Branscombe is a village in the
East Devon district of the
English County of
Devon
Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...
.
The
parish
A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...
covers . Its permanent population in 2009 was estimated at 513 by the Family Health Services Authority, reducing to 507 at the 2011 Census. It is located within the
East Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, overlooking
Lyme Bay.
Branscombe has one of the South West's most scenic bus routes. AVMT Buses ru
service 899from Seaton to Sidmouth via Beer and Branscombe.
History
The name of the parish is probably
Celtic in origin. It is made up of two words, "Bran" and "cwm". Bran is a well established Celtic personal or tribal name that may also mean "black" or "crow black".
Cwm is a topographical term still in use in English as well as modern
Welsh to describe a steep-sided hollow or valley. Thus the name may derive from the first Celtic family or tribe to take possession of the land, probably from the
Dumnonii tribe, sometime between 2700 and 2000 BC.
From the 17th to the 19th centuries, Branscombe was a source of hand-made
lace, and ''Branscombe Point'' is a style that is still practised by lacemakers worldwide. Fishing was also a traditional industry, as well as a source of food. The manufacture of flints for early guns and the cooking of limestone to make
fertiliser were short-lived but important local enterprises in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The current
Church of Saint Winifred was built between 1133 and 1160 in the
Norman era and enlarged in stages over the following 200 years, but there is some archaeological evidence suggesting there may have been a former
Saxon church or building on the site.
Aethelweard (c.880-922), the youngest son of King
Alfred the Great
Alfred the Great ( ; – 26 October 899) was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 until his death in 899. He was the youngest son of King Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who both died when Alfr ...
and his wife
Ealhswith whom he married in 868, inherited Branscombe by his father's will of 899, a copy of which is now in the
British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...
.
The church contains a memorial of the Wadham family originally of
Wadham, Knowstone, in north Devon and later seated at
Merryfield, Ilton
Merryfield (''alias'' Merrifield, Murefeld, Merefeld, Muryfield, Merifield, Wadham's Castle, etc.) is a historic estate in the parish of Ilton, near Ilminster in Somerset, England. It was the principal seat of the Wadham family, and was called ...
Somerset, who lived at
Edge in the north of the parish from the end of the fourteenth century, and later used it as their
dower house. When
Nicholas Wadham died in 1609, part of his fortune was used to found
Wadham College, Oxford.
Today
Branscombe's principal industries are farming and tourism, although a significant number of permanent residents are retired. In 2009 over half the estimated population were aged over 50. The village straggles along narrow roads down steep-sided valleys, terminating at a
shingle beach, Branscombe Mouth, which forms part of the East Devon and Dorset
Jurassic Coast. To either side of the beach, the coast rises steeply to cliffs, which are in the ownership of the
National Trust. It is a popular point for starting walks on the
South West Coast Path; it is a short walk eastwards to
Beer (with two alternative routes, one at the top of the cliffs and the other ascending the cliffs via the interesting
Hooken Undercliff area and a longer walk westwards towards
Sidmouth.
There is a small primary school, which had 68 pupils in 2005. It is owned and operated by the
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...
with grant assistance from the
Devon County Council. The original building dates from 1878.
There are two public houses in the parish, the Fountain Head and the Mason's Arms, both of which were included in
CAMRA's Good Beer Guide 2008. The Fountain Head is sited at the source of a spring in the hamlet of Street. The name of the Mason's Arms is a reminder that stone quarrying in the nearby
beer stone caves was once a major employer in the village; from the undercliff path east of Branscombe Mouth, an
adit to the former beer stone mine can be seen. The Mason's Arms is also a hotel. A village brewery, Branscombe Vale Brewery, has won many awards for its beer.
The village contains three National Trust properties,
The Old Bakery, Manor Mill & Forge, restored by the Trust, which has owned them since 1965.
July 2013 saw the inaugural Branscombe Music Festival, hosted by
BBC Radio 3 presenter
Petroc Trelawny. Performers included the Carducci String Quartet, Philip Higham (cello),
Ailyn Pérez and
Stephen Costello with
Iain Burnside (piano), the
Leo Green Experience jazz band and the Trelights Brass Quintet.
''MSC Napoli''
On 18 January 2007 the container ship ''
MSC Napoli'' was holed whilst in the
English Channel
The English Channel, also known as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates Southern England from northern France. It links to the southern part of the North Sea by the Strait of Dover at its northeastern end. It is the busi ...
during the storm
Kyrill, forcing the rescue of her 26-man crew by
French Navy
The French Navy (, , ), informally (, ), is the Navy, maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the four military service branches of History of France, France. It is among the largest and most powerful List of navies, naval forces i ...
and
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...
helicopter
A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...
s. On Saturday 20 January 2007 she was beached at Branscombe to enable the salvage of the cargo.
The ''MSC Napoli'' was carrying 2,394 containers, of which around 150 contained "hazardous" substances including industrial and agricultural chemicals, according to the
Maritime and Coastguard Agency. The ship was beached following serious structural failure, amidst fears she would not reach nearby
Portland Harbour.
Items of cargo were stolen in acts of
wrecking.
References
External links
The Branscombe Project
{{authority control
Villages in Devon
Beaches of Devon
Jurassic Coast