Synopsis: Following a day of solid rain good to get out. Lunch on a bench in the graveyard of St Martin’s Church, Exminster. A walk around my old school, and past where my childhood home once stood.
(selection of photos from Flickr photo set – use link above to view album)
Nothing remains the same, I suppose would be the adage for today’s walk. And certainly Exminster is much changed, and fast changing village. The place of my boyhood seems a distant memory of a bygone world. As my father would have said, “You can’t stop that clock going round.”
I had made no plans for today so just had to wing it. The day was fine and warm and too good to stay indoors. I quickly packed a picnic lunch and set off for the Exeter Ship Canal. Although there had been some rain on previous days I was hoping the Exminster Marshes wouldn’t be so wet that I couldn’t cross them. As I walked along the canal towpath I saw what I first thought to be an old WWII gun boat, but subsequently discovered it was in fact built in the 1960s for the Finnish Navy. Quite what it’s doing there I do not know.
Glancing out at Exminster Marshes, as I neared the motorway bridge over the canal, I could see the way ahead across the marshes was dry enough for me to walk. In the winter this area was completely under water. It’s perhaps surprising how quickly the countryside dries out once the weather improves.
I entered Exminster through a housing estate, and approached the parish church of St Martin’s. It was already lunch time so I sought out a bench in the graveyard. I pretty much had the place to myself, well, apart from the usual incumbents, some of which are family. We have seven family members buried in this graveyard, which indicates our families long ties with the village of Exminster. After my picnic lunch I inspected our family graves and then tried the door to the church which I found locked.
I crossed the road from the church and entered what’s left of the village school I once knew. I say this, as the old building, at which my mother and her sister and brother, and me and siblings, all attended, was demolished some time back. There was once a newish building (classroom, canteen and sports hall combined) where the current hotch-potch of a school stands, but circling the present buildings I couldn’t even find this, so I think it too must have gone the way of much of my past.
I couldn’t walk out the lane at the back of the school, since there was a padlocked gate barring my way. Instead I returned to the road and turned right up Deepway Lane, and then right again into Exe View. I passed No. 17 where my aunt and uncle once lived, which I had known quite well. I wished to see Nos 12 and 13, also once occupied by our family. Sadly it’s hard to get a view of these houses since the lovely old village cottages now have whopping great garages at the end of their gardens nearest the road.
I picked up the path at the bottom of the hill which took me out onto the road again, next to Exminster Garage. I was intrigued to find a large print of an old photograph of the garage how it once looked. The garage is presumed to have been established circa 1920s, and I would also think that about the right date for the photo. The rather lovely shack that housed the old garage has an almost mid-western US’s look about it. Parts of the modern garage are how I remember it, and would suggest a build date in the 1930s, which I think was a boom time in the age of the motorcar.
Sadly the petrol pumps that I remember, slightly more modern than those in the old photo above, are no longer there, for who can compete with the supermarkets these days? I remember Dad would usually buy 4 gallons of petrol, which would give him change from £1. Those were the days to be motoring. Even in my day of times’ past, when a mere youngster, I remember Campbell’s ‘office’ appeared to be a typical, but charming, mechanic’s dark and greasy hovel.
I wandered past the sites of what would have been old family homes on the Holly Bank (or is that Holley Bank?) range of hospital houses. Some ambiguity surrounds the spelling, as on old maps of 1955 it’s spelt Holley, but for myself, and everyone I’ve ever spoken to, it’s always been Holly Bank, and we’ve been around about here an awful long time. I suspect the ‘official’ name Holley simply never got used, but ironically it’s been adopted as a street name on the new estate. Maybe people today are more tractable, and perhaps it might just stick this time round.
I followed the modern Reddaway Drive (named after an electrician who worked at the hospital) towards the old hospital buildings. I know today I shouldn’t think of it as a hospital, but it’s hard to shed a lifetime of memory. It’s possible to make out the radial style of the main complex, which was a typical design of this type of institution during Victorian times [Devington Park] (Listed II*). The hospital transferred to the National Health Service in 1948, it was closed (as Exe Vale Hospital) in July 1986. Records are held at the Devon Heritage Centre.
After a little follow-up research on the name Reddaway as associated with Exminster Hospital, I discovered that ‘T.E. Reddaway’ is mentioned in ‘Annual reports for the years 1949 and 1950 : Exminster Hospital, Digby Hospital, Wonford Hospital’ as being ‘Building Foreman’, and is mentioned in ‘Annual report 1954-1955 : Exminster Hospital, Digby Hospital, Wonford House Hospital’ as ‘Group Clerk of Works’. Therefore the memory in our family of Mr. Reddaway as ‘electrician’, although possibly justified to some extent by actual experience, nevertheless probably fails to adequately do justice to the man’s actual position and rank. And, one final thought on the name: ‘Reddaway’ [Forebears] – this is predominantly a Devon name, one that is described as '(English) Dweller at the Red Road [Old English réad + weg]' [‘Redway’ on Forebears]. Since Devon is very much the red clay county of England, it strikes me as a highly appropriate name for a group of Devonians. Incidentally, ‘Reddaway’ [How to pronounce] is typically pronounced, in UK English, with a very soft central ‘da’ that is almost lost when spoken.
I headed out of Exminster for Marsh Barton, then followed a path that led me over the canal and along the mill leat that passes close by the grounds of the Exeter & Devon Crematorium. The maple trees were newly in leaf and all the colours looked incredibly vibrant.
And here is one final photo for this blog post, me at Holly Bank, Exminster, taken just a little while ago.
It was an odd experience, visiting where your home once stood, to find the landscape barely recognisable today. I felt an alien in my own environment, as once this was. I think it’s not just a case of the place looking so different, but the knowledge that times are so different too. The simple pleasures we sought in the countryside, riding around on our bikes, playing in the fields and building dens, seem now to be so out of place in a world of smartphones and SUVs. Could I (purely rhetorical) be getting old?
Sobering thought #697: there is a greater period of time between today and this photo of me as a boy than the time between it and the image from the 1920s of Exminster Garage shown above. Oh dear!
Walk Statistics:
Total Distance: 12.8 miles
Moving Time: 4hrs 37min
Stopped Time: 34min
Total Ascent: 290 metres
Maximum Elevation: 112 metres
Buses: (none)
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