NHER 2390 (Place record) - Tom Hickathrift's washbowl and Giant's Grave

Tom Hickathrift's Washbowl was a cicular hollow with a low mound enclosing it, classified as a pond barrow (S4), and was located in the centre of a field at a junction of four roads (S7). The giant's grave was a nearby mound with marks of an entrenchment around it, located close to the roadside (S7) near smeeth Road Station (S3).
The name of the site comes from the marshland folk hero Tom Hickathrift, born in the reign of William the Conqueror. A man of great size and strength, he is said to have rid the land of various ogres and undesirables, eventually being knighted (S12). The mound was said to be the grave of one of the ogres he defeated (S3).
A cross known as Hickathrift's Candle used to stand on the mound (S2), but the shaft was removed in the 19th century when the earthwork was destroyed (S4). The base of the cross, known as Hickathrift's Collar Stud, was exposed when the mound was destroyed and is now apparently built into the current village sign (S11).

1929.
Earth was removed from the mound to fill in the hollow and a pedestal, 2 feet 9 inches square and 1 foot 9 inches high with stop angles, of a medieval cross with two feet of a pointed shaft remaining, was found. It was put in the hedge by the roadside and is now situated at Terrington St John.
Information from (S4) and (S7).

26 September 1978. Site visit by Ordnance Survey Inspector.
'A large circular depression with maximum measurements of about 50m north to south, 30m east to west, and a maximum depth of 1.6m. There is no surface indication of an accompanying counterscarp bank to the depression, nor is there now surface evidence of an adjacent mound'. Information from (S7 ?).
R.J. Rickett (NAU), 26 February 1990