Watch the video: Illegally felled – 16-year-old is said to have cut down the famous “Robin Hood” tree.
It was one of the most famous trees in the world:
The lone sycamore maple, which became famous in the 1991 Kevin Costner film “Robin Hood: King of Thieves,” has apparently been felled illegally.
The police have arrested a 16-year-old suspect.
Officials did not initially provide any information about the possible motive.
The iconic tree was a tourist attraction and popular photo opportunity in Northumberland National Park in England.
Tony Gates, Chairman of the Park Authority:
We’ve had people in tears today and we’ve been absolutely overwhelmed by the messages through social media, through our website and through email, of people who are genuinely touched by this loss. This will have meant a lot to people. People will have proposed to hear, they will have held significant family occasions here. Some people may have scattered the ashes of loved ones here. And for someone to feel that they can do this to such a site, I just find really hard to understand and I feel a real sense of loss today.”
“(The tree) will have meant a lot to people. Some people have gotten marriage proposals here, some have held important family celebrations here. Some people may have scattered their loved ones’ ashes here. And that someone could do something like that, to a place like that, is just hard for me to understand and I feel a real sense of loss today.”
A police spokesman describes the crime as a “deliberate act of vandalism.”
Northumbria Region Police say they have begun an investigation.
Local politician Steven Bridgett wrote on the online network X that the tree was “definitely felled with a chainsaw.” The nature conservation and heritage organization National Trust wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that the tree had been an “important and distinctive part of the landscape” for around 200 years.