High Bray is located within North Devon local authority area. Historically it formed part of Sherwill Hundred. It falls within Sherwill 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 264 in 1801 219 in 1901 . Figures for other years are available on the local studies website.

A parish history file is held in South Molton 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 High Bray 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 14/4 Six inch (1:10560) sheet 14NE
The National Grid reference for the centre of the area is SS690343. On the post 1945 National Grid Ordnance Survey mapping the sheets are: 1:10,000 (six inch to a mile: sheet SS63SE, 1:25,000 mapping: sheet Outdoor Leisure 09, Landranger (1:50,000) mapping: sheet 180. Geological sheet 293 also covers the area.

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

BRAY, HIGH gets its name from its situation on the brow of a precipitous hill. The church (All Saints) stands on the summit and commands fine views. It was rebuilt early in the 16th century and thoroughly restored in 1878. The font is early Norman but the shell ornament on the lower part of the bowl was added later with a chisel.

The parish extends NE. to the Somerset boundary along a high ridge of Exmoor and includes Span Head (1618 ft.) and Setta Barrow (1556 ft.) There are numerous barrows on Whitefield Down, Bray Common and Fullaford Down. Gratton and Whitefield farms were Domesday estates, and Muxworthy is mentioned as early as c. 1100. The parish contains deep wooded valleys and fine moorland scenery.