A well known tree in a historic graveyard in London has fallen. It was known as The Hardy Tree in Old St Pancreas Churchyard. The churchyard is behind St Pancreas and King's Cross stations.
The tree got its name from the famous British writer Thomas Hardy. This novelist and poet stacked gravestones around the base of the tree in the 1860s. The tombs had to be dismantled and the remains exhumed because the Midland railway line was being built over part of the original churchyard. Hardy oversaw this project and had the headstones placed around the ash tree.
I went to the churchyard in 2017 -
Photo of the fallen tree from BBC News [Simon Lamrock] 28 Dec 2022.
The tree was infected with a fungus in 2014 and had been monitored, then was weakened by storms earlier this year.
The church -
UPDATE
It seems the story about the gravestones around the tree might not be true.
This article from Ian Visits says the tree is younger and the gravestones were already there when the tree grew through them. There is a link to a photo to prove this.
