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Coal Tax Posts were markers defining the area within which the Corporation of London could charge duty on coal entering the area. This area had been expanded in 1851 but then reduced in 1861 to coincide with the Metropolitan Police District of the day, the limits of which were between about 20 km and 30km from Charing Cross. It is from this latter time that most of the existing posts date. The post stands in a secluded corner of Wormley Wood, part of 360 acres of woodland purchased from the Gascoyne Cecil Estate. It had been in that family since queen Elizabeth I's minister Sir William Cecil bought it 300 years ago.