Dongas road protest group
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The Dongas road protest group were a protest group in England noted for their occupation of Twyford Down outside Winchester, Hampshire. This was a protest against the M3 motorway extension which would destroy some of the environment there. The name Dongas comes from the Matabele word for Gully. This had somehow been given by Winchester locals to the drovers tracks on Twyford Down.
After they were driven from Twyford Down by bulldozers, they moved to Bramdean Common. They constituted about twenty people in their early twenties. The group maintained an involvement in various subsequent road protests (Solsbury Hill, North Wales, Newbury), but gradually morphed into a semi-nomadic 'tribe', travelling the South West of England on foot, squatting various hill-forts and putting on seasonal gatherings in an attempt to reawaken a sense of connectedness with the land. The last of the nomadic Dongas were travelling in Cornwall until the end of 1999, after which some of them moved to France to continue their nomadic lifestyle.