Beer, Devon

Historical Description

Beer, a village and a tithing in Seaton parish, Devonshire. The village stands on the coast, in a romantic cove, 1¼ mile SW of Axmouth, and 1 from Seaton and Beer station on the L. & S.W.R. It has a post, money order, and telegraph office. It carries on fishing and lace-making, and was noted in former days for smuggling. It was the birthplace of the notorious Jack Rattenbury, sometimes called the Rob Roy of the West of England, and it produced the wedding-dress of Queen Victoria in 1839. The cove around it is a fine subject for the pencil. Beer Head, projecting on the west, is crowned by two natural towers, and Beer quarry, about 1 mile inland, is a labyrinth of excavations, about 3- of a mile long, and about 300 feet below the surface of the ground. The church of St Michael was erected in 1877-78 by the Hon. Mark Rolle, at a cost of about £8000; it is a building of freestone in the Decorated style, and possesses a good organ. The east window, a fine work of art, was added in 1889 by the same gentleman. There are Congregational and Plymouth Brethren chapels.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Church Records

Findmypast, in association with the South West Heritage Trust, Parochial Church Council, and Devon Family History Society have the Baptisms, Banns, Marriages, and Burials online for Beer

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for Beer from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Beer)

Maps

Online maps of Beer are available from a number of sites:

• Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• Google Streetview.
• National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
• OpenStreetMap.
• old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
• Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)

Newspapers and Periodicals

The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following newspapers covering Devon online:

• Western Times
• Exeter and Plymouth Gazette
• Western Morning News
• North Devon Journal
• Exeter Flying Post

Visitations Heraldic

The Visitation of the County of Devon in the year 1564, with additions from the earlier visitation of 1531, is online.

The Visitations of the County of Devon, comprising the Heralds' Visitations of 1531, 1564, & 1620, with additions by Lieutant-Colonel J.L. Vivian, published for the author by Henry S. Eland, Exeter 1895 is online.