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Tawton, North (St. Peter)

TAWTON, NORTH (St. Peter), a parish, in the union of Oakhampton, hundred of North Tawton, South Molton and N. divisions of Devon, 12 miles (W. by N.) from Crediton; containing 1728 inhabitants. This place was anciently called Cheping-Tawton, "a market-town on the river Taw." Its market-charter was confirmed in the year 1270, and the market was held until about 1720; at the former period Tawton was a borough-town, and it is still governed by a portreeve, elected annually at the manorial court. The parish contains 3551 acres of fertile land, and 1088 of common or waste: the soil is a red gravelly earth; the surface is undulated, and comprises several well-watered meadows. Ashbridge, one of the most ancient demesnes in the county, has nearly 100 acres of woodland, containing a vast quantity of fine oak-trees. A quarry of good freestone is worked: here was formerly an extensive woollen manufacture, and a mill still employs 200 persons in spinning yarn. Cattle-fairs are held on the third Tuesday in April, October 3rd, and December 18th. The living is a rectory, valued in the king's books at £32.4.7.; net income, £751; patron and incumbent, the Rev. George Hole: there is a parsonage, with a glebe of 98 acres of good land. The Independents have a meeting-house. Chapels formerly existed at Crook-Burnell, Nichols-Nymet, and Bath-Barton, in the parish; the last hamlet is the birth-place of Henry de Bathe, who was in 1238 made a justice of the common pleas, and in 1240 one of the justices itinerant. Henry Tozer, expelled from Exeter College for his loyalty, in 1648, and who was author of Directions for a Devotional Life, which passed through ten editions, was also a native of the parish. In the neighbourhood, a small brook sometimes issues out of a large pit ten feet deep, called Bathe Pool, and continues running for several days together.

Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.

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