Thus some 21 sites were examined in 14 parishes, with one site generating two reports.
Three sites were examined in each of Great Torrington, Hartland, and Northam parishes
and 2 sites were examined in both Ashreigny and Clawton parishes. A total of 7 commercial
organisations were involved, with South West Archaeology producing 15 reports, AC
Archaeology and Substrata each producing 2 reports. The most common forms of development
generating reports in 2015 were small scale extensions and refurbishments of historic
buildings. There were slightly more developments involving wind-turbines in 2015
than the previous year, although the Swingdon Farm, Ashwater turbine report was the
result of an amended application, with the initial report being produced in 2013.
The Marland School, Peters Marland had also seen an earlier report in 2013.
Reports
1. Alverdiscott: Higher Kingdon Farm
Two reports were produced in sequence for this Scheduled Historic Monument, which
lies 2.8km W of Alverdiscott church. The first was a geophysical survey using gradiometry
and earth resistance. The site was known from crop marks and aerial photography
to have a triple-ditched enclosure and a Roman marching camp and the work was part
of an evaluation of the whole site by Devon County Council as it was speculated that
there could be more archaeology present. Linear anomalies in the SW of the site
were related to the triple-ditched Iron Age enclosure and other anomalies, considered
to be back-filled pits, were also associated with this. The Roman marching camp
appeared as linear anomalies. Other linear anomalies were considered to be ditches
and banks associated with settlement within the site and linear anomalies in the
N and E of the site were presumed to be former field boundaries. However, the Roman
marching camp was not apparent in the earth resistance data and only a portion of
the Iron Age enclosure was detected by this methodology.
The second report was a follow-up and involved test pits to establish the state of
preservation of features detected in the geophysical survey but not to excavate them.
Nine test pits were hand-dug, with 6 uncovering archaeology. The pits without archaeology
were considered to be near-misses, and within the margins of error between survey
and setting out relatively small pits. Ditches are probable ditch fills were found
for both the Roman marching camp and the Iron Age enclosure, but nothing was found
to allow for dating. Four pits yielded medieval and post-medieval pottery within
the plough soil, with North Devon gravel-tempered ware of medieval and post-medieval
age being positively identified. It was concluded that ploughing had destroyed
surface and shallow features but that the principal archaeology survived at greater
depth.
2. Alwington: Portledge House
The report presents the results of geophysical survey (gradiometry and earth resistance)
in the grounds of Portledge House, a Grade II Listed Building, as part of landscaping
the garden, which was first known to have been laid out in the eighteenth century.
Portledge lies close to the coast and about 1.8 km NW of Alwington church. The
geophysics found several anomalies consistent with features of a garden, including
possible flower beds, paths and garden buildings.
3. Ashreigny: Densham Farm
The report concerned monitoring during construction of a wind turbine at Densham
Farm, about 1km SE of Ashreigny village. Map evidence suggested that the site formed
the fields of a hamlet at Densham, now shrunken to a single farm. One probable former
field boundary was identified but nothing else of archaeological importance was found.
4. Ashreigny: East Westacott
The report concerned a watching brief during cinstruction of groundworks for a single
wind turbine at East Westacott, about 3 km west of Ashreigny village. The general
area was known to contain archaeological features and it was considered possible
that small features, unobserved by aerial photography or field walking might lie
within the site. Only a single feature was exposed during the groundworks, an undated
ditch that probably related to previous field boundaries.
5. Ashwater: Swingdon Farm
This report concerned monitoring at a wind turbine site at Swingdon Farm, some 3.5km
NW of Ashwater village and about 2km ESE of Clawton village. The site had been evaluated
for the initial application in 2013 and nothing of archaeological interest was found.
This report directly deals with the trenches needed for the cable to link the turbine
to the grid. Only in one field was anything found and the few sherds of pottery
here were of eighteenth or nineteenth century date.
6. Buckland Brewer: Sunderleigh
The report concerned a desk-based assessment and visual impact assessment of a single
wind turbine at Sunderleigh about 1km WSW of Buckland Brewer village and about 1.2km
SSE of Parkham village. The site formed part of Babeleigh Moor, which was enclosed
and improved during the nineteenth century. Only limited numbers of archaeological
and historical sites are within a 5km radius and the hill and valley nature of the
topography and the hedgerows of the landscape limit the visual impact, although the
turbine can now be seen to dominate the skyline on a short stretch of the Yeo Vale-
Powlers Piece road.
7. Clawton: Blagdon Manor
The report was occasioned by the return of what had been a hotel to domestic residential
use and comprised a brief Historic Building record for a Grade II Listed Building.
The house, formerly a farm, lies some 2.8km SE of Clawton village. This report
found that some aspects of structure found in the initial record had been lost in
its conversion to a hotel, but that others were now apparent and the history of the
building was somewhat easier to read. The core of the house represented piecemeal
construction and alteration over a period from the seventeenth to the early nineteenth
centuries and with a more significant nineteenth century extension. The building
is of rubble stone and cob on stone footings and original slate floors survive throughout
much of the ground floor. Some of the roof timbers appear to be original. The conversion
was felt to be sympathetic to the building.
8. Clawton: Whimble Hill, Holsworthy
The reports concerned monitoring and recording during the construction of a new sewage
pipeline at Whimble Hill on the southern outskirts of Holsworthy and just within
Clawton parish. Cartographic analysis suggested that the area contained medieval
enclosures of strip fields and Bronze Age tools had also been found previously in
the vicinity. No finds were made and nothing of archaeological interest was recorded
on the c 1.6km course of the pipeline.
9. Great Torrington: 9 High Street
The report examined the eastern gable end of this house in the heart of Great Torrington.
The property is not listed but is a fairly original seventeenth century merchant’s
house. Most of the original timber frame survives and was exposed during the repair
work. In common with many properties in North Devon, it was ‘modernised’ in the
nineteenth century with the framing cut so a narrow sash window could be inserted.
This has rather compromised the structural integrity of the house and the report
concludes, both on building and on historic and aesthetic grounds, that the nineteenth
century window should be replaced and the tie beam, which was severed to insert the
window, could then be renewed.
10. Great Torrington: Sydney House, South Street
The report was an evaluation of the site ahead of possible development. It lies
just SW of the Town Hall and overlooks the Torridge valley. A total of 11 trenches
were mechanically excavated. Six trenches in the west of the site yielded nothing.
The remaining trenches, in the centre of the site uncovered a ditch and from this
were recovered a variety of pottery sherds, much with glaze, some animal bone, oyster
and mussel shells. A seventeenth century pottery kiln is known to be located immediate
to the W of the site and it is possible that some of the pottery derived from this.
However, most of the pottery suggests medieval and post-medieval domestic activity
on the site.
11. Great Torrington: Town Hall
The report concerned an Historic Building Record and archaeological monitoring and
recording occasioned by renovation and extension work at the Town Hall, in the heart
of Great Torrington. The present building dates from 1861 and is a Grade II Listed
Building and prominent within the Conservation Area. The Town Hall and the buildings
to each side of it are presumed to be in-filling of an original market square. Documentary
sources reveal that the Town Hall of 1763 removed to allow the present building to
be erected was itself a replacement of a still earlier Town Hall. So it was concluded
that there was potential for traces of these earlier buildings to be revealed during
ground-works for the new extension. Cobbled surfaces were found across much of the
exposed site, some probably relating to earlier buildings and some possibly being
the road surface of the High Street incorporated when the building was extended into
the street. Foundation trenches were exposed but precise dating proved to be impossible.
A moderate amount of pottery was recovered, predominantly North Devon coarse ware
but with a little sgraffito.
12. Hartland: Lower Brownsham House
The report was occasioned by renovations and repair work to this Grade II Listed
Building owned by the National Trust. The building had been the subject of an earlier
extensive survey and report in 1990 and this report adds a little to the substance.
Brownsham is among the more easterly of the farmsteads in Hartland parish, lying
about 700 metres from the coast and about 3.5km E of Hartland village. The present
farm house has a long history, with the oldest parts dating to the early sixteenth
century. It was extended in the seventeenth century and considerably altered in
the eighteenth century. Most of the farm-buildings date from this period or later.
In a former dairy two large stone slating troughs survive.
13. Hartland: South Hole and Embury Beacon
The report was produced as part of the process of developing a management plan for
the National Trust’s South Hole property, which includes, roughly at its centre,
the Scheduled Monument of Embury Beacon. The whole property is of some 126 acres
and contains some of the most impressive coastal scenery in NW Devon. Most of the
report is synthesis of already published sources to present a landscape history of
this area. As such, Embury Beacon has been the focus of work in 1972 and more recently
a full survey (Devon Archaeological Society Proceedings, volume 72, 2014). The report
concludes that there is much potential to enhance visitor understanding of the complex
landscape elements and identifies more general principles to be incorporated in land
management that would improve and conserve both the fragile ecology and the complex
and diverse historic landscape. Central for much of this would be more active scrub
control and some coppicing of woodland and sustained grazing of the coastal strip.
14. Hartland Stoke Barton
The report was a desk-based study and evaluation trenching exercise ahead of the
construction of a single dwelling in a field adjacent to the farm house. Stoke Barton
lies just to the S of St Nectan’s church Stoke, the mother church of the large parish
of Hartland and about 2km W of Hartland village. The field had seen various changes
in its land-use, from pasture to orchard and back again. Some of the site had been
compromised by sceptic tanks works. Traces were found of a hollow-way and of two
hedge banks that had been part of a pre-1840 configuration. Whilst the wider site
yielded a range of pottery, with some medieval and much post medieval, especially
North Devon coarse ware, none was found on the site of the proposed dwelling house.
15. Northam: Daddon Hill
The report is a gradiometry survey of the site for a large development, about 1km
SSW of Northam village. A desk-based assessment had been completed in 2014 and suggested
further evaluation. Over 130 clusters of magnetic anomalies were found, but about
a quarter could be related directly to field boundaries shown on the Tithe Map and
many other linear features were either drains or possible pre-Tithe Map field boundaries.
One cluster of anomalies was probably a set of quarries and pits but two others
as curvilinear features could possibly have been ring ditches of a barrow or hut
and were considered to merit trial trenching to establish more precise information.
16. Northam: St Mary’s CoE School, Chanters Lane
The report notes the outcome of two small test pits in the grounds of St Mary’s CoE
Primary School in Chanters Road, Northam, but within the continuously built-up area
of Bideford. The aim was to provide an educational, hands-on, experience for the
older school children. Most of the pottery recovered was North Devon ware, with
about twice as much gravel-tempered as gravel-free. A small quantity of clay-pipe
stems was found and one piece of glass from an onion bottle rim of early eighteenth
century date was found. All the material found has been retained by the school.
17. Northam: Pebbleridge Road, Westward Ho!
The report analysed ten mechanically dug trenches on a site for development for housing.
It lies about 250 metres inland of the Pebble Ridge and c 400 metres from the Mesolithic
site on Westward Ho! beach. The trenches intercepted several land drains and from
within one of these a few sherds of fifteenth and sixteenth century North Devon gravel-free
ware were recovered. The sub-soil yielded a few fragments of sixteenth and seventeenth
century North Devon gravel-tempered ware. The site itself lay next to Venton farm
house, and so pottery fragments of the late medieval and early modern period might
have been expected.
18. Peters Marland: Marland school
The report details the results from 3 trenches opened by mechanical excavator on
a site to be developed for school buildings. A trial trench in 2012, and the subject
of an earlier report, suggested that the site could have been the focus of medieval
manorial activity close to the church, which adjoins it. Only one of the trenches
found any pottery, a single sherd of medieval North Devon coarse ware. Another trench
confirmed the existence of a field boundary shown on the Tithe Map. It was concluded
that the medieval manor demesne farm lay nearby but did not occupy any of the site.
19. Tetcott: Nethercott Farm
The report covers archaeological monitoring on a site where three wind turbines and
associated infrastructure were to be built. It lies om high ground in the E of the
parish, some 1.5km E of Higher Lana, the principal settlement focus of the parish,
and 2.2km E of Tetcott church and Tetcott Manor. Six areas were mechanically excavated
under supervision. Three areas produced no finds, but flint flakes and cores and
a piece of Greensand chert, showing possible signs of use. All but one flake came
from the sub-soil and probably had been disturbed by ploughing at some time. Nonetheless,
it was concluded that there could have been prehistoric settlement on or very close
to the site.
20. Virginstowe: Railway Bridge
The report is of an historic building recording of a former railway over-bridge on
the minor road from Panson to Virginstowe, about 500 metres W of Virginstowe church.
The bridge had been constructed for the North Cornwall Line of the London and South
Western Railway, which opened in 1886. It was a typical piece of railway architecture
for the line and constructed of local stone. The line closed in 1967 and the current
planning application was for the arch was to be filled in.
21. Winkleigh: Homeleigh, Queen Street
The report was an archaeological watching brief during the demolition of an old and
construction of a new garage at a site just S of the church in the heart of the village.
Homeleigh itself is a seventeenth century Grade II Listed Building. Because of
its location, the site was considered to have potential to yield some interesting
archaeology. A total of 16 sherds of pottery were recovered, 7 being North Devon
coarse ware of c 1200-1350 and 9 were post-medieval, principally North Devon coarse
ware with a single sherd of seventeenth century sgraffito ware. The finds were typical
of what might have been expected from a site forming part of the village core.
22. Woolfardisworthy: Manor House & Farmers’ Arms
The report was a desk-based assessment and historic building record for two properties,
both Grade II Listed Buildings, at the heart of Woolfardisworthy village which were
undergoing restoration and refurbishment. The Manor House, next to the church,
proved to be a complex structure with an eighteenth century front range added to
a late fifteenth or early sixteenth century house. The whole was then modified slightly
in the later eighteenth century and a few nineteenth century alterations were made,
especially a few windows. The Farmers Arms comprised a cottage and two barns, all
cob built, of mainly eighteenth century origin, modified somewhat to facilitate conversion
into a public house early in the twentieth century. The two buildings contribute
significantly to the townscape of this part of the village, and together with the
parish church, they form a centrepiece to this part of the village. The Farmer’s
Arms and other associated buildings may possibly represent an undated in-filling
of a former square, the original ‘worthy’ of Woofardisoworthy.
Discussion
Work published this year adds a little to our archaeological knowledge, although
in several instances, the reports tantalise rather than reveal a great deal. Nowhere
is this more apparent than at Higher Kingdon Farm, Alverdiscott, where both an Iron
Age enclosure and Roman army marching camp are to be found. A principal aim of the
work here was to ascertain the survival of archaeology on these Scheduled Monuments
and so investigative excavation was not attempted, in line with Historic England’s
policy for such sites not in any immediate danger. Work at Nethercott Farm, Tetcott
is of interest in that here further evidence of site continuity between pre and post
Saxon settlement was found.
Back