Baring-Gould Sabine
A Book of the West. Volume I Devon
There was a woman, and she lived at Brennan27 on the moor. And she had a baby. And one day she left her baby on the moor to play and pick "urts" (whortleberries), and she hasted to Moreton town. Now as she went she saw three ravens flying over her head from Blackiston. And she said, "Where be you a goin' to, Ravens cruel?" They answered, "Up to Brennan! up to Brennan!" She had not gone far before she saw three more flying in the same direction. And again she asked, "Where be you a goin' to, Ravens cruel? "And these three likewise answered her, "Up to Brennan! up to Brennan!" Now when she had gone somewhat further, and was drawing nigh to Moreton, again she saw three ravens fly over her head, and for the third time she put the same question and received the same answer. When in the evening she returned to Brennan Moor, there no little baby's voice welcomed her, for all that remained of her child was a heap of well-picked white bones.
Brennan is what is marked on the Ordnance Survey as Brinning, a lonely spot south of Moreton Hampstead, and between it and North Bovey. It seems to me that the story needs but a touch, and it resolves itself into a ballad.
BRENNAN MOOR
Three ravens, they flew over Blackistone,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
And loudly they laughed over Moreton town,
Over Moreton town,
Saying, Where and O where shall we dine to-day?
On the moor, for sure, where runneth no way.
As I sat a-swaying all in a tree,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
I saw a sweet mother and her babie,
And her babie,
Saying, Sleep, O sleep. I'm to Moreton fair,
For Babie and me to buy trinkets rare.
As I was a-flying o'er Brennan Down,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
I saw her a-wending her way to town,
Away to town.
Our dinners are ready, our feasting free,
Away to Brennan, black brothers, with me.
The babe upon Brennan, so cold and bare,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
The mother a-gadding to Moreton fair,
To Moreton fair.
We'll laugh and we'll quaff the red blood free,
There is plenty for all of us, brothers three.
Three ravens flew over Blackistone,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
And loudly they laughed over Moreton town,
Over Moreton town.
With an armful of toys, came mother, to none
Save a little white huddle of well-picked bone.
From Moreton an expedition may be made to Grimspound.
This is an enclosure, prehistoric, on the slope between Hookner Tor and Hameldon.
The circumference wall measures over 1500 feet, and was not for defence against human foes, but served as a protection against wolves. Grimslake, a small stream that dries up only in very hot summers, flows through the enclosure at its northern extremity. It passes under the wall, percolates through it for some way, and then emerges three-quarters of the way down.
The pound was constructed where it is for two reasons: one, to take advantage of the outcrop of granite that divides the waterways, and which was largely exploited for the construction of the enclosure wall and of the huts within; and the other, so as to have the advantage of the stream flowing through the pound.
The entrance is to the south-south-east, and is paved in steps. There are twenty-one huts within the pound; most of these have been explored, and have revealed cooking-holes, beds of stone, and in some a flat stone in the centre, apparently for the support of the central pole sustaining the roof. Flints and rare potsherds have been recovered.
The most perfect of the huts has been railed round, and not filled in after clearing, that visitors may obtain some idea of these structures in their original condition. This one has a sort of vestibule walled against the prevailing wind. On the hill-top above Grimspound, a little distance from the source of Grimslake, is a cairn surrounded by a ring of stones; it contains a kistvaen in the centre. On the hill opposite, the col between Birch Tor and Challacombe Common is a collection of stone rows leading to a menhir.
By ascending Hameldon, and walking along the ridge due south, the Great Central Trackway is crossed, in very good condition, and a cross stands beyond it.
On the left-hand side of the road under Shapley Tor, above a little hollow and stream, before reaching the main road from Tavistock to Moreton, may be seen a remarkably fine hut circle composed of very large slabs of stone. On Watern Hill, at the back of the "Warren Inn," or to be more exact, on that portion called Chagford Common, are two double rows of upright stones leading from a cairn and small menhir. The stones are small, but the rows are very perfect.
The Central Trackway to which I have alluded is a paved causeway, the continuation of the Fosseway. It runs across Dartmoor. It can be traced from Wray Barton, in Moreton Hampstead, where it crosses the railway and the Moreton and Newton road. Thence a lane runs on it to a cross-road; this it traverses, and is continued as a practicable road by Langstone – where, as the name implies, there was once a menhir – by Ford to Heytree, where is a cluster of hut circles. Then it ascends Hameldon by Berry Pound, and becomes quite distinct. From the cross on Hameldon it descends into the valley, mounts Challacombe, and aims across the upper waters of the Webburn for Merripit; on the marshy ground above the little field planted round with beech at Post Bridge it can be seen. Road-menders have broken up a portion of it, thus exposing a section. It traverses the East Dart, and can be distinctly traced above Archerton, whence it aims for Lower White Tor. It has been thought to be distinguished on Mis Tor, and striking for Cox Tor, but I mistrust this portion, and am inclined to think that the old Lych Way is its continuation from Lidaford Tor, where it disappears. The Lych Way, or Corpse Road, is that by which the dead were borne to burial at Lydford, till licence was granted by Bishop Bronescombe in 1260 to such people on the moor as were distant from their parish church, to recur to Widecombe for their baptisms and interments. The Lych Way is still much used for bringing in turf, and for the driving out and back of cattle. The paved causeway is fine, but in parts it has been resolved by centuries of use to a deep-cut furrow. It was said formerly that of a night ghostly trains of mourners might be seen flitting along it.
There are extensive, and in some cases very ancient, stream works at the head of the two Web-burns. Chaw Gully is an early effort in mining. The rocks were not blasted, but cut by driving wedges or cutting grooves into the stone, then filling the holes with lime and pouring water over the quicklime, when the expansion split the rock.
Great quantities of tin have been extracted from these rude works; how early and how late these are none can say. The same heaps have been turned and turned again.
There are good screens in the churches of Bridford, Manaton, Lustleigh – where is also an inscribed stone – Bovey Tracey, and North Bovey; and beautiful scenery in Lustleigh Cleave and about Manaton.
Bowerman's Nose is a singular core of hard granite, left standing on a hillside in the midst of a "clitter." The way in which it was fashioned has been already described.
The valley of the Teign is beautiful throughout; it deserves a visit both above and below Dunsford Bridge. Fingle has been spoken of in the chapter devoted to Exeter. Below Dunsford the river should be left to ascend a picturesque combe to Bridford, in order to visit the very fine screen and pulpit.
Christow Church is good, and there is in the porch a stone, on which is inscribed, "Nathaniel Busell, aet. 48 yeers, clark heere, dyed 19th Feb., 1631." Tradition asserts that he was shot where he lies buried by the soldiers of the Parliament, who desired to enter and deface the church; but Busell refused to deliver up the keys. In the churchyard are some stately yews.
Ashton possesses a screen with paintings on it in admirable preservation. Here was the seat of the family of that name from which came Sir George, who, after the battle of Stratton, passed over from the side of the Parliament to that of the king. Hence also sprang the notorious Duchess of Kingston, the lovely Miss Chudleigh, who was tried for bigamy in Westminster Hall by the peers in 1776, and who was the original from whom Thackeray drew his detailed portrait of Beatrice Esmond, both as young Trix and as the old Baroness Bernstein. She has had hard measure dealt out to her, and cruellest of all was that John Dunning, a native of her own part of Devon, should have acted in the prosecution against her and insulted her before the peers, so as to wring tears from her eyes. There can be no question but that when she married the Duke of Kingston she believed that her former clandestine marriage was invalid.28
Further down the Teign, in a beautiful situation, is Canonteign, an old mansion of the Davie family, well preserved. Hence Hennock may be visited, lying high on the ridge between the Bovey and the Teign. Of this place Murray in his Handbook told the following story: – "It is said that when a vicar of Hennock, one Anthony Lovitt, died, his son, of the same name, took his place, although not in orders. The parishioners made no objections, and it was not until some years afterwards, when he tried to raise their tithes, that they denounced him, thinking that, 'if they were to pay all that money they might as well have a real parson.'" The story, however, is not true. There was a vicar, Anthony Loveys, and he had a son of the same name whom he appointed parish clerk, and the second Anthony remained on as clerk after his father's death and the appointment of a new vicar. The name continues in the place, and has become that of a yeoman family. There was a very locally-famous parson of Hennock, named Harris, not yet forgotten. He was a wizard. Those who had lost goods went to him, and he recovered them for the true owners. One day Farmer Loveys went to him. "Pass'n," said he, "last night my fine gander was stolen. How can 'y help me?"
So Parson Harris went to his books, drew a circle, muttered some words, then opened his window, and in through the casement came the gander, plucked, trussed, and on the spit, and fell at his feet.
On another occasion someone else came to him with a similar complaint, only on this occasion several geese had been carried off.
"You be aisy," said the vicar. "The man as has a done this shall be put to open shame." So next Sunday, when he got up in the pulpit, he proclaimed: – "I give you all to know that Farmer Tuckett has had three geese stolen. Now I've read my books and drawn my figures, and I have so conjured that three feathers of thickey geese shall now – this instant – stick to the nose of the thief."
Up went the hand of one in the congregation to his nose. At once Parson Harris saw the movement, pointed to him, and thundered forth, "There is the man as stole the geese."
His maid, Polly, had a lover, as the manner of maids is. The young man took service in Exeter. Polly was inconsolable. He left on Saturday, and the girl did nothing but sob all day. "You be easy, Polly," said her master; "I'll conjure him home to you."
So he began his abracadabra, but Sunday came and Sunday passed, and no John appeared. Polly went to bed much shaken in her belief in the powers of the master.
However, about the first glimmer of dawn there came a clatter of feet and a rapping at the door, and lo! outside was John, in his best suit, except the coat, bathed in perspiration and out of breath. The spell had not taken effect on him all day because he had worn his best coat with the Prayer Book in the pocket. But so soon as ever at night he took off his coat, then it operated, and he had run all the way from Exeter to Hennock.
At Hennock are Bottor Rocks and also those of John Cann. A path at the side is called "John Cann's path." John Cann is said to have been a staunch Royalist, who was hunted by the Round-heads. He took refuge among these rocks, to which provisions were secretly conveyed for his use, and there he secreted his treasure. The "path" was worn by his pacing at night. He was finally tracked to his hiding-place by bloodhounds, taken and hanged, but his treasure, the secret of which he would not reveal, lies concealed among the rocks, and a little blue flame is thought to dance along the track and hover over the place where lies the gold.
Lustleigh Cleave is a fine rocky valley, so strewn with rocks that the river for a considerable distance worms its way beneath, unseen. From hence an ascent may be made to Becky Falls, a dribble except in very wet weather, and higher still to Manaton and to Hey Tor Rocks, bold masses of hard granite. More picturesque, though not so massive, are Hound Tor Rocks, that take their name from the extraordinary shapes, as of dogs' heads formed by the granite spires and projections.
Widecombe is a valley shut in by moor; where the people are much of a law to themselves, having no resident manorial lords over them, and having no neighbours. A sturdy and headstrong race has grown up there, doing what is right in their own eyes, and somewhat indifferent to the opinions and feelings of the outer world. In winter they are as much closed in as was Noah in the ark.
This was the scene of a terrible thunderstorm, a record of which is preserved in the church. Mr. Blackmore has worked it into his novel of Christowel. The tower is very fine, but the church does not come up to one's expectations. Widecombe is walled up to heaven on the west by Hameldon, and the morning sun is excluded by a bold chain of tors on the east. It was for the purpose of going to Widecombe Fair that Tom Pearse was induced to lend his old mare, which is the topic of the most popular of Devonshire songs.
"Tom Pearse, Tom Pearse, lend me your grey mare,
All along, down along, out along, lee.
For I want for to go to Widecombe Fair,
Wi' Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, Peter Gurney, Peter Davy, Dan'l Whiddon,
Harry Hawk, old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all."
Chorus.– Old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all.
"And when shall I see again my grey mare?"
All along, etc.
"By Friday soon, or Saturday noon,
Wi' Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer," etc.
Then Friday came, and Saturday noon,
All along, etc.
But Tom Pearse's old mare hath not trotted home,
Wi' Bill Brewer, etc.
So Tom Pearse he got up to the top o' the hill,
All along, etc.
And he seed his old mare down a making her will
Wi' Bill Brewer, etc.
So Tom Pearse's old mare, her took sick and died,
All along, etc.
And Tom he sat down on a stone, and he cried
Wi' Bill Brewer, etc.
But this isn't the end o' this shocking affair,
All along, etc.
Nor, though they be dead, of the horrid career
Of Bill Brewer, etc.
When the wind whistles cold on the moor of a night,
All along, etc.
Tom Pearse's old mare doth appear, gashly white,
Wi' Bill Brewer, etc.
And all the long night be heard skirling and groans,
All along, etc.
From Tom Pearse's old mare in her rattling bones,
And from Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, Peter Gurney, Peter Davy, Dan'l Whiddon,
Harry Hawk, old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all.
Chorus.– Old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all.
CHAPTER XIV.
ASHBURTON
Ashburton manors – The Ashburn – The cloth-workers – The tucking-mills – County families sprung from the woollen trade – Introduction of machinery – John Dunning – Created Baron Ashburton – Wood-carving in Ashburton – The Oldham owl – Screen destroyed – Ilsington – The Pomeroys – Holne – Dean Prior and Herrick – Abbey of Buckfast – A foundation of S. Petrock – Staverton Church – Screens in Devon – Dr. Blackall's Drive – Holne Chase – Bovey Tracey – William de Tracy – Chudleigh.
A pleasant, sleepy, country town, hardly able to maintain its old-world dignity against the ruffling, modern, manufacturing Buckfastleigh. A pleasant centre, whence delightful excursions may be made, and with an old-world aroma about it, as though preserved in pot-pourri.
It has a beautiful church. Ashburton consisted of a royal and an episcopal manor, each with its several municipal officers. A stream divided the manors. Ashburton is the tun on the Ashburn. Ash is but another form of Exe, from usk, water. It owed its growth and prosperity to the wool trade. The proximity to Dartmoor, an unrivalled run for sheep, and the water of the stream to turn the mills, gave to Ashburton a great significance as a centre of cloth manufacture. Added to which it was a stannary town.
The old chapel of S. Laurence in the town, now converted into a grammar school, belonged to the guild of the cloth-workers, and their seal became the arms of the borough: On a mount vert, a chapel with spire, in dexter chief the sun in splendour, in sinister a crescent moon, in dexter base a teasel, in sinister a saltire. The teasel and sun and moon were emblematical of the chief staples of the place; the woollen trade and the mining interests.
The old fulling-mills were locally termed tucking-mills, and the extent to which cloth-working was carried on in South Devon is shown by the prevalence of the surname Tucker.29
The process of manufacture given by Westcote, in 1630, is as follows: —
"First, the gentleman farmer, or husbandman, sends his wool to the market, which is bought either by the comber or spinster, and they, the next week, bring it hither again in yarn, which the weaver buys, and the market following brings that hither again in cloth, when it is sold, either to the clothier, who sends it to London, or to the merchant, who, after it hath passed the fuller's mill, and sometimes the dyer's vat, transports it. The large quantities whereof cannot be well guessed, but best known to the custom-book, whereunto it yields no small commodity, and this is continued all the year through."
The clothier was a man of some means, that bought the yarn or abb in the Tuesday's market from Cornish and Tavistock spinners, who kept this branch of the trade pretty much to themselves. The worsted was spun into "tops" – and the name Toop is common now in the neighbourhood. Tops, the combed wool so called by poor cottagers, was made by them into chains to form the warp or framework of the fabric.
One day a week the serge-maker assumed a long apron and met his weavers, the poor folk of the neighbourhood, who frequently hired their looms from him, paying him a shilling quarterly. He served out to them the proper proportions of abb and worsted, with a certain quantity of glue to size the chain before tying it to the loom. This they took home with them, and wove at leisure, returning it the following week and receiving the price of their labour.
These serges were then fulled at the borough tucking-mill. This was supplied with a water-wheel that gave motion to the tree or spindle, whose teeth communicated it to the stampers, which were made to rise and fall. The stampers or pestles worked in troughs in which was laid the stuff that was intended to be fulled. The cloth had already been saturated in various unsavoury liquids to prepare it for the stampers. For raising the nap after dying the dipsacus, or common teasel, was extensively grown. The heads were fixed round the circumference of a large, broad wheel which was made to revolve, and the cloth was held against it.
The cloths were then ready.
It is evident that no large capital was needed in this mode of doing business; the clothier had no operatives to look after, and only a small portion of his time was occupied in his business. A day set apart to "tend" his weavers, and an hour in the yarn market on Tuesdays was about all that was regularly required of him. Yet the business done was large, and he expended his capital in purchasing land, in enclosing commons, and in starting tanneries, above all in acting as banker to the neighbourhood.
It is really surprising to see how many of the notable heraldic families of Devon rose from being clothiers. But then the serges of the West were in request not in England only, but also abroad. Westcote says: —
"The stuff of serges or perpetuanos is now in great use and request with us, wherewith the market at Exeter is abundantly furnished of all sorts and prices; the number will hardly be credited. Tiverton hath also such a store in kersies as will not be believed. Crediton yields many of the finest sorts of kersies. Totnes and some places near it hath had besides these a sort of coarse cloth, which they call narrow-pin-whites, not elsewhere made. Barnstaple and Torrington furnish us with bays, single and double frizados. At Tavistock there is a good market. Ottery St. Mary hath mixed kersies; Cullompton, kersey stockings."
The introduction of worsted spinning-frames in the North of England early in the present century revolutionised the trade, and in 1817 Mr. Caunter started the first worsted spinning-frames in Ashburton, charging 10d. a pound for spinning. For a while he held the monopoly. But the Dart was now called into requisition at Buckfast, and on the site and out of the materials of the abbey a spinning factory was established.
"The next great change," says Mr. Amery, "was brought about by the fact that all the weaving was carried on in the houses of the poor. Perhaps in a social point of view it was a good thing, as the mother was always occupied at home, and had her eye on the family; but to the manufacturer it was bad, as the materials entrusted by him to the weaver were open to great peculations, for weavers could always supply themselves with yarn or abb sufficient to provide their families with stockings, and joiners could purchase the best glue at half price in the little shops, where it had been bartered for small goods. So great was the loss of yarn, worsted, and glue, and so various were the means taken to make up the short weight by the use of oil, water, etc., that a remedy was sought and found in the expedient of erecting large factories, fitted with the newest spring looms; here the weavers came and worked, and nothing was allowed to be carried off the premises."
More wool is now worked up by the aid of the power-looms and combing machines at Ashburton and Buckfastleigh than in the old prosperous times.
Ashburton's most distinguished son was John Dunning, first Baron Ashburton. He belonged to a respectable family, originally seated in Walkhampton parish, which, though not bearing an armorial coat, was yet above the class of yeomen. His father, John Dunning, settled as an attorney at Ashburton, where the future Lord Ashburton was born in 1731.30 John Dunning the elder had as one of his clients Sir Thomas Clarke, Master of the Rolls, who owned a good deal of property about Ashburton. A legal instrument drawn up by the young Dunning when only nineteen, and sent to Sir Thomas, struck the Master of the Rolls as being so well done that he undertook the charge of fitting him for a career at the bar; and under this patron's auspices young Dunning, in the twenty-first year of his age, entered the Middle Temple in 1752.
It was whilst keeping his terms that Dunning made acquaintance with Horne Tooke, who addressed to him in 1778 his Letter on the English Particle, which was later expanded into The Diversions of Purley. After four years of study Dunning was called to the bar, and for five weary years after that his prospects remained in a most unpromising condition. He was a very ugly man, stunted in growth, his limbs misshapen, and his features mean. Horne Tooke used to tell a story illustrative of his personal appearance. On one occasion Thurlow wished to see him privately, and going to the coffee-house he frequented, asked the waiter if Mr. Dunning were there. The waiter, who was new to the place, said he did not know him. "Not know him!" exclaimed Thurlow with his usual volley of oaths. "Go into the room upstairs, and if you see a gentleman like the knave of clubs, call him down." The waiter departed, and returned with Dunning.
On one occasion he was retained in an assault case, and his object was to disprove the identity of the person named by an old woman as the aggressor. Abandoning his usual overbearing demeanour towards witnesses, he commenced his cross-examination thus, mildly: —
"Pray, my good woman, what sized man was he?"
"Short and stumpy, sir; almost as small as your honour."
"Humph! What sort of a nose had he?"
"Well now, what I should ca' a snubby nose, like your own, sir, only not quite so cocked up like."
"Humph! His eyes?"
"He'd gotten a bit o' a cast in 'em, sir, like your honour's squint."
"Go down, woman. That will do."
Presently affairs took a turn. Dunning worked his way into notice by adopting violent radical or democratical views, and became the friend of the notorious Wilkes, who also had a squint, and he acted as junior counsel in the famous prosecution of the publishers of No. 45 of the North Briton, which contained strictures on the speech from the throne, at the close of the session of 1763. It was in this case that Dunning firmly established his reputation as a close and subtle reasoner, and he could ever calculate on being employed by his party. From this date no member of the bar obtained a larger number of briefs. I have already told, in my Old Country Life, a story illustrative of the way in which he managed the defence of a man on trial for murder. In 1766 he won the recordership of Bristol, he was appointed Solicitor-General in 1767, and in the general election of 1768 he was elected member for Caine.
"Among the new accessions to the House of Commons at this juncture," writes Lord Mahon, "by far the most eminent in ability was John Dunning… He was a man both of quick parts and strong passions; in his politics a zealous Whig. As an orator, none ever laboured under greater disadvantages of voice and manner; but these disadvantages were most successfully retrieved by his wondrous powers of reasoning, his keen invective, and his ready wit. At the trial of the Duchess of Kingston for bigamy, when he appeared as counsel against her Grace, Hannah More, who was present, thus describes him: 'His manner is insufferably bad, coughing and spitting at every word, but his sense and expression pointed to the last degree. He made her Grace shed bitter tears.'" The mode in which he used his hands was absurd as it was peculiar. He drew them whilst speaking up close together to the height of his breast, where he rested his wrists, and kept up a continual paddling with his outspread palms, moving them with a rapidity corresponding to the motion of his tongue. It was said that he looked on such occasions like a flat fish hung up in a fishmonger's shop, the body rigid, but the fins in front vibrating up and down unceasingly.
In 1769 Dunning bought the manors of Spitchwick and Widecombe. "Manors in Devonshire!" exclaimed Jack Lee. "A pity, Dunning, you should have them there, and should bring no manners with you to Westminster."
In 1770 he resigned his position as Solicitor-General, and resumed his old position outside the bar, but with a professional income estimated at the then unprecedented sum of £10,000 per annum.
He was now on the Opposition benches in the House. In the hot debates on the American War, Dunning steadfastly advocated a policy of conciliation. An instance of Dunning's sharpness of repartee was afforded when Chatham moved an address to the Crown in favour of this policy. The motion was upheld by Lords Shelburne, Camden, and Rockingham, and they were supported by the vote of the Duke of Cumberland. His Royal Highness was one day complimenting Dr. Price on a pamphlet he had written in favour of the Americans. "I sat up reading it last night," said he, "till it had almost blinded me." "On the rest of the nation, your Royal Highness," said Dunning, who stood by, "the pamphlet has had the opposite effect. It has opened their eyes."
John Dunning was nearly fifty years old when he married. His choice was Elizabeth Baring, daughter of John Baring, of Larkbeare, one of the many woollen merchants then flourishing in Exeter, and sister of the founders of the great house of Baring Brothers. He was married to her in 1780.
His honeymoon must have been short, for exactly one week after his marriage Dunning brought forward in Committee of the House of Commons his famous motion, "That it is the opinion of this Committee that the influence of the Crown has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished." After a fierce debate he succeeded in carrying his motion by a majority of eighteen.
On the 15th March, 1782, a motion of want of confidence, though negatived by a majority of nine, proved fatal to the Administration, and the Premier resigned. Then, after twelve years passed in "the cold shade of opposition," the Whigs were again in power; and one of the first steps taken by the Marquess of Rockingham, who now became Prime Minister, was to reward John Dunning with a coronet. His patent of nobility bore date April 8th, 1782, and thus the misshapen but clever son of the little Ashburton attorney became the first Baron Ashburton. None when in opposition had denounced more vigorously, and with greater display of righteous indignation, the bestowal of pensions on a large scale; but no sooner had he passed out of the Opposition into place than he exacted for himself the enormous pension of £4000 per annum, a sum to him quite unnecessary, as he had amassed a huge fortune.
By this time, however, his health had begun to fail, and he died on August 18th, 1783, of paralysis, leaving a son, Richard Barré Dunning, to succeed him in the title, and to inherit a fortune of £180,000. The second Lord Ashburton married a daughter of William Cunninghame, of Lambshaw, and through her became allied with the Cranstoun family, to whom a large portion of his ample possessions passed at his death without issue in 1823.
Ashburton, in the Tudor period, seems to have possessed a school of wood-carving. The Churchwardens' Book shows that much work was done in the church between 1515 and 1525. An Exeter man named John Mayne was then employed in wood-carving, but there were Ashburton workmen as well. There was then erected a very fine screen. The rood-loft was removed in 1539, but not the screen itself till last century, when portions of it became the property of private persons, and others were laid as foundations to the galleries.
