Morchard Bishop
Morchard Bishop is located within Mid Devon local authority area. Historically it formed part of Crediton Hundred. It falls within Cadbury 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 1698 in 1801 985 in 1901 . Figures for other years are available on the local studies website. In 1641/2 253 adult males signed the Protestation returns.
A parish history file is held in Crediton 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 Morchard Bishop 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 54/3 Six inch (1:10560) sheet 54NE
The National Grid reference for the centre of the area is SS770076. On the post 1945 National Grid Ordnance Survey mapping the sheets are: 1:10,000 (six inch to a mile: sheet SS70NE, 1:25,000 mapping: sheet Explorer 113, Landranger (1:50,000) mapping: sheet 191. Geological sheet 309 also covers the area.
Extract from Devon by W.G.Hoskins (1954), included by kind permission of the copyright holder:
MORCHARD BISHOP is a large and pleasant village on the old turnpike road from Crediton to Barnstaple. The Bishop of Exeter bought the manor in 1165. In 1548 the then bishop was obliged by Edward VI to part with it to Sir Thomas Darcy, after which it changed hands several times. (D.A. 33 (1901), 391; Patent Rolls Edw. VI. iv, 18.) The making of the new turnpike road to Barnstaple along the valley in the 1820s gave the village a heavy blow. In 1831 it had 2,000 people; by I901 the population had halved, and it has continued to fall since then.
The church (St. Mary) is entirely a 15th to early 16th century structure, except the plastered and panelled chancel which was rebuilt in the 18th century and has a reredos and altar-rails of that period. There is also a two-decker pulpit with canopy. The church was in process of being built in 1451, when Bishop Lacy granted an indulgence to all who should contribute to the work or the furnishings. (Oliver, Eccl. Ant., iii, 47) In the S. aisle, formerly known as the Easton aisle, are the recumbent effigies of a Devonshire franklin and his wife, in civilian dress. These are almost certainly the effigies of William Easton (d. I505) and his wife who paid for the completion of the aisle (plate 16).
Easton Barton, the home of the Eastons from the 13th century to the 17th, is a notably good example of a late medieval "mansion," built c. I500 and practically unaltered since.
