Hewe’s Virginia Crab

Possibly a seedling of the native Malus coronaria var. angustifolia. Probably Virginia about 1700.  One of the most prized of all American cider apples. So important was the apple that in his 1817 A View of the Cultivation of Fruit Trees, William Coxe devoted an entire chapter to making cider with Hewe’s.  The red-skinned white-spotted fruit is small, round, juicy, tough, astringent and acidic. According to AJ Downing in 1848, Hewe’s “makes a very high flavoured high dry cider, which, by connoisseurs, is thought unsurpassed in flavour by any other.” The fruit is small—you may want to plant several!   Quite hardy despite its name. Long ago used as a rootstock even as far north as Maine. Blooms midseason. Z4-8.