Buckfastleigh
Buckfastleigh is located within Teignbridge local authority area. Historically it formed part of Stanborough Hundred. It falls within Totnes Deanery for ecclesiastical purposes. The Deaneries are used to arrange the typescript Church Notes of B.F.Cresswell which are held in the Westcountry Studies Library. The population was 1525 in 1801 2781 in 1901 . Figures for other years are available on the local studies website. In the valuation of 1334 it was assessed at £01/04/03. The lay subsidy of 1524 valued the community at £10/00/00. In 1641/2 331 adult males signed the Protestation returns. A market is recorded from 14c.-1888.
A parish history file is held in Buckfastleigh Library. You can look for other material on the community by using the place search on the main local studies database. Further historical information is also available on the Genuki website.
Maps: The image below is of the Buckfastleigh area on Donn's one inch to the mile survey of 1765.
On the County Series Ordnance Survey mapping the area is to be found on 1:2,500 sheet 114/10,11 Six inch (1:10560) sheet 114SW,SE
The National Grid reference for the centre of the area is SX739661. On the post 1945 National Grid Ordnance Survey mapping the sheets are: 1:10,000 (six inch to a mile: sheet SX76NW, 1:25,000 mapping: sheet Outdoor Leisure 28, Landranger (1:50,000) mapping: sheet 202. Geological sheet 349 also covers the area.
Illustrations: The image below is of Buckfastleigh as included in the Library's illustrations collection. Other images can be searched for on the local studies catalogue.
A fair is known from: 1792 1888. Extract from The glove is up! Devon's historic fairs, by Tricia Gerrish, by kind permission of the author.
BUCKFASTLEIGH
LOCATION:Off A38, SE edge of Dartmoor
ORIGINAL CHARTER:c.1460, given by Henry VI for St Bartholomew’s Day on 24th August.
Buckfastlegh, as it was known, received a fairs charter from Henry VI c.1460, for St Bartholomew's Day (24th August). Owen lists 29th June - for sheep, and 24th August - Horned cattle. By 1890, these were on 3rd Thursday in June and 2nd Thursday in September.
The fairs were known respectively as Lamb Pie Fair and Pear Pie Fair. These dishes were traditionally part of celebrations. Whilst they have become slightly movable events, both fairs’ names have been revived as part of tourism initiatives. Lamb Pie Day has the longer celebration, being in June, with Lamb Pie Day in September.
Extract from Devon by W.G.Hoskins (1954), included by kind permission of the copyright holder:
BUCKFASTLEIGH is a small market town on the old main road from Exeter to Plymouth, close to the Dart. The original settlement was at Buckfast, about 1 m. N. beside the river, where an abbey was founded c. 1030, and endowed by King Canute. It is possible that the house was founded somewhat earlier but no good evidence of this is yet forthcoming.(For the possibility of an earlier date, see Stephan, Historical guide to Buckfast Abbey, 2-3. The suggestion of a Celtic foundation must be received with caution.) For some reason the abbey seems to have perished by the early 12th century, and was refounded by monks from Savigny in 1134-6. King Stephen ordered the restoration of all the former possessions of the abbey, which passed in 1148 under Cistercian rule and so remained until the Dissolution. The site of the abbey came to Sir Thomas Dennis of Holcombe Burnell, a great devourer of monastic lands in Devon; but the most valuable manors came to Sir William Petre (born at Torbryan not far away), Secretary of State to four Tudor monarchs. The great abbey buildings were stripped by Dennis, and were reduced to ruin. In 1806 a local woollen manufacturer, who had bought the site, levelled the standing walls and built a house and woollen mill here. The house now forms part of the reconstructed abbey. A community of French Benedictines acquired the site in 1882 and set out to rebuild the abbey. In 1902 they became an autonomous community once more, and elected the first abbot of Buckfast since the Reformation. The work of rebuilding the abbey church was carried on by the monks under great difficulties for twenty-five years and finally accomplished. On 25 August 1932, St. Mary's Abbey church as solemnly consecrated by Cardinal Bourne, archbishop of Westminster. The church follows the foundations of its 12th century predecessor and is mainly in the transitional style between Norman and Early English. The tower was completed in 1938. There are some remains of older work, including the Abbot's Tower (15th century) and part of the Abbot's Lodging. The chapel of St. Anne in a vaulted undercroft is probably part of the 12th century foundation. At The Grange, near by, the tithe barn is a medieval building. The woollen mills by the river are late 18th or early 19th century in date, and were working until recent years.
Buckfastleigh was "the clearing of Buckfast", and probably originated in the 13th century The parish church (Holy Trinity) stands above and away from the town, on a high limestone rock which commands a view of the abbey, the Dart valley, and the beautiful woods. It is a 13th century building (tower and chancel) with a 15th century nave. There is a fine Norman font. The church is pleasant despite the drastic restoration of 1845. In the churchyard are the ruins of a 13th century chantry chapel. Buckfastleigh never developed much as a town, chiefly because of the proximity of the woollen and stannary town of Ashburton (3 m. away), and it contains little or nothing of architectural note. Dart Bridge, which carries the main Plymouth road, is an attractive structure, perhaps of 15th century date.
