A real milestone!

This milestone is 1 of 16 milestones that are part of the oldest consecutive series anywhere in the world. Known as the Trinity Hall series, they were constructed between 1728 and 1732 along the old coach road between Cambridge and London. The 16 survivors are between Cambridge and Barkway which is a distance of 18 miles. The original surveyor was Dr William Warren, a Fellow of Trinity Hall who began surveying in 1725 from Great St Mary’s Church in Cambridge town centre armed with just a chain which was 66 feet long!

This photograph taken today is his first milestone which cost £5 and 8 shillings to set up and the inscription appears to have been recut several times, with the date originally shown in Roman numerals, then Arabic script around 1900 and reverting to Roman numerals in the 1960s. It is Grade 2 listed.

In June 1940, during World War Two, the government decreed that all placenames should be hidden or removed, to impede the Germans in case of invasion. Workmen laid the stones down and hid them in the verge. They were re-erected in 1946.