To walk from St. Aldhelm's along the cliff to Anvil Point and so into
Swanage is possible but fatiguing, and perhaps not worth the labour
involved. Winspit Quarry and Seacombe Cliff would be passed on the
way; between the two are some old guns marking the spot where the East
Indiaman _Halsewell_ went down in a fearful storm in January, 1786.
This tragedy was immortalized by Charles Dickens in "The Long Voyage."
Out of 250 souls only eighty-two were saved by men employed at Winspit
Quarry. Some of the passengers are buried in the level plot between
the two cliffs.
Worth Matravers, a mile and a half from the Head and four from
Swanage, is a village at the end of a by-way that leaves the Kingston
road near Gallows Gore(!) cottages, a mile west of Langton Matravers.
The name of both these villages connects them with an old Norman
family once of much importance in south-east Dorset. It is said that
one of them was the tool of Queen Isabella and the actual murderer of
Edward.
Worth is famous for its fine early Norman church, also restored by the
Earl of Eldon.
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