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Ottery St Mary |
| Ottery St Mary | |
  Ottery St Mary shown within Devon |
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| Population | 7,692 (2001) |
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| OS grid reference | |
| District | East Devon |
| Shire county | Devon |
| Region | South West |
| Constituent country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | OTTERY ST MARY |
| Postcode district | EX11 |
| Dialling code | 01404 |
| Police | Devon and Cornwall |
| Fire | Devon and Somerset |
| Ambulance | South Western |
| European Parliament | South West England |
| UK Parliament | East Devon |
| List of places: UK • England • Devon | |
Ottery St Mary, known locally as just "Ottery" (pronounced ɒtərɪ or, more colloquially, ɒtrɪ), is a town in the East Devon district of Devon, England, on the River Otter, about ten miles east of Exeter on the B3174. It is part of a large civil parish of the same name, which also covers the villages of West Hill, Metcombe, Fairmile, Alfington, Tipton St John and Wiggaton.
The town was the birthplace of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the noted diplomat Sir Ernest Satow spent his retirement (1906–29) here at a house called Beaumont, which still stands. Satow was buried in the churchyard; there is a commemorative plaque to him in the church.
Ottery's notable buildings include the Tumbling Weir and Ottery St Mary church. The town is the site of The King's School, now a comprehensive school, a former grammar school founded in 1545 by Henry VIII.
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The town typically stages annual events around Guy Fawkes Night when, in a tradition dating from the 17th century, barrels soaked in tar are set alight 1 and carried aloft through parts of the town by residents.2
The festivities begin in the early evening with children's, youths' and women's events, culminating in the men's event when a total of seventeen barrels are lit outside each of the four public houses in the town. (Originally there were 12 public houses in the town). The barrels, increasing in size up to 30kg, are carried through the town centre, often packed with onlookers, in an exhilarating and risky spectacle. Only those born in the town, or who have lived there for most of their lives, may carry a barrel.3 Generations of the same family have been known to compete across the years and it is thought that the event may have originated as a means of warding off evil spirits, similar to other British fire festivals, around the time of Halloween. In recent years the event has been jeopardised by the need for increasing public liability insurance cover. Nevertheless the event continues and the town's population of 7,000 increases at the event to well over 10,000. During the event all roads in and out of Ottery St Mary are closed for safety reasons with diversions in place.4
It has been suggested that the tradition may have started when the Black Death entered the town. In those days cannons (ten pipe strikers using gunpowder) were said to have been employed to scare the rats carrying the plague out of the houses and into the street. Burning barrels were then rolled through the street to kill the rats before being picked up and moved to the next street. The dead rats were gathered and thrown on a big bonfire at the end of the town.
On 30 October 2008 the annual event was threatened by a serious hailstorm 5 which hit East Devon shortly after midnight. The storm led to serious flooding in the town, caused mainly by storm drains becoming clogged with hailstones. Roads became blocked and the Coastguard service was required to airlift some people to safety. The flooding also caused problems on the Millennium Green, where the annual bonfire and fairground were being constructed in preparation for the November 5th celebrations. One of the owners of the fairground said that the builders working there were "lucky to be alive". The clear-up operation was entirely successful, howewer, and both the carnival procession and the Tar Barrels and bonfire night celebrations went ahead as planned.6
Pixie Day is another old tradition which takes place in the town annually on a Saturday in June. The day commemorates an ancient legend of infamous "pixies" being banished from the town, where they caused havoc, to local caves known as the "Pixie's Parlour".
The Pixie Day legend is as follows: Many hundreds of years ago in the early days of christianity, the people of the land of East Devon, used to believe in Pixies and spirits. But Bishop Grandisson decide to build a church in Otteri and in doing so commissioned a set of bells to be cast in iron in the bells works in Wales. The Bishop so concerned about the bells getting destroyed organised an escort of Monks to bring the bells to Otteri. On hearing of this the Pixies were very concerned because the knew that once the bells were installed in the Church it would spell the death knell of their rule over the land. So they got together and cast a spell over the monks and redirected the monks from the road down Chineway, towards the road leading them to the cliffs overlooking the sea at Sidmouth. Just as the monks were about to fall over the cliff, one of the monks hit his big toe on a rock and said "god bless my soul" and immediately the spell was broken. The bells were then brought to Otteri (Ottery St Mary) and installed in the church. However the Pixies spell was not quite broken, because each year as legend has it on a day in June, the Pixies come out and capture the town's bell ringers (and some years the parish council) and imprison them in Pixies parlour to be rescued by the Vicar of Ottery St Mary. This legend is re-enacted each year by the Primary school children of Ottery St Mary with a specially constructed Pixies Parlour in the Town Square. The original Pixies Parlour (a cave in sandstone) can be found along the banks of the River Otter about 1 mile south of the Otter road bridge in Ottery St Mary on the left hand bank (looking south).
One mile north-west of the town is the Elizabethan Manor House of Cadhay, the residents of which have had a long association with the church.The house has been occupied by the William-Powlett family since the 1920's and has recently been inherited by a furniture maker nephew, Rupert Thistlethwayte. He has restored it to its previous splendour whilst introducing modern comforts such as heating and additional bathrooms, as well as contemporary furniture of his own to complement the antique furniture. Sir Simon Jenkins in his book of England Thousand Best Homes said “The courtyard ….. with statues of Henry VIII and his three monarch offspring, Edward, Mary and Elizabeth ….. is one of the treasures of Devon.“ Cadhay was built by John Haydon in 1550 on the site of an earlier house. His nephew Robert built a long gallery, a feature of late 16th century housebuilding, closing in the south side of the house to form a courtyard. The four statues of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth which stand over the doors in the courtyard were carved in 1617. By 1737 the house was in a poor state of repair and the new owner, Peere Williams, restored the house in the style of that period. He plastered up most of the Tudor hearths and panelled a number of the rooms. He inserted a lower ceiling in the great hall under the magnificent oak-timbered roof to form the current dining room and roof chamber.The house was at times divided into two in the 18th and 19th centuries and fell into a bad state of repair. It was bought by Dampier Whetham in 1910 who uncovered the old Tudor hearths and put the house into sound structural condition. He let the house to the William-Powletts in the 1920's and then who bought the property in 1935, and members of their family have occupied it since.
One Sunday afternoon in 1898 six young men from Ottery St Mary, who were then living in London, met on the steps of St Paul's Cathedral, and resolved to form a Society to promote good fellowship among Ottery people wherever they may be. And so was founded the Old Ottregians Society, which took as its motto 'Floreat Ottregia ('May Ottery Flourish')" The Old Ottregians society still exists today (2008).
Another tradition in Ottery St Mary still continued today is the daily playing of the Old Ottery song. At midday each day the Church of Ottery St Mary plays the Old Ottery song after the midday peal of the church bells. Tradition has it that the funerals of Old Ottregians always take place at 12.00 midday, with the funeral service commencing immediately following the playing of the Old Ottery song: The words are: Sweet-breathing kine, the old gray Church, The curfew tolling slow,The glory of the Western Sky, The warm red earth below. O! Ottery dear! O! Ottery fair! My heart goes out to thee, Thou art myhome, wher'er I roam, The West! The West for me!
On May 25, 1866, a great fire occurred in Ottery St Mary. The fire started about noon and the raged through the homes and shops of about a quarter of the town, reducing everything to ashes. The fire started on Jesu street where the charity schools formerly stood. At first some people believed that the fire had been started by children playing with matches, but subsequent investigation has now proved this to be incorrect. It appears that the fire was started by a woman burning rubbish and papers in her cottage fireplace on Thursday. The fire smoldered and eventually burned through the wall to the school next door. It was eventually discovered at the top of the staircase in the schoolroom, near the cottage chimney around noon on Friday. It then spread very rapidly. Within hours one hundred houses had been destroyed, and 500 people rendered homeless - 10% of the population. A great part of the town extending westwards from the school to the silk factory in Mill Street was reduced to a heap of smouldering ruins.
The parish church of Ottery St Mary has been referred to as a miniature Exeter Cathedral and is renowned for its painted roof and fan vaulted aisle.
The south transept (bell tower) houses the Astronomical Clock, one of the oldest surviving mechanical clocks in the country. It is commonly attributed to Bishop John de Grandisson, who was Bishop of Exeter (1327–69) and adheres to Ptolemaic cosmology with the Earth at the centre of the solar system.7
The church interior has two medieval carved stone green men.
A small stone plaque commemorating poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge can be found in the south churchyard wall.
Whitham, J. (1984). Ottery St Mary Camelot Press. ISBN 0 85033 526 4.
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