Tales of the Urban Explorer: Buckwood Animal Sanctuary
The tale of Buckwood Animal Sanctuary is a sad one. In 2009 the owner, ‘Alan Littlewood’ was banned for life for keeping animals after alleged cruelty charges.
His defence maintained it was due to ill-health. Despite this, he was fined £700 but was spared a jail sentence.
Mr. Littlewood appealed against his ban for life which was overturned. Five years later he was found dead surrounded by his three dogs. It might sound like he was eaten alive in some sort of doggy retribution but the official diagnosis was pneumonia.
I was intrigued to see what was left behind in this hermit’s legacy. A hermit he must have been as this cottage was off the beaten track and situated in woodland.
Is that a stone dog? I figured we might be heading in the right direction.
Maybe we got here a little late. There was bad graffiti everywhere we looked.
Getting inside Buckwood Animal Sanctuary was a little tricky and involved sliding under a fence, or climbing over it.
@dizzydiscovery and @goblinknackers all took slightly different approaches and I personally remember witnessing some expletives:
'Owwww, my fucking balls', 'Arrghh, bastard.. my twatting head'; such fine examples of profanity are part and parcel of everyday exploring and should be fully expected.
Knowing we had to exit the same way didn’t make it much easier.
Inside was a bit of a train wreck. I was hoping there may be a little evidence of past habitation.
He might have been isolated from society but still had the comforts of a gas fire. That plastic chair however....
Home, sweet home. An open fire with real coal and logs once. It must have been cosy.
…and what is that? It looks suspiciously like one of those home-made bars. Did Alan Littlewood like his beer?
We saw no signs of the sofa he was reported to have been found dead upon. 'That does sound a little morbid.'
Upstairs was in a terrible state, burnt but accessible.
Walking around up there was out of the question. Look at those big holes. Everything was covered in that slippery green moss.
Note there is little roof left. I dared not see what was behind the iron door.
We vacated the house faring a little better at keeping our balls and heads intact this time. Experience is always a blessing.
…’A side view of the Buckwood Animal Sanctuary house. Someone had gone to great lengths to try and keep people like us out.. and failed’…
At a guess, this is where the kennels used to be. It looks to be mostly demolished. Living here as a dog couldn't have been much fun.
A couple of the old buildings remained, heavily laden with graffiti and with nothing of interest inside.
Living in the woods alone must have been a lonely experience. Some people don't like people and prefer hounds I guess.
Buckwood Animal Sanctuary was the last visit of our Bradford area explores that day, and a sad one to finish with.
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How sad when someone who wants to assist animals doesn't get is right. Lovely neck of the woods but sure as hell would not venture into such a derelict place.
@tipu curate
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Thanks @joanstewart, oh.. it wasn't so bad, if you lived close enough you could have tagged along and got into the spirit of things!
Alan Littlewood most probably took more animals than he could cope with, at the end of the day three stayed with him, loyalty.
Doubt many would venture into old places such as this, although I love adventure trying some weird things out. Exploring up storm water systems to see where they came out 😂, snakes alive down there I tell you!
Derelict buildings no longer an option, yikes take your life into your own hands, too many weirdos live there that have not been thrown out....
There's another fun read. Thanks, I didn't slip or hit my head or anything twatty.
There was definitely some swearing going on, some of it probably from me! !WINE.
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I was half hoping for some lost world antics where forgotten pets had mutated into terrible awful things which hunted the bunch of you into a shed necessitating some extravagant escape plan :OD
Fuck the IRA is quite a depressingly common bit of graffiti up here, its a shame to see it is in other places too
I only take notice of what the graffiti says when I look later. 'I will suck cock for weed'... was different. What gender wrote that?
Hahah, yeah, I am hoping that it would be a lady but really, I don't think there are a lot of lady taggers out there. I would be very happy to be proved wrong!
!WINE
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Very interesting. What was that yellow cord that was just dangling from the rafters in the one photo. Was it a rope or was it a power cord. It almost looked like a power cord. That is pretty sad about the guy unless he was really abusing them. Hopefully all of the animals ended up being okay.
It looks suspiciously like someone laying the foundations of self-hanging. Look at the large gap through those rafters below. !WINE
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I wondered that too! Yikes!
I can understand some folk giving up on people and preferring the company of animals (not like that!). Looking after them properly is not always easy.
I was reading about a pub that a builder 'accidentally' demolished and was forced to rebuild. It said them have tricks like removing a few tiles so the damp gets in and makes it non-viable to fix.
He did have some contacts with humans, according to the two newspaper reports. Bad health, and alone, can't have been nice. !WINE.
Very interesting, though as you pointed out @slobberchops , rather depressing.
I'm going to have to explore this "Urbex Community" as I have a fair amount of photos from my past "Urban exploration"
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I wish it was more active, feel free to post your content there. I look daily for goodies.
I have the community page open in Peakd right now, been sitting there open in fact for almost 2 hrs.
Things just keep coming up to draw me away from the pc.
But I HAVE subscribed to it, and I WILL create a post soon.
I've also followed you @slobberchops
Excellent post, as always.
What a sad story. I always have found animal cruelty to be horrible, I don't know how this sort of people can live with themselves. His death was definetely intriguing. A nasty place. The woods are fine, beautiful, but no one would like to be there alone for a lifetime
!ENGAGE 20
I am wondering how long those dogs were whining before he was found. They would have known he had passed.
God rest his soul, but being alive and having that kind of behaviour ain't right. I hope the dogs are fine
ENGAGEtokens.The regrowth within this location is incredible. Easy to see how nature takes things back without human influence. Very cool!
One day governments might actually be there to help people out. They knew he was struggling to help the animals he rescued, so instead of offering to help and pointing out options to get assistance, they just fine arrest and ban him for trying to do something no one else wanted a part of, helping a few animals stay alive.
That's what they do here, such is life.
That's a really sad story, I take it he didn't have any families...
They would have taken the house if so. I think in many cases, it may be like this. The property discarded.
yep, ... caught my bits on the wall way in.😣
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Not much left there, even the graffiti is a tad soulless
Would you believe me if I told you I went there to snatch Alan's priceless golden doubloons hidden under the sofa he died on? !WINE
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Probably 😂
I’m very gullible
Thanks for continuing to make Hive awesome.
Oh oh. This is absolutely a good time for fun reading through. I always love sitting down to read your articles from A-Z. Thanks for sharing my friend. Greetings from Nigeria 🇳🇬.
It's interesting, you explore these ruins and its like historic exploration.
I would love to live in the woods by myself, I hate humans, although love the cat kind, alas that's not to be for me!!
This charactor, is interesting, I like to read up more about him?
Did he torture animals or something like that, he somewhere seems to be a bit of a psycho and the question how he died, it could be suicide... definitely lonely fellow. Anyway.