Denbury
Denbury is located within Teignbridge local authority area. Historically it formed part of Haytor Hundred. It falls within Moretonhampstead 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 330 in 1801 303 in 1901 . Figures for other years are available on the local studies website. The lay subsidy of 1524 valued the community at £02/02/03. In 1641/2 112 adult males signed the Protestation returns. It is recorded as a borough from 1286. A market is recorded from 14 cent..
A parish history file is held in Newton Abbot 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 Denbury 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 115/2 Six inch (1:10560) sheet 115NW
The National Grid reference for the centre of the area is SX823689. On the post 1945 National Grid Ordnance Survey mapping the sheets are: 1:10,000 (six inch to a mile: sheet SX86NW, 1:25,000 mapping: sheet Explorer 031, Landranger (1:50,000) mapping: sheet 202. Geological sheet 339 also covers the area.
A fair is known from: 14c.-1792. An extract from The glove is up! Devon's historic fairs, by Tricia Gerrish, by kind permission of the author.
DENBURY FAIR
LOCATION: Between A38 and A381, near Newton Abbot (c. 3 miles) and Ashburton
ORIGINAL CHARTER: 1285 Charter granted by King Edward I to the Abbot of Tavistock: Robert Champeaux (Campell).3 day fair at festival of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary: 8th September.
A GLOVE FAIR
Denbury is recorded as a borough in ancient records. A yearly fair was granted to the Abbot of Tavistock by King Edward I for the borough of Devenebr in 1285, and confirmed in 1318. There is, however, a suggestion that Denbury Fair goes back to the Scandinavian autumn festival, and that it was later 'christianised' into a fair at the Feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Lysons mention a cattle fair on 11th September in 1822; the old 8th September fair date is listed by Owen two years later, for cattle and soap. Interestingly, a report in the Western Times in 1879 claims that, following the 1752 calendar change, Denbury Fair moved to 19th September, the date on which it was held in that year.
According to various sources, Denbury Fair lapsed in the 1880s and during World War I, was recorded again in about 1934, and appeared in a list of Devon fairs current in around 1960.
Cattle sales were an important part of this fair. When an epidemic of rinderpest hit the country in 1866, it was closed, and may have fallen into disuse, for an attempt was made in the 1870s to 'revive' it. Soap was also a feature in the early 19th century, and cheese became a speciality in the early 1900s.
According to a correspondent to the Western Antiquary in 1880, Denbury had a glove ceremony. A large white glove, said to have been sent by King Edward (who gave the charter) was always exposed 'in a conspicuous place.' Fair day was the fixed day for paying rents. In its heyday, carriages bearing the arms of the Carews and other county families were to be seen approaching Church Town, where the Denbury Fair was held. It was also, by local superstition, the last day for gathering hazelnuts. After 19th September, they became 'slip-shell.'
The people of Denbury are believed to have taken the custom of charter fairs to Labrador's Newfoundland fisheries. A fair was celebrated there on the same date, with similar ceremonies. Many Irish Roman Catholics also worked at the fisheries, and, in the belief that all fairs are celebrated on saints days, commented 'what a grand old man Saint Denbury must have been.'
The fair's last known site was in an eight acre field behind the Manor. A ceremony involving Old Mother and Old Father Denbury seems to have been very popular in its latter years. A couple of mature age were chosen, and chaired in procession round the borough. Old Father Denbury traditionally carried a scythe. At the 1935 fair, it is recorded that effigies represented the two characters.
Denbury is one of many fairs which has dwindled into oblivion. It was stopped by the Great War, and was never the same afterwards. Amusements did not keep pace with the times: a complaint which incidentally was first levelled in the 1870s, when very few people visited and it was described as being 'a duty for the gentry.' Perhaps when the gentry became reduced in number, there was nothing to sustain it.
Extract from Devon by W.G.Hoskins (1954), included by kind permission of the copyright holder:
Denbury is an ancient village in the parish of Torbryan, taking its name from the strong earthwork which crowns a lofty igneous rock to the SW. It is "the fort of the men of Devon" (Defnas burh), a name which may well commemorate a stronghold where the Dumnonii held out for a time against a Saxon advance from the head of the Teign estuary. The fort consists of an elliptical, ramparted area, with an outer court on the W. side, and with two large mounds in the main camp. (It has never been excavated and its date is unknown: it may conceivably be of two distinct periods.
Denbury belonged to Tavistock Abbey in 1086 and possibly earlier. It market in 1286, and given the status of a borough with a portreeve some time in the 14th century (See V.H.C., 589-90 for a fuller description) but never became more than a village. The church (St. Mary) is a cruciform building with a battered tower, all of early 14th century date and pretty certainly the church dedicated by Bishop Stapeldonin 1318. (Reg, Stapledon, 137) The fine 12th century font remains from an earlier church.
Denbury House is an Elizabethan mansion. There is some good 16th and 17th century building in the village; several houses have massive chimney-breasts on the street, a characteristic feature of certain Devon villages.
