Smaller Villages

As well as our main towns, there are some wonderful villages to explore across West Devon.

Milton Damerel is a Parish made up of a number of hamlets. The Parish covers some seven square miles, approximately five miles from the market town of Holsworthy and 13 miles from Bideford.

Milton Abbot is a village northwest of Tavistock, near the western edge of Dartmoor National Park. The parish church of St Constantine & Aegideus is mainly 15th century and Endsleigh House in Milton Abbot is a Grade I listed building.

Bere Ferrers is a lovely village set against the scenic backdrop of the River Tavy and sits within the Tamar Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

Bere Ferrers parish is to the north of Plymouth in the county of Devon, on its border with Cornwall.

The parish consists mainly of the small village of Bere Ferrers and the larger village of Bere Alston. Both are on the Bere peninsula, situated between the Rivers Tavy and Tamar. Also included are smaller areas such as the picturesque boating haven of Weir Quay.

In bygone days this was a mining community for tin, silver lead ore and arsenic, with much of the surrounding area taken up with daffodil farming and soft fruit, such as strawberries, cherries and grapes.

Gulworthy straddles a ridge between the Tamar river to the west and the river Tavy and Lumburn stream to the east. Now predominantly agriculture and forestry, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries the area was heavily industrialised. Blanchdown Wood, in the northwest of the parish, was the site of the Devon Great Consuls copper mine, one of the world’s largest copper mining enterprises. Arsenic and other metal ores were also mined extensively around Gulworthy. As part of these operations the port at Morwellham, in the southwest of the parish, was developed. The Tavistock canal, which passes under the parish in a tunnel bored through Morwell Down, connected Morwellham to the mines and Tavistock.

Buckland Monachorum is one of the larger parishes within the Borough of West Devon. The very name ‘Buckland Monachorum’ refers to ‘land owned by the monks’, (these being the monks that lived at Buckland Abbey). The Parish actually has five villages within its boundaries, Yelverton, Clearbrook, Crapstone, Milton Combe and of course Buckland Monachorum.

The Parish has many notable features such as Buckland Abbey, the Garden House, and its old wartime airfield at ‘Harrowbeer’, (also found spelt as Harrabeer).

Milton Combe lies in a hollow surrounded on three sides by steep hills. To the South, the Milton brook and the road go down the valley to Lillipit and then on to Maristow and Lopwell by the River Tavy.

Further information can be found at www.bucklandmonachorum.com