Rousdon memories
Here are memories of Rousdon and the local area. You can start now: Add your own Memory of Rousdon or a Rousdon photo.
Relatives Buried at Rousdon Church
My great grandmother's sister Frances Ostler/nee Start (died 1889) is buried at Rousdon Church yard with her husband Luke Ostler (died 1916). They have a very strange looking memorial it is a long oak slab with an upright at either end, I have never seen a memorial like it before. It is now very weathered and starting to rot. There is an inscription on the oak slab "I have loved thy house and the place where thine honour dwelleth" and their names and date of death. They both worked for the Peek family.
All Hallows School
All Hallows school was started in Honiton - now Honiton Museum - by my father's uncle John Murch and later moved to Lyme Regis. John Murch died in Bournemouth in 1959.
Gamekeeper's House, Rousdon Manor
I did get to see my great-grandparents' house at Rousdon Manor (the gamekeeper's cottage), I stayed there for a few days. I came from Australia with my father. I had a great time there. Everyone was so friendly and helpful. It is an experience I will never forget. I loved the history of Lyme Regis and all of Cornwall. My father was watching the 'Antique Roadshow' one night, it was on Rousdon Manor. I rang to see if I could get a copy of the show, but it is not possible because of the people in it, due to copyrights. But if anyone knows how I could get a copy I would really appreciate it. We love the show here in Australia. I did get to see part of the Manor which was someone's home, but not the stairway, as the people were away that look after it.
Thank you.
Louise Brown.
Evacuation to Combpyne
My sister Margaret and I (nee Rayner) were evacuated to the home and caring of a friend Olive Tuck who had a cottage next to a farm just out of Combpyne. Across the fields where we were allowed to play, was the path to Landslip Cottage. When mum and dad came to visit a special treat was to have afternoon tea at the cottage. To this day I remember a pathway of bright orange nasturtiums, the wooden tables and seats and the path (forbidden) to the beach which was festooned at that time with barbed wire. I am sure we had afternoon tea but think the adventure made the visits more memorable.
Margaret attended school in the village so may figure on the roll for 1942/43. We visited the farm to watch the cows being milked. Unfortunately I contracted bovine TB and spent the next year in a convalescent establishment!! We met snakes for the first time.
I remember going to the station to meet our parents and... Read more
Cream Teas at Landslip Cottage
My Greatgrandmother & Greatgrandfather lived at the Landslip Cottage for many years providing cream teas to visiting locals and tourists alike. My own mother married a Gapper born at the bungalow higher up the cliff. The visitors books, in our possession, for the cottage teas read like a script from PG Woodhouse with very reserved English expletives referencing the wasp population. The cottage was aready a ruin and overgrown when I was a boy although Auntie Lizzie and Annie, born at the cottage, still lived on the estate. Auntie Lizzie gave me a large photograph of greatgrandfather Gapper in front of the cottage doorway that I treasure.
The Gamekeeper at Rousdon Manor Peek Estate
Hi, I am Louise Brown of Australia. My grandmother Ellen Maud Edwards (married name Jefferis) lived with her parents Samuel and Alice Maud Edwards (Searle), at the cliff Cottage on the Peek Estates around the early 1900's, he was the gamekeeper there. I have a early picture of the house, Lady Peek was very interested in my grandmother, as she was partly deaf. She contributed to her learning of sign language. I also have a telegram she sent to my grandmother on her marriage day. I am looking for information about the death of Samuel, I think he died in 1923, but am not sure. I have several letters written to my grandmother from her mother in Cliff Cottage but no dates were given. My grandmother migrated to Australia in 1912. I was told about a house that fell into the sea, it was the engineers cottage, it was about 150 yards from Cliff Cottage. I would love to visit, but I am a bit far away. I have been... Read more
Sunday Walks
I was born in Axmouth and most Sundays we would have to walk out to Landslip Cottage. We all knew it as Anne's Cottage because the lady who lived there was called Annie Gapper. She would give my late Mum and Dad a cup of tea. I was one of nine in the family.
Formerly Whitlands Cottages
The cottage used to be called Whitlands Cottages. In 1881 my great grandparents Mr & Mrs French lived at no 3, next door to Mrs Gapper.
Allhallows School
I was a student at Allhallows in the early 1970's... I have many memories of this unique school, Rousdon and Lyme Regis as well as photos of this wonderful estate, for both its architectural beauty as well as its contribution to the local community... I would love to find out how it is today... I did visit Allhallows with my wife about 15 years ago and found that they had fallen into hard times... this is a terrible shame... parts of the especially delicate hallways, with its galleries of stuffed animals and birds were well in disrepair... this was a particular shame and I wondered who was to blame or perhaps responsible for the upkeep... which would be most important for its heritage.
Memories of Dorset
Mid 1960's - Mid 1980's
My parents David & Valerie, and younger brother Roger Angus lived at 'Rosevine' opposite the Rectory.
The then vicar, Christopher Leach lived in the Rectory with his wife and children Godfrey and Hilary. Additionally, they charitably fostered many children, having a minimum of four guests at any given time if my memory serves me correctly, hence using many of the available bedrooms.
When the vicar moved to live elsewhere, the new owner, an insidious individual called Mr. Ryan who was very fond of dogs, had the unfortunate habit of discarding his dog waste over the hedge into the road below.
Local farmer Frank Webber used to provide much sought after weekend and holiday employment by lifting potatoes and swedes/turnips for them.
It was a wonderful place to live your childhood with the multiple benefits of having a close knit local community and no major external distractions such as traffic, pollution and crime.
You truly learnt how to live in and with the countryside, being able to run free and investigate... Read more
Growing up
I moved to Combpyne when I was 4 years old with my mum, dad, brother and sister. We lived in the house in the centre of the village called Clock House. Its garden backed on to the churchyard. I spent many happy hours on the Webbers' farm next door to the church opposite the village pond, I remember we had an old dingy at one time and had fun on the pond. I have been back a few times since leaving in the mid 70s but it has grown and lots of things have changed, but I had a wonderful happy childhood in Combpyne.
Combpyne Village Reservoir
I am a little bit unsure whether it was 1948 when my late father, the Revd Peter N Longridge, moved from Sticklpath in Barnstaple down to Combpyne. Or maybe a year or two later. The list of Rectors in the church will confirm. My memories of the village are several, and not in any particular order of importance. There was the church, of course. I recall excavations inside which revealed a very old medieval mural showing a ship on the south wall, and two coffins under the nave when electric cables were laid. And the Yew tree from which I fell at the age of 12, breaking my right leg, whose consequences I now feel at the present age of nearly 68! There was Farmer Webber and his son Frank, and we used to collect fresh milk every other day in a aluminium pail. Clotted cream almost every day. Then the clunk-clunk of the water ram which pumped beautiful tasting fresh water up to the tiny covered reservoir above the... Read more
Addendum to First Comment on Combpyne
In February 2007 I was able to revisit Combpyne church. I looked at the little St Francis carving in the chancel, and saw that the carving had suffered somewhat from woodworm. Also, I noted that my note, that I had scrawled on a card a few years earlier, was still there; but that I had incorrectly stated that my father had carved it. It should read that a tramp had carved it, and given it to my father as a thank-you for allowing him to spend the night in a shed. Perhaps someone might re-write that card! I spoke to a gentleman living next to the church, the churchwarden, and explained who I was, and we exchanged memories. I was pleased to see the Village Reservoir again, in my time there were rainbow trout living in it. My late father was also Chaplain to Allhallows School in Rousden, but that unique school, whose buildings were constructed by the 19th C Tea-Baron named Sir Henry Peake has long-since closed, leaving our... Read more
Living in Combpyne
I was 9 years old when we came to live in Combpyne, we lived at the end of the village accross the road from a farm where my father worked. The farm must have belonged to the Webbers as I remember they had a son called Giles, like the other reader said, I think his sister was called Frances. My brother and I used to walk to the other end of the village to catch the school bus. I used to go to Uplyme school and my brother went to a school in Axminster. I remember the green bus that used to come on a Friday, also many a time we would walk up that long hill to catch the train to Lyme Regis. My mother used to get eggs from a house across the road from the church. I remember going to church every Sunday, also as we didn't own a lawn mower back then my dad used to bring the black and white bull from the farm and... Read more
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