Around midnight on January 12th Jeremiah Whaley was taking his two Fox Terriers for their usual late night walk before retiring to bed. Whaley, who lived in one of the old Gin Sloshers cottages in Devonshire Road was a regular sight walking about Honor Oak, and his dogs were very popular with the local children. 

As was his nightly habit, Whaley walked the dogs towards One Tree Hill, once there he would let them off their leads to run around the small wooded enclosure that led up to St Augustines church, seated at the top of the hill.

On this night however, the dogs seemed reluctant to be walked and as Whaley approached the path that climbed up the hill he was virtually dragging them along. Finally losing his patience Whaley removed the leads from the pair and started up the path alone, trusting the dogs to come to their sense and follow him in their own good time.

When he was about halfway up the path Whaley began to hear strange sounds coming from over on his left. Peering into the night, he thought he glimpsed amongst the trees a dim light and some movement. Pausing to  bend down and grab a large stick, Whaley decided to see who else was up on the Hill with him. Drawing near a small clearing which has now become the site of the gun emplacement, Whaley could see the figures of ‘about twenty adults cavorting in the nip and the like. A most rum bunch I never seen in my life’.  After about five minutes of watching Whaley was preparing to return home, when the strange group suddenly became excited and started running about shouting; Whaleys dogs had finally plucked up the courage to make the journey up the hill and had also  discovered the strange group. The Fox Terriers darted around the panicked group barking and snapping at their bare legs.  Whaley, fearing for the safety of his dogs more than the strangers legs,  broke forth from his cover and ran into the group, causing even more shrieking and shouting from the group. Eventually Whaley managed to grab hold of both his errant dogs and slip their leads back on. With some modicum of calm restored Whaley finally managed to survey the group who now stood glowering at him, clothes and robes hastily pulled on. Whaley casually remarked that it was a cold night to be dispensing with clothing and enquired if the group were Occultists. Several members of the group guffawed loudly at this, and a woman stepped forward and proudly declared: “We sir are gardeners!” 

At this the group turned their backs on  Whaley, and began to rummage around for their clothes. Whaley convinced he was being made fun of, called the group “a bunch of tossers”, shrugged his shoulders and began to walk back down towards Honor Oak.

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The next night Whaley was in The Cardinals Arms  recounting his strange meeting the previous night to an amused crowd. Not surprisingly he had some trouble getting anyone to believe his tale of nude horticulturists cavorting about in the local woods in early January. But there was man in the Arms that night who wasn’t laughing at ‘poor old Whaley’, instead between sipping at a pint of stout, he was quietly taking down notes in a small black notebook which he took care to keep out of sight of those around him.