Feniton History Group held the 67th meeting in the Nog Inn

 We had another evening consisting of a good natter about various topics,   the old chapel at Sidmouth Junction, sad that we could not have made use of it for the village as an arts centre and cafĂ©. Being an old building the upkeep would have been a problem.

 Something I omitted from last month was the amount of £66.00 raised by Jim Rider’s talk. This has been passed to the Church. I have received a note from Jo Chown thanking us and hoping we will continue to make use of the building in this way.

Brenda bought along an interesting article about Sidmouth junction Station shown in the form of a model in a railway magazine, very well made, though  Alan says the train on the branch line is wrong it would have been a tank engine suitable to run the line without being turned around.

The conversation then moved on to Moles, Badgers and hedgehogs and the plans to re-wild rural areas.

The Boundary Stone unveiling and walk was a great success, the Group hope to make this an annual event on Rogation Sunday.  

Brenda is researching the cottages now known as Parr Cottages. This building has a long and varied history, being the local inn or cider house, a room was used by the Men’s Club. Brenda now has the minute books which from 1924 onwards. The club was started by the Rev. Watson to give men something to do. John Virgin was running it when it closed.

The rooms there were used like a village hall, the parish council held their meetings there, it was also used for the large ploughing match lunches, wonderful write ups in the newspapers of the day. The men were asked to use the facilities rather than the garden!  The rooms played a big part in the social life of the village.

We talked about how Post Cards were delivered same day compared to modern day communications, how many of us during our school days found the teaching of history uninspiring.

Hugh  told us about his interests in the history of Plymouth Argyle football  team. The whole town had a half day closing for the match days and the dockyard also let their employees off.  Seeing the local sports news Hugh must be very chuffed to see his team off to Wembley! My brother who lives in Hampshire tells the Portsmouth followers are devastated!!

Jenny and George are taking the Western Uprising PowerPoint to Honiton this week. Jenny has kindly honoured us with the copyright to safeguard it.

Thank you all for a jolly evening. Shout if I have left anything out.

 Our next meeting is on 2nd June, when we look forward to having Graeme with his metal detecting and field walking find.

1061 Boundary between Ottery St Mary and Feniton

On Rogation Sunday 1st May 2016 The History Group and guests attended while Rev. Cate unveiled a Boundary Stone to mark this ancient boundary. We followed this with a walk along a part of the boundary.

Susie Bond has kindly written about the process that led us to the event:
https://susiebond.wordpress.com/