The stories of Devonshire

May Day 2011 near Chagford, Dartmoor - If you want to use this image please attribute this blog

"The marvellous tales of supernatural visitations, death omens, apparitions, charms for healing the sick and the bewitched, with cursings and blessings, would fill many volumes. I can only furnish a few examples and hope they may prove interesting to the reader. 

One dear old country woman, who was never tired of telling me all the witch lore she could collect, one day, said, " Ave I askeed ee missus by telling ee thease yer discoose ? If zo be I've a gallied ee, I be main put about, but whot I dii tell 'e is true. Ess fy tez ! Ess by gor missus ! Ess fy !""

Hewet 1900



[I am rather sad Hewett didn't set about filling these potential volumes - she could have been the Robert Hunt of Devonshire]

The Living Corpse

Xaos fractal

By Nevit Dilmen (Rendered with [Xaos]) [GFDL (www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons

"The Lady Edgcumbe, believed to be the mother of the first baron - created 1748 - was supposed to be dead, and was buried in less than a week after she had expired. She was interred in the family vault. But the sexton had noticed a valuable ring on her finger, and resolved to take it. He went down into the vault, opened the coffin, and endeavoured to remove the ring; but it was small, and he could not get it off. He pressed, pinched, and pulled, and suddenly the corpse sat upright and opened its eyes. The man ran off in an agony of superstitious terror. The lady arose after a pause, took the lantern and issued from the vault, which happily the man had been too much alarmed to close. Her husband, sorrowful and sleepless, heard her voice, and admitted her at once. She had, of course, been in a trance. Five years afterwards her son, Sir Richard, was born."

Valentine (undated)

Map - Possibly to do with Mount Edgcumbe

Madron - Saint Madern or Doom Well - Part 1

"To this well, about a mile to the north, in the parish of St. Madron, many extraordinary properties have been ascribed. Dr. Borlase says: "The soil round this well is black, boggy, and light; but the strata through which the spring rises is a gray moorstone gravel. Here people who labour under pains, aches, and stiffness of limbs, come and wash; and many cures are said to have been performed, although the water can only act by its cold and limpid nature, as it has no mineral impregnation."

"Its fame in former ages was greater for the supposed virtue of healinge which St. Madderne had thereinto infused, and manie votaries made anuale pylgrimages unto it, as they doe even at this day, unto the Well of St. Winnifrede beyond Chester in Denbighshire, whereunto thousands doe yearelye make resort: but of late St. Maderne hath denied his (or her I know not whether) pristine ayde; and he is coye of his cures, so now are men coy of comynge to his conjured well, yet soom a daye resort."

Though this writer seems to despise the efficacy of these waters, the tradition of their virtues still remained amongst the Cornish, only a century ago. Borlase said: To this miraculous fountain, the uneasy, the impatient, the fearful, the jealous, and the superstitious, resort to learn their future destiny from the unconscious water. By dropping pins or pebbles into the fountain, by shaking the ground around the spring, or by continuing to raise bubbles from the bottom, on certain lucky days, and [11] when the moon is in a particular stage of increase or decrease, the secrets of the well are presumed to be extorted. This superstition continued to prevail up to the beginning of the present century, and is still spoken of with respect by some, particularly the aged..." [to be continued...]

 
Hope 1893

Salting Down Feyther - Warren House Inn

"Once more we have gained the Moreton and Princetown road. The little house close by is Newhouse, or the Warren House Inn, the second of that name. The first house stood on teh other side of the road, and here Crossing places the scene of the "salting-in" story related by Mrs. Bray, who, howver, gives no locality. If you have ever been near the spot, you will have heard the tale of the traveler who on a wild, wintery night, saught shelter in a rough, lonley house, where the people, though kindly, where not attractive charecters. A large chest in his room roused his curiosity.  He opened it, and found a corpse! Horror-struck, he remained awake all night. Finding himself alive in teh morning, he ventured to inquire who the dead man might be. "Tis only feyther," replied the host. "Twas too cold to take 'un to the buryin', so mother salted 'un down." I have given the story as breifly as may be. Mrs. Bray tells it admirably ; and after reading her narrative one dares not rush in on classic ground."

Cresswell 1921

Map - Warren House Inn

Cromlechs and Druid's stones - part 2

Dartmoor - through a weathered joint in a Tor - Watern Tor?

"...The result, however, of my own observations, made with much curiosity and considerable care, has been to convince me, that in by far the greatest number of instances the disintegration, though general around the line of a "bed-way" or horizontal joint, has gone on rapidly on the side exposed to the beat of the weather, while the opposite extremity has been but slightly worn; consequently, the stones have a tendency to be depressed on the sheltered side. With a little labour man could correct this natural defect, and with a little skill make a poised stone. We have incontrovertible evidence that certain poised stones have been regarded, through long periods of time, as of a sacred character. Whether these stones were used by the Druids, or merely that the ignorant people supposed them to have some peculiar virtue, I care not. The earliest inhabitants of Cornwall, probably Celts, ["A Celtic race, however, continues to occupy the primeval districts of Cornwall, and preserved, almost to our own day, a distinct dialect of the Celtic tongue."--Prehistoric Annals a Scotland, p. 195 DANIEL WILSON. See Appendix N, 'in, Celts.] were possessed with some idea that these stones were connected with the mysteries of existence; and from father to son, for centuries, notwithstanding the introduction of Christianity, these stones have maintained their sacred character. Therefore, may we not infer that the leaders of the people availed themselves of this feeling; and finding many rocks of a gigantic size, upon which nature had begun the work, they completed them, and used the mighty moving masses to impress with terror--the principle by which they ruled--the untaught, but poetically constituted, minds of the people. Dr Borlase has been laughed at for finding rock-basins, the works of the Druids, in every granitic mass. At the same time, those who laugh have failed to examine those rock-masses with unprejudiced care, and hence they have erred as wildly as did the Cornish antiquary, but in a contrary direction. Hundreds of depressions are being formed by the winds and rains upon the faces of the granite rocks. With these no Druid ever perplexed himself or his people. But there are numerous hollows to be found in large flat rocks which have unmistakably been formed, if not entirely, partly by the hands of man. The Sacrificing Rock, or Cam Brea, is a remarkable example. The larger hollows on the Men-rock, in Constantine, several basins in the Logan Rock group, and at Cam Boscawen, may be referred to as other examples. With these remarks, I proceed to notice a few of the most remarkable rock-masses with which tradition has associated some tale."

Kestor - Dartmoor, associated in the past with the Druids

Hunt 1903

Map - Carn Brea
Map - Constantine
Map - Cam [Carn?] Boscawen 

The Mermaids Vengence - part 11

"...Walter, led by the melancholy song, advanced slowly along the sands. He discovered that the sweet, soft sounds proceeded from the other side of a mass of rocks, which project far out over the sands, and that now, at low-water, there was no difficulty in walking around it. Without hesitation he did so, and he beheld, sitting at the mouth of a cavern, one of the most beautiful women he had ever beheld. She continued her song, looking upwards to the stars, not appearing to notice the intrusion of a stranger. Walter stopped, and gazed on the lovely image before him with admiration and wonder, mingled with something of terror. He dared not speak, but fixed, as if by magic, he stood gazing on. After a few minutes, the maiden, suddenly perceiving that a man was near her, uttered a piercing shriek, and made as if to fly into the cavern. Walter sprang forward and seized her by the arm, exclaiming, "Not yet, my pretty maiden, not yet." She stood still in the position of flight, with her arm behind her, grasped by Walter, and turning round her head, her dark eyes beamed with unnatural lustre upon him. Impressionable he had ever been, but never had he experienced anything so entrancing, and at the same time so painful, as that gaze. It was Selina's face looking lovingly upon him, but it seemed to possess some new power--a might of mind from which he felt it was impossible for him to escape. Walter slackened his hold, and slowly allowed the arm to fall from his hand. The maiden turned fully round upon him. "Go!" she said. He could not move. "Go, man!" she repeated. He was powerless.

"Go to the grave where the sinless one sleepeth!
Bring her cold corpse where her guarding one weepeth;
Look on her, love her again, ay! betray her,
And wreath with false smiles the pale face of her slayer!
Go, go! now, and feel the full force of my sorrow!
For the glut of my vengeance there cometh a morrow."..." [cont.]

Hunt 1903

The Mermaids Vengence - part 4

"...The mother, as may well be supposed, suffered a momentary agony of terror; but presently the babe swam up to the surface of the water, its little face more bright and beautiful than it had ever been before. Great was the mother's joy, and also--as the gossips say -- great her surprise at the sudden change in the appearance of her offspring. The mother knew no difference in the child whom she pressed lovingly to her bosom, but all the aged crones in the parish declared it to be a changeling. This tale lived its day; but, as the girl grew on to womanhood, and showed none of the special qualifications belonging either to fairies or mermaids, it was almost forgotten. The uncomplaining father had solace for all his sufferings in wandering over the beautiful sands with his daughter. Whether it was when the summer seas fell in musical undulations on the shore, or when, stirred by the winter tempests, the great Atlantic waves came up in grandeur, and lashed the resisting sands in giant rage, those two enjoyed the solitude. Hour after hour, from the setting sun time, until the clear cold moon flooded the ocean with her smiles of light, would the father and child walk these sands. They seemed never to weary of them and the ocean.

Almost every morning, throughout the milder seasons, Selina was in the habit of bathing, and wild tales were told of the frantic joy with which she would play with the breaking billows. Sometimes floating over, and almost dancing on the crests of the waves, at other times rushing under them, and allowing the breaking waters to beat her to the sands, as though they were loving arms, endeavouring to encircle her form. Certain it is, that Selina greatly enjoyed her bath, but all the rest must be regarded as the creations of the imagination. The most eager to give a construction unfavourable to the simple mortality of the maiden was, however, compelled to acknowledge that there was no evidence in her general conduct to support their surmises. Selina, as an only child, fared the fate of others who are unfortunately so placed, and was, as the phrase is, spoiled. She certainly was allowed to follow her own inclinations without any check. Still her inclinations were bounded to working in the garden, and to leading her father to the sea-shore. Honour Penna, sometimes, it is true, did complain that Selina could not be trusted with the most ordinary domestic duty..." [cont.]

Hunt 1903

Thunderbore

Did Thunderbore walk the land, inspiring terror by his extreme ugliness?' [between Dartmoor and Land's End]

Hunt 1903