On the lonely stretch of Ewrin Lane near Rainow, a curious stone sits quietly in the grass at the roadside. On one face it reads:
HERE JOHN TUR
NER WAS CAST
AWAY IN A HEAVY
SNOW STORM IN
THE NIGHT IN OR
ABOUT THE YEAR
1755
The other side is harder to explain:
THE PRINT OF A
WOMANS SHOE WAS
FOUND BY HIS SIDE
IN THE SNOW WERE
HE LAY DEAD
Turner was a 29-year-old packhorse driver, son of Richard Turner of Saltersford Hall, who died in a snowstorm on Christmas Eve 1735 after leaving Bollington despite warnings to stay. When his body was found, there was a single print of a woman’s shoe beside him in the snow, with no other tracks anywhere near.
The current stone is believed to be the third to mark the spot, the original having been erected by James Mellor of Hough Hole House. The date of 1755 is thought to reflect an error made when the inscription was copied during one of its replacements. No explanation for the footprint has ever been put forward.
