Malcolm Saville and his wife Dorothy made their first visit to Shropshire in 1936. It has already been widely documented that whenever Malcolm Saville planned to visit an area that was new to him, he always made a point of first reading about the area, studying maps and taking guidance from any local guide books that were available to him. 

In 1935, Heath Cranton Ltd had published a book by Magdalene M. Weale entitled Through the Highlands of Shropshire on Horseback.  It followed Weale’s ramblings through South Shropshire on a pony called Sandy who she borrowed from the stables of Hogstow Hall, near Minsterley.

Saville was certainly familiar with this book and took great inspiration from its pages. It is likely that Weale’s volume, along with the works of Mary Webb, provided much of his early inspiration when it came to setting his Lone Pine books against real locations; in particular, around the Stiperstones area which he didn’t visit until after Seven White Gates had been published.

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