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Save the Hundred Acre Wood – the real story behind the new BBC Radio 4 play

In 1987, Ashdown Forest – the ancient woodland that inspired the Hundred Acre Wood, home to RLF benefactor AA Milne’s beloved Winnie-the-Pooh characters – faced the very real prospect of being sold off, split up and even partially acquired by British Petroleum (BP), who had requested permission from East Sussex County Council to erect a 35 metre oil rig in the Forest’s open heathland. “Oil threat to an Enchanted Place”, read a headline in the East Grinstead Courier on 20 August 1987, alongside a picture of Christopher Milne next to a memorial plaque dedicated to his father and Winnie-the-Pooh illustrator EH Shepard. 

The Enchanted Place referred to by the East Grinstead Courier is a spot “on the very top of the Forest” called Gill’s Lap (named Galleon’s Lap in the stories.) This is the place where the fictional Christopher Robin says goodbye to his beloved bear, Winnie-the-Pooh, at the end of Milne’s final Pooh book, The House at Pooh Corner. Christopher Milne was, of course, the real child on whom the character of Christopher Robin was based, the Winnie-the-Pooh stories having begun life as tales created by the family about Christopher and his childhood toys, set in a fictionalised version of the woods near their home. 

The plaque commemorating AA Milne and EH Shepard at the Enchanted Place in Ashdown Forest

From unwilling child star to Ashdown Forest champion

The phenomenal success of the Winnie-the-Pooh stories, which are 100 years old this year, took both Milne and his son by surprise. The younger Milne was 6 years old when the first book came out, and as he grew up he became increasingly frustrated by the worldwide fame thrust upon him. By May 1986, when Ashdown Forest’s then-owner the 10th Earl De La Warr decided to sell the Forest – offering first refusal to East Sussex County Council at a price well below what it would be worth on the open market – Christopher Milne was hundreds of miles away, running a bookshop in Devon where he lived with his wife, Lesley, and their daughter, Clare. He had avoided anything to do with Winnie-the-Pooh for years.  

But when the Conservators of Ashdown Forest announced their intention to raise funds to help the Council at a press event on 12 October 1987 – 39 years ago today – Christopher Milne was very much a part of the effort. He told the assembled journalists he had spent his life trying to live down the Christopher Robin image, but that he was nevertheless there to try and save the Forest and above all to prevent any exploitation by BP (Milne was an early supporter of Friends of the Earth).

So how did he go from reclusive fictional hero to a central part of the Ashdown Forest fightback, delivering speeches that were shown as far afield as on America’s CNN?

The story of Christopher Milne’s involvement in the campaign to save Ashdown is told in a new BBC Radio 4 play written by RLF Chief Executive Edward Kemp. Save the Hundred Acre Wood follows Christopher as he learns of Ashdown’s potential fate, and how that news impacts his relationships with his family, present and past. The cast includes Robert Bathurst as Christopher Milne; Lia Williams as his wife Lesley Milne; Anton Lesser as AA Milne and Rosie Jones as Clare Milne.

(l-r) Anton Lesser (AA Milne), Rosie Jones (Clare Milne) and Robert Bathurst (Christopher Milne), pictured during the recording of Edward Kemp’s Save the Hundred Acre Wood for BBC Radio 4

Listen to Save the Hundred Acre Wood live on BBC Radio 4 on Saturday 17 October, or after the broadcast via BBC Sounds. 

If in our victory, a tiny child and his teddy bear played their part, I should be very proud of them.

Christopher Milne, talking at the Ashdown Forest campaign press launch in 1987

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