea Long Barrow
The only long barrow known between the Kent and Wessex tombs is now destroyed. Archaeologist William Rankine first discovered and excavated it in 1936, not long before the surviving remains were removed by quarrying. It is thought that the barrow was originally some 140 feet long and orientated slightly north of east.
The site is accessed by parking in Hurlands Place (Sat Nav Farnham, not Badshot), just beyond the entrance to Sainsbury’s superstore. There is easy parking near the entrance to Hurlands Business Centre. A public footpath can now be seen at the end of the road heading east. Once the railway bridge is crossed, the path emerges into the open, and a container in a fenced compound can be seen on the left. The site is just the other side of this container. Although this is private land, the chap running a dog-minding business in the compound proved very amicable, although the mention of the long barrow left him looking rather blank.
The ground here has a slight slope to the south. The site is on high ground with views in all directions apart from a segment to the east, where the ground rises even higher. The Hog’s Back is visible to the south, with the South Downs just being visible beyond. To the southeast, Crooksbury Hill is prominent, and to the west and north, the horizon is some miles distant. This would have been a pleasant spot without the current tree cover, but now it is in an area of rough scrub and small fields overshadowed by power lines and a radio mast.
The barrow site is now a patch of scraped rubble and soil with a soil bund a few yards on the north edge beyond, which is a disused quarry. There is a railway embankment to the western edge, heavily overgrown. Immediately to the south edge of the barrow site is a fenced compound housing the container. A rough-metalled track provides access from the north-east.
The site is so damaged by industrial activity that it is difficult to make out the original ground levels. My impression was that so much scraping of the ground in association with earthmoving and storing activities had taken place that the current levels are below the original landform. Consequently, no evidence of the barrow would be found by excavation. This assumption is backed up by the proximity of a small cliff some 25m to the south-east. The face of the cliff, which is some two to three metres high, is virgin chalk, showing that cutting into the landscape has occurred in the past.
Wikipedia extract from entry on Badshot Lea
The village has historic remains in, or close to, the village from the Mesolithic, Neolithic, Iron Age, Roman and Medieval periods. In 1967, the Badshot Lea Village schoolmaster and amateur archaeologist William (Billy) Rankine discovered the remains of a Neolithic Long Barrow (burial mound also known as a tumulus) here. The Surrey Archaeological Society excavated the site, and many finds are on display at Guildford Museum. Little remains of the original mound due to quarrying and the excavation of the Railway cutting in the 1800s. The burial mound was situated close to the Harrow Way.
Ed. correction: nothing remains of the original mound.
I will visit the Guildford Museum and report my findings.