Hessenford The Village

A Memory of Hessenford.

I have just read the memory of the fishing trips and the use of the jeep to tow the fishing boat down the beach to launch it into the sea at Downderry. I also remember that jeep as if it were yesterday. My Grandmother, Marjorie Buckley, was the Headmistress of Hessenford School in the 40's and 50's (maybe into the 60's before she finally retired) and I spent alot of my youth living with her and on family holidays in Hessenford. I spent 9 months with my Grandparents towards the end of the war, as my home town, Redditch, had been badly bombed by the Germans. My Grandather died, I think in 1947, and is buried in the graveyard at the Hessenford Parish Church, St. Annes. in 1953 most of the summer term and summer holidays were spent there, taking part in the festivities organised for the Coronation and celebration of the conquest of Everest. (Sir Edmund Hillary's death, ironically, was announced only 2 or 3 days ago). The Coronation events were held in the school playgoung and also in one of teh fields belonging to Farmer Lane. One of my jobs, when spending protracted periods there, was to go by bus to Downderry to change the accumulator batteries used to power the radio. From what I recall of the radio shop, it was on the main road through Downderry, somewhere near to the path that led down to the beach, but on the opposite side of the road. It was not unusual for my brother and I to walk along the beach from Seaton to Downderry, if the tide allowed, having already walked down the valley from Hessenford to Seaton. Many happy hours were spent swimming in the river, just upstream of the mill race. The village pump, sited in the lane leading up the side of the Copley Arms towards the Church, was still in use at this time. That was another duty we had, to fetch containers of water. I spent my honeymoon in Hessenford, at a guest house owned by Mary Sandys, in 1963 and met her in a chance meeting nearly 40 years later during a one hour visit to the village. She told me that she was the last remaining native resident living in the village of all those that were there in the 40's, 50's and 60's. The family names that I recall from that time were, Sandys, Stephens, Jeffries, (farmers from up the Old Valley) Kitt, Lane (the farmer), Alford (also farmers), Pote (or is it Poat?), Gwillam, Painter.
What has happened to all of these people?
Dave Styler. 14 January 2008.

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