There are three round barrows and two cairns here on the moorland at the top of Weacombe Hill, on the neck of land between Sheppard’s Combe and Bicknoller Combe. Ruth Tongue has a story about this very spot:
[This] story was told me by a very sweet and gentle cottager who had once had occasion to climb the Quantocks late one winter afternoon. When he had climbed Weacombe to the top the sea mist came down, and he felt he might be frozen to death before he got home. But as he was groping along he suddenly touched shaggy fur and thought that old Shep, his sheep-dog, had come out to look for him. ‘Good dog, Shep. Whoame, boy!’ he said. The dog turned and led him right to his cottage door, where he heard his own dog barking inside. Heturned to look at the dog who had guided him, which grew gradually larger and then faded away. ‘It was the Black Dog, God bless it!’ he would always say.
Black Dogs are not always so friendly – it’s nice to hear that some of them can be so helpful. Perhaps he uses one of the barrows as his kennel.
from ‘Somerset Folklore’ 1965
