Dunsford is located within East Devon local authority area. Historically it formed part of Wonford Hundred. It falls within Kenn 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 661 in 1801 633 in 1901 . Figures for other years are available on the local studies website. In 1641/2 148 adult males signed the Protestation returns.

A parish history file is held in Moretonhampstead 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 Dunsford 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 79/13,91/1 Six inch (1:10560) sheet 79SW,91NW
The National Grid reference for the centre of the area is SX813892. On the post 1945 National Grid Ordnance Survey mapping the sheets are: 1:10,000 (six inch to a mile: sheet SX88NW, 1:25,000 mapping: sheet Explorer 031, Landranger (1:50,000) mapping: sheet 191. Geological sheet 325 also covers the area.

Illustrations: The image below is of Dunsford as included in the Library's Etched on Devon's memory website. Other images can be searched for on the local studies catalogue.

Extract from Devon by W.G.Hoskins (1954), included by kind permission of the copyright holder:

DUNSFORD parish has much diversified and beautiful scenery even by Devonshire standards, the wooded gorge of the Teign-deservedly famous for its beauty-being only one of its charms. The village stands on a hill above the Teign, and contains a good deal of whitewashed cob, and some 16th and 17th century moorstone building.

The church (St. Mary) stands well and dominates the village. It has a good W. tower, and is of 14th to 15th century date. The early 14th century chancel was rebuilt in 1846. Though rather thoroughly restored, the interior is attractive and interesting. The pulpit, altar rails, and W. gallery are all late 17th to early 18th century work. At the E. end of the aisle is the Fulford pew and an elaborate monument, with effigies, to Sir Thomas Fulford (1610) and his wife (1639). Hung above the tomb is a helmet of one of the Fulfords. The oak seating is modern (1933) and good.

Fulford, 2 m. NW. of the village, was a Domesday manor. The Fulfords are first recorded here in the time of Richard I, and are today the only family left in Devon who can claim an uninterrupted descent in the male line since that date. Few Devon families have been more distinguished in the history of the county, above all as soldiers. Three early Fulfords were Crusaders. Sir Baldwin Fulford fought at Towton for Henry VI, and was be-headed at Hexham in 1461. Sir Thomas Fulford came, with the Earl of Devon, to the relief of Exeter when it was besieged by Perkin War beck in 1497. In the Civil War, Col. Francis Fulford (later Sir Francis) garrisoned his house for the king. It was besieged by Fairfax in December 1645, and honourably surrendered to him after a bombardment from the park where two redoubts of this period may still be seen.

The present house, standing in an old park, is one of the most interesting in Devon (plate 32). It was built temp. Henry VII-Henry VIII, and probably completed about 1534 when much finely carved panelling of Renaissance type was put in. This has now been brought together in the Great Hall. Considerable remodelling was done internally temp. William and Mary: there is a fine staircase of that period. The house was altered externally and internally in the early 19th century, when a garret floor was put in and the windows all Gothicised, but its quadrangular Tudor plan was left untouched. The chapel, licensed in 1402, was used intermittently as a chapel until well into the 19th century. The pictures form a better collection than could be found in most of the Devon squires' houses. There is a bust portrait of Queen Elizabeth by Nicholas Hilliard. Sir John Fulford fought at Gravelines with Count Egmont in July 1558, and a huge canvas at Fulford depicts the scene. It is said to have been painted by the elder Franck and presented to Sir John by Egmont, whose portrait also hangs here.

Clifford Barton and Halstow were Domesday manors. The former is a fine old farmhouse with considerable traces of its formerstatusasa "mansion." Clifford Bridge, over the Teign, is mentioned by Leland, but the present bridge may not be older than the 17th century Sowton Barton, recorded in 1244, also has remains of the old " mansion."