The Buckinghamshire historian Lipscomb, writing in 1847, speaks of a local tradition that Henry II had a retreat in this neighborhood for his mistress, ‘Fair Rosamund’ (Rosamund Clifford). On an old map he prints, of part of Bernwood Forest, a lane between the woods bears the name ‘Rosiman’s Waye’. According to Murray’s Handbook for… Bucks (1860), the lane in the woods was ‘still’ at the time of writing known as Rosamund’s or Rosamond’s Way, and it was said that ‘King Ludd’s Hall’ at Ludgershall was her retreat.
According to Robert of Gloucester (fl. 1260-1300):
Bours hadde Rosamande
About in Engelonde
Which this King for her sake made
Ich understonde[.]
If Henry indeed made several bowers for Rosamund, perhaps she really had one here because of the nearness of Kingswood to the royal hunting lodge of Brill.
However, it is more likely that the traditional connection with Fair Rosamund was made long after her and Henry’s deaths. Although Kingswood is mentioned as ‘the lord King’s wood’ in a document of 1298, nothing is known of its ownership until it was forfeited to the Crown by Thomas Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester (1355-97). Thomas was the youngest son of Edward III, and given his surname because he was born at Woodstock, Oxfordshire, where Rosamund traditionally had her bower.