A MOTHER taking her children to school was forced to step around pools of blood after a deer’s severed head was left at a New Forest church.
The grisly discovery was made at St Michael and All Angels Church in Lyndhurst High Street on Wednesday morning, when the area was busy with youngsters and parents heading to the school opposite.
The parent, who asked to remain anonymous, called the incident “barbaric”. She told the A&T: “My daughters and I walked past the church entrance at around 8.35am and nearly stood in the puddles of blood.
The head was found at St Michael and All Angels Church in Lyndhurst (picture: Google)
“My eldest, who is four, recognised immediately what it was and I had to try and move them away from it whilst trying to not draw any further attention to what it was. I noticed the porch door was closed, which is unusual.
“My concern was was that someone had been hurt and sought refuge in the church. I reported it to the school office to see if they could contact the church and get it cleaned up.
“I had intended to investigate on my return, but was told by the office that it was a deer head. I could barely believe what they were saying. So many children walk past that church daily to the school and preschool, and it is barbaric that someone would do that, let alone subject very young children to it; it’s horrendous.”
She added: “It is unnerving that someone would do this. Yes, there is a lot in the news about knife crime anyway and you would like to think that’s not something that happens here, but in the past sheep have been stabbed, so it does make you wonder, what is this person(s) up to? Why do this? This must have been planned in advance – I can’t believe it was a spur-of-the-moment thing.”
The church declined to comment when approached by the A&T, while Hampshire police had no record of it being reported.
The New Forest has been blighted by similar sinister acts over the years. As reported in the A&T, the same church was targeted in 2021 when a deer’s head was also left in the porch.
Speaking at the time, the Rev David Potterton described the incident as a “savage, callous and disgusting act”.
“A very distressing find for the person who discovered it this morning,” he said.
“It is not unknown for animal parts to be left in church porches with graffiti or other messages supporting various groups or organisations. No clues in the porch as to who is responsible.”
Last May, Commoners Defence Association chair Andrew Parry-Norton found a flock of his sheep mutilated in Cadnam – which he described as “horrific” and “devastating”.
In May 2023 commoner Patrick Langdown told the A&T he feared occult-style animal killings had returned to the area after one of his lambs was found dumped and with its throat slit at Long Cross Pond, near Fritham.
In January of 2023 animal entrails – thought to include hearts – surrounded by a circle of 30 candles were arranged at the top of a trig point of Stagbury Hill, near Bramshaw.
In December 2022, Bramshaw vicar the Rev. David Bacon warned locals to stay vigilant after a dead cat and fox were left at the 12th century St Peter’s Church, on Judds Hill.
In 2019 vandals also sprayed the church walls with phallic and Satanic symbols.
Later that year police launched an investigation after sheep and cattle were found stabbed and sprayed with markings in the space of five days within a few miles of each other in the Bramshaw area.