Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for TEIGNMOUTH

TEIGNMOUTH, a town, two parishes, and a sub-district, in Newton-Abbot district, Devon. The town stands on the South Devon railway, at the mouth of the river Teign, and at the terminus of the Stover canal, 12 miles by road, but 14 by railway, S by E of Exeter; was known to the Saxons as Tegnton; was burnt by the Danes in 970,-by the French in 1338 and 1690; sent a member to parliament in the time of Edward I.; contributed 7 ships to the siege of Calais in 1347; rose slowly from the condition of a small village to that of a considerable town; gives the title of Baron to the family of Shore; is a seat of petty sessions, a head port, and a well-frequented watering-place; occupies a fine site, amid charming environs; consists chiefly of wide, well built, and well-cleaned streets; includes, at the river's mouth, a spacious esplanade, called the Den; publishes two weekly newspapers; and has a head post-office,‡ a r. station with telegraph, two banking offices, five chief inns, excellent bathing appliances, public baths, very fine public rooms of 1826, a theatre, a bridge 1,671 feet long, erected in 1825-7, a custom-house, a coastguard station, two churches rebuilt in 1822-3, three dissenting chapels, a Roman Catholic chapel, a literary institution, large parochial schools, an infirmary, a dispensary, and charities £17. A weekly market is held on Saturday; fairs are held in Jan., Feb., and Sept.; a very productive salmon fishery formerly existed, but is now extinct; ship-building has recently become prominent; and a large export trade in granite and porcelain clay is carried on. The harbour is small and barred; a new pier was begun to be constructed in 1865; and a light house stands on the end of the Den, was erected in 1845, and shows a fixed light 31 feet high. The vessels belonging to the port, at the beginning of 1864, were 10 small sailing-vessels, of aggregately 256 tons; 52 large sailing-vessels, of aggregately 6,288 tons; and 1 steam vessel, of 15 tons. The vessels which entered, in 1863, were 22 British sailing-vessels, of aggregately 2,216 tons, from British colonies; 30 British sailing-vessels, of aggregately 2,454 tons, from foreign countries; 13 foreign sailing-vessels, of aggregately 1,688 tons, from foreign countries; and 544 sailing-vessels, of aggregately 48,029 tons, coastwise. The amount of customs, in 1862, was £628.

The two parishes are East T. and West T.; and are re- garded as jointly conterminate with the town. Acres of East T., 745; of which 75 are water. Real property, £11,327. Pop. in 1851, 1,760; in 1861, 2,059. Houses, 399. Acres of West T., 493; of which 90 are water. Real property, £14,207. Pop. in 1851, 3,389; in 1861, 3,963. Houses, 735. The living of East T. is a p. curacy, and that of West T. is a vicarage, in the diocese of Exeter. Value of East T., £127; of West T., £180. Patron of the former, the Vicar of Dawlish: of the latter, Trustees.—The sub-district contains also two other parishes, and comprises 7,540 acres. Pop., 11,184. Houses, 2,232.


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a town, two parishes, and a sub-district"   (ADL Feature Type: "cities")
Administrative units: Teignmouth CP       Teignmouth SubD       Newton Abbot RegD/PLU       Devon AncC
Place names: TEGNTON     |     TEIGNMOUTH
Place: Teignmouth

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