Brown Clee
Brown Clee Hill lies 5 miles north of its sister Titterstone Clee Hill. Its highest peak is Abdon Burf at 540 metres above sea level (1772 feet), the highest point in Shropshire and the highest point south of the Penines. A toposcope situated at the summit of the Brown Clee points out all the local landmarks and more distant peaks, some of which are over 50 miles away.
Much of the Brown Clee is private land with the eastern side owned by the Burwaton Estate and the western side is owned by various private landowners and the parish of Clee St. Margaret. The common land features the remains of where an Iron Age hill fort once stood, now called Nordy Bank.
Air traffic control radar masts can be seen on the summit of the hill which build up a picture of all the aircraft within a 100 mile radius.
There are many walks and bridleways on and around Brown Clee, including the Shropshire Way. For more information on walking, riding and cycling in the area visit:
History
The Clee Hills are famed for appearing on the Mappa Mundi (in Hereford Cathedral) dating from the 13th century.
Nordy Bank is the last intact survivor of three Iron Age Hill forts on the Brown Clee. The other two, at Abdon Burf and Clee Burf, have been largely lost to quarrying activity.
Quarrying for Dhustone (Dolerite) was for long the main income of the area and it was widely known as a dangerous and gruelling job, with dhustone being a very hard and challenging material to extract. Workers would walk to the Abdon Quarry from as far as Bridgnorth and Ludlow, both over 10 miles away.
The Abdon quarries closed in 1936, and by this time the area had become almost industrial with a concrete plant, tarmac plant in Ditton Priors, and a small railway to move the stone. If the wind was coming down over the hill it was apparently possible to hear the stone crusher at the top crunching away.
After the Abdon quarries closed a lot of the quarrymen went to work at the Cockshutford quarries on the other side of Brown Clee, but the quarries failed to after a short period since the dhustone there wasn't of the same quality and durability as the Abdon side. Many of the men returned and worked at the naval ammunition depot set up at Ditton Priors at the start of the war.
Today the scene is somewhat different. Black dhustone is still quarried on Clee Hill, but Brown Clee and the top of Titterstone Clee are silent. Nature has reclaimed the hills and remnants of rare wildflower meadows survive while the disused quarries have become home to a wealth of wildlife.
Nowadays the radar facilities of the Clee Hills protect aircraft, but both hills were once a hazard to aircraft and a memorial commemorates the 23 Allied and German airmen killed here when their planes crashed into Brown Clee during World War II. The first aircraft to crash into Brown Clee was a German Junkers 88 on 1 April 1941. Two Wellington Bombers, a Hawker Typhoon and at least two Avro Ansons also crashed here. The engine and other parts of one of the Wellington Bombers are said to rest on the bottom of Boyne Water, Brown Clee.