MDE20415 - Bodley, Parracombe (Place)

The Blackmore family, ancestors of RD Blackmore, were freeholders of East Bodley and Barton. They were settled there as far back as parish registers go. The community is made up of 17th Century or earlier farmhouses and cottages.

East Bodley and Barton. The Blackmore family, ancestors of RD Blackmore, were freeholders of this property. They were settled there as far back as parish registers go. [1] The area is labelled Bodley on the Parracombe Tithe Map of 1839 and many of the buildings and associated land are in the ownership of Reverend John Blackmore, occupied by William Lock. The arrangement of the original buildings depicted seems to have been little altered between the survey of the 1839 Tithe Map and the present MasterMap. [2-5] Bodley is described as a long established small community of farmhouses and cottages with 17th Century or earlier origins. Most dwellings are noted to be at right angles to the lane. [6] Bodley was first mentioned in 1332, when it was owned by William de Bodeleigh, and again in the early 14th Century. The hamlet of Bodley follows the lane along the valley side. It is formed almost entirely of historic buildings and comprises tightly clustered houses and farm buildings, mainly on the south side of Bodley Lane. Most of the houses are aligned end-on to the road. Further east, there are two terrace rows comprising four local authority houses each which are set one third back within regular rectangular plots with front and rear gardens. Between here and Bodley Cross, on the south side of the lane there are larger earlier twentieth century dwellings. On the north side, and set above and back from the lane, there are regularly spaced twentieth century bungalows within long rectangular plots. The buildings around Bodley Cross are aligned hard up against the road and are a late nineteenth/early twentieth century development and not within regularly shaped plots. [7]