Anne Hathaway's Cottage

Shakespeare's wife Anne Hathaway grew up in Shottery, a small village just outside of Stratford. While courting Anne, William would have walked to her house, about two miles away, making for a lovely stroll through the countryside. At the Hathaway family's cottage, called "Hewlands," William sat with Anne on a wooden bench next to the fire. (While our tour guide was leading the group to the next room, I stayed behind to snap a quick photo of the bench!)

For 300 years, long after Anne's and William's deaths, long after Shakespeare became a tourist industry for Stratford, the cottage remained in the Hathaway family. In the later 1700s, visitors began traveling regularly to the home, and for much of the 1800s, Mary Baker, a descendant of Anne, lived in the cottage and acted as a tour guide. Mrs Baker would carve small pieces of wood from the bench on which Anne and William sat to sell to visitors as souveniers. In 1892 the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust purchased the property for permanent preservation, and the bench carving ceased.

Click here to see Mrs. Barth's photos of Anne Hathaway's cottage on Flickr: MrsB Hathaway Cottage.

Watch my (forbidden so furtively taken) videos below for a look at Anne Hathaway's cottage: