Devil’s Jumps

Three small hills near Churt have been known as the Devils Jumps (or the Devils Three Jumps) since at least 1765. The highest of the three hills is known as Stony Jump. There are a few folk tales attached to these hills which explains their name.

Sandstone outcrop upon the easternmost of the Devil’s Jumps at Churt, Surrey.

A boulder at the Devils Jumps is explained by a story in which the Norse God Thor gets annoyed with the Devil jumping from hill to another and so throws a boulder at him which was then left there.

There is a tradition that fairies would lend tools to people who whispered at their request at a boulder on Stony Jump. Edwin Sidney Hartland in ‘English Fairy and Other Folk Tales’ (1890) has a similar story attached to Borough-hill, a mile from Frensham.