Tawstock
| Tawstock | |
 St Peter's Church, Tawstock |
|
  Tawstock Tawstock shown within Devon | |
| Population | 2,093 (2001) |
|---|---|
| OS grid reference | SS5529 |
| Civil parish | Tawstock |
| District | North Devon |
| Shire county | Devon |
| Region | South West |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | BARNSTAPLE |
| Postcode district | EX31 |
| Dialling code | 01271 |
| Police | Devon and Cornwall |
| Fire | Devon and Somerset |
| Ambulance | South Western |
| EU Parliament | South West England |
| UK Parliament | North Devon |
Tawstock is a village and civil parish in North Devon in the English county of Devon. It has a population of 2,093.[5]
Parish Church
St Peter's church is, unusually for Devon, a church largely of the 14th century. The plan is cruciform and the site is in the former park of the Earls of Bath. The collection of church monuments is particularly fine: most of the persons commemorated are members of the family of the Earls, connections of theirs, or household officers. Features of interest include the 16th century gallery, the manorial pew of the Earls of Bath (Renaissance in style) and two ceilings of Italian plasterwork. The tomb of Lady Fitzwarren and the monument of Rachel, Countess of Bath (with figure by Burman) are in the south chancel aisle.[6]
Tawstock Court
The Elizabethan mansion re-built by William Bourchier, 3rd Earl of Bath (d.1623), whose magnificent monument with effigies exists in St Peter's Church, no longer exists apart from the gatehouse, with date-stone 1574. The Wrey family of Trebeigh Manor, St Ive near Liskeard, Cornwall, were heirs of the Bourchiers on the death of Henry Bourchier, 5th Earl of Bath in 1654 without progeny.[7] Anne Bourchier, one of the three daughters of his first cousin once removed Edward Bourchier, 4th Earl of Bath (d.1636), had married Sir Chichester Wrey, 3rd Baronet (1628-1668), and thus as one of the three Bourchier co-heiresses she brought the Tawstock estate to the Wrey family.[8] Four years after Sir Bourchier Wrey, 7th Baronet (1757-1826) had inherited the estate from his father the house burned down in 1787 and was rebuilt by him in the Neo-Gothic style by about 1800, when Rev. John Swete described visiting it in his travel journal: "Entering through a gateway of antient date by the stables I arrived in front of Tawstock House the seat of Sir Bourchier Wrey which when completed (for it is now but a shell) will be one of the finest houses in the county"[9] He considered however that the church intercepted the view but excused its presence on account of its architectural merits and "highly-wrought" monumental contents. Part of the Elizabethan house survives today on the south front. The north front was re-modelled in 1885.[10] The principal east front, with crenallated parapet and two end turrets, faces towards St Peter's Parish Church and has a magnificent view across the River Taw to Bishops Tawton village and Codden Hill. It forms a highly picturesque sight when viewed from Bishops Tawton, through which passes a main road to Barnstaple. Sir Robert Bourchier Sherard Wrey, 11th Baronet (1855-1917) was the last to live at Tawstock Court and "to keep house in the old manner" and moved to Corffe, a house on the estate about 1/2 mile SW of Tawstock Court, having let the Court.[11] On his own death in 1917 the title passed to his younger brother, Sir Philip Bourchier Sherard Wrey, 12th Baronet (1858-1936),[12] who in 1919 sold 2,500 acres of the estate for £67,000, leaving some 7,000 acres remaining.[13] In about 1940 Sir Philip's younger brother and heir, Rev. Sir Albany Bourchier Sherard Wrey, 13th Baronet (1861-1948), let Tawstock Court to St Michael's Preparatory School. His nephew and heir Sir (Castel Richard) Bourchier Wrey, 14th Baronet (1903-1991) lived at Webbery,[14] near Bideford, about 4 1/4 miles SW of Tawstock Court, and in the 1970s sold Tawstock Court to its tenant St Michael's School and sold most of the remaining land. Sir George Richard Bourchier Wrey, 15th Baronet (born 1948) inherited only a farmhouse with a few hundred acres, and in 2002 was running a family property business, entirely unconnected with the former Wray estates.[15] St Michael's School continued to occupy Tawstock Court until 2012 when it became insolvent and went into administration, upon which the preparatory school closed. On 17 July 2012 the property with 32 acres was purchased for an undisclosed sum from the administrator Grant Thornton UK LLP, joint administrators of St Michael's School Tawstock Ltd., by Mr Rik Peryer, a property investor and developer, as a private residence.[16] As part of the sale the nursery school division of St Michael's School continues to operate (in 2013) in the stable blocks to the immediate west of the house.
References
- ↑ The same quarterings are shown on the monument of Lady Frances Bourchier (d.1612) in the Bedford Chapel, Chenies, Buckinghamshire, daughter of the 3rd Earl of Bath http://www.middlesex-heraldry.org.uk/publications/monographs/chenies/cheniesBKM-monuments.htm
- ↑ Debrett's Peerage, 1968, p.968
- ↑ The Manners peacock and Bourchier knot are also shown sculpted with the arms of Bourchier impaling Manners above the south-east door to Tawstock Church
- ↑ Visitation of Devon, 1895, p.106
- ↑ Office for National Statistics : Census 2001 : Parish Headcounts : North Devon Retrieved 28 January 2010
- ↑ Betjeman, John, ed. (1968) Collins Pocket Guide to English Parish Churches; the South. London: Collins; p. 166
- ↑ Vivian, Heralds' Visitations of Devon, 1895, p.107
- ↑ Vivian
- ↑ Gray, Todd & Rowe, Margery (Eds.), Travels in Georgian Devon: The Illustrated Journals of the Reverend John Swete, 1789-1800, vol.1, Tiverton, 1999, p.33
- ↑ Pevsner, N. (1952) North Devon. Harmondsworth: Penguin; p. 154
- ↑ Lauder, Rosemary, Devon Families, Tiverton, 2002, p.156
- ↑ Obituary: p. 156, The Annual Register: a review of public events at home and abroad, for the year 1917. London: Longmans, Green and Co. 1918
- ↑ Lauder, Rosemary, Devon Families, Tiverton, 2002, p.156
- ↑ Debrett's Peerage, 1968, p.877
- ↑ Lauder, p.156
- ↑ Independent property adviser GVA has completed the sale of the Tawstock Court estate near Barnstaple, Devon, on behalf of Nigel Morrison and Trevor O'Sullivan of Grant Thornton UK LLP, joint administrators of St Michael's School Tawstock Ltd.
Further reading
- Pevsner, N. (1952) North Devon. Harmondsworth: Penguin; pp. 151–53 [Church of] St Peter
External links
Media related to Tawstock at Wikimedia Commons
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