Literary Trees – Shakespeare’s Mulberry Tree

Around 1609, in his retirement, William Shakespeare was said to have planted a black mulberry tree in his Stratford home of New Place. According to legend the playwright was gifted it as a sapling by King James I.

After Shakespeare’s death, the tree became a relic that drew pilgrims to the property, and this angered the irascible Reverend Francis Gastrell, the man who, in 1756, owned New Place. Indeed, he grew so angry that, in a fit of spite, he chopped down the famous mulberry tree. James Boswell, Dr Johnson’s biographer, called this an act of “gothick barbarity”. In a rage, he also destroyed the house of New Place, depriving the world of the home where the retired poet and playwright saw out his last years. The residents of Stratford-upon-Avon were not impressed and Reverend Gastrell became so unpopular that he was forced to leave the town. Rumour has it that a law was passed forbidding anyone of the name of Gastrell from ever living in Stratford again.

The wood from the tree, which Gastrell sold to local turners and wood carvers, was then carved into numerous souvenirs – decorative boxes, toothpick cases, goblets, picture frames, tea caddies, sugar tongs, snuff boxes and even tables. Some of these items are today in museums and libraries – in Stratford there are 63 items alone made from this one tree. A mulberry tree in the town is said to have been propagated from the original tree. One does have to wonder about the size of that tree, since so many items have been made from its wood?