Portuguese Fireplace

In the heart of The New Forest, at the side of a forty-mile-per-hour road, lies a fireplace (pictured above). I found out about this peculiar memorial through the brilliant Atlas Obscura, a website that documents the ‘hidden wonders’ of the world (and which I highly recommend visiting to discover all manner of interesting things, wherever you are in the world), and couldn’t resist going to have a look in person. The page on the Atlas Obscura website does a pretty great job of explaining the memorial’s significance, so I’ll hand over to them:

During the beginning of World War I, Canada supplied timber for the Allies in Britain. But by 1916, its logging industry was unable to keep up with the increasing demands. Britain had a problem: it needed to start using its own trees, but all the local foresters were fighting in the war.

Over the next several years, the Canadian Forestry Corps sent 1,500 men and equipment overseas to the New Forest lumber camp, which encompassed about five acres of land. In 1917, as the demand continued to climb, the Portuguese government started sending laborers to help out with the efforts.

The stone fireplace in New Forest National Park is located between the village of Emery Down and the Bolderwood Deer Sanctuary. It marks the site where the foresters lived in a small village of huts and memorializes the efforts of the Canadian Forestry Corps and Portuguese Army.

A plaque explains its significance: “The Forestry Commission have retained the fireplace from the cookhouse as a memorial to the men who lived and worked here and acknowledge the financial assistance of the Portuguese government in its renovation.”

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/portuguese-fireplace