Blenheim boot poses puzzle

6:58pm Tuesday 5th August 2008

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An old boot found in a tree by a child has left historians at Blenheim Palace baffled.

Ten-year-old Tom Clutterbuck discovered the Victorian hobnail boot lodged halfway up in an old oak tree while he was playing in the grounds of the stately home at Woodstock.

Historians think the boot is about 100 years old, dating from the late Victorian or early Edwardian era.

It is a Blucher-style Derby boot, named after Prussia's Field Marshal Blücher, who fought alongside the Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo. He ordered similar boots for his troops to wear.

Theories on how the boot got stuck in a tree include a childish prank or an accident.

Tom said: "I was climbing the tree and found it in a hollow. I thought it was a wetsuit shoe and threw it down.

"It's very exciting. It must be about 100 years old. I think maybe someone was climbing the tree and their foot got stuck and they lost their boot."

He made the find while on a day out with his brother Dan, 12, and friends India, ten, and Tahlia Edmunds, nine, with their mother Tracey.

Mrs Edmunds, 49, a teacher at Bartholomew School, Eynsham, said: "We found a fantastic tree with a hollow about 8ft off the ground and the children were playing in it.

"Tom shouted 'I've found an old wetsuit boot' and flung it out.

"I caught it and was astonished to realise it was a hobnail boot."

Sam van de Geer, a social history conservator for the county council's museums service, said: "The sole of the boot has lots of nails hammered in to give it grip, so it looks as if it was a fashionable boot that has been turned into a working boot.

"It's been well worn, with a large hole in the toe.

"It was quite common in Victorian times for shoes to be re-shod many times but also for employers to give their boots to their servants, once the employer no longer needed them."

John Forster, archivist to the Duke of Marlborough, said: "As to how the boot got into the tree, we can never know for certain.

"Since it's of child's size and worn-out, I suspect some childish prank or game.

"At that time, when money was scarce, children needed to be adept at making up simple games."

The boot will be on display in the Blenheim Bygones exhibition, in the Palace's Pleasure Gardens, from Tuesday.