Fox Tor is a relatively minor

tor Tor, TOR or ToR may refer to: Places * Toronto, Canada ** Toronto Raptors * Tor, Pallars, a village in Spain * Tor, former name of Sloviansk, Ukraine, a city * Mount Tor, Tasmania, Australia, an extinct volcano * Tor Bay, Devon, England * Tor ...

Dartmoor Dartmoor is an upland area in southern Devon, South West England. The moorland and surrounding land has been protected by National Park status since 1951. Dartmoor National Park covers . The granite that forms the uplands dates from the Carb ...

in the 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 ...

, England. On the flank of the tor, about 500 m to the north stands Childe's Tomb - according to local legend, the last resting place of Childe the Hunter, an unfortunate traveller who died there during a blizzard. About 800 m. NNE of the tor lie the remains of Foxtor Farm, which was used by Eden Phillpotts as one of the main settings of his 1904 novel '' The American Prisoner'', and in a subsequent early "

talkie A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed befo ...

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

, made in 1929. Occupancy of Fox Tor farm lasted for fifty years, and various people tried grazing sheep on the land in short stays from 1807 to the 1880s. Little Fox Tor, also known as Yonder Tor lies about 500 m. to the east. About a kilometre north-east of the tor lies the swampy land or mire known as Fox Tor Mires. This is said to have been the inspiration for the fictional Grimpen Mire in the novel ''

The Hound of the Baskervilles ''The Hound of the Baskervilles'' is the third of the four Detective fiction, crime novels by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes. Originally serial (literature), serialised in ''The Strand Magazine'' from ...

'' by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. This wide expanse of

peat Peat is an accumulation of partially Decomposition, decayed vegetation or organic matter. It is unique to natural areas called peatlands, bogs, mires, Moorland, moors, or muskegs. ''Sphagnum'' moss, also called peat moss, is one of the most ...

bog continues to be dangerous to walkers, especially after heavy rain. There is another Fox Tor on Dartmoor, one of five outcrops on the western bank of the

River Tavy The Tavy () is a river on Dartmoor, Devon, England. The name derives from the Brythonic languages, Brythonic root , once thought to mean 'dark' but now generally understood to mean 'to flow'. It has given its name to the town of Tavistock and ...

in woodland north of Peter Tavy, at grid reference SX514788. There is another on Bodmin Moor near Lewannick.

References

Further reading