Wembworthy
From Wikishire
| Wembworthy | |
| Devon | |
|---|---|
 St Michael's Church, Wembworthy | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | SS667099 |
| Location: | 50°52’26"N, 3°53’44"W |
| Data | |
| Postcode: | EX18 |
| Local Government | |
| Council: | Mid Devon |
Wembworthy is a small village in Devon, in the valley of the River Taw, eight miles north-east of the towns of Hatherleigh and twelve miles south of South Molton.
The parish church is St Michael's Church, which was much rebuilt in the 1840s.[1] The vestigial remnants of two mediæval earthwork castles survive within the parish, one in Heywood Wood, of motte and bailey form, the other to its south of ringwork and bailey form.
History
In the time of Tristram Risdon (d.1640), Wembworthy was merely a tithing of the adjacent parish of Brushford, and was thus not apparently a parish of itself.[2]
Historic estates
- Heywood, now the site of New Eggesford House, for many centuries the seat of the Speke family. Risdon (d. 1640) claimed that a secret underground passage connected Heywood House with the ancient motte and bailey Heywood Castle.[2] The present building known as Heywood House was built in the mid-19th century in the Tudor Gothic style as a cottage orné[1] by Newton Fellowes, 4th Earl of Portsmouth (1772–1854), builder of New Eggesford House.
- Rashleigh, historic seat of the ancient Rashleigh family, and later inherited by the Clotworthy family formerly of nearby Clotworthy.[2]
Outside links
 |
("Wikimedia Commons" has material about Wembworthy) |
