The George Green Sweet Chestnuts

On 7 December 1993 one of the chestnuts on George Green was cut down for the M11 Link Road. Protesters had fought for it, and it had a nickname, the tree with a postcode. It was about 250 years old. Four of its neighbours are still standing, and a young chestnut planted in 1999 stands in as its replacement. The survivors are old. The Great Trees of London guide says the George Green chestnut was probably planted in the early 1700s, and Wanstead Wildlife counts these trees, with those in nearby Bush Wood, as the most significant of the few large trees left from the avenues of Wanstead House. Other accounts stretch the age to about 400 years, so the honest answer is roughly three centuries, perhaps more. Wanstead Wildlife measured all five in 2007 and 2008. The biggest is 6.0 metres round and 18.8 metres tall. Another, 3.9 metres round, is the tallest at 21.1 metres. A third is only half a trunk, after lightning struck it in 1984, and a fourth is an old pollard. Between them they have come through lightning and a road scheme, and they still stand on the green by the road junction. The green is free and open at all times, five minutes' walk from Wanstead station.