HISTORY

Brixham is a very old and historic town.  It is full of legends and ghosts.  We warmly welcome our visitors and our new inhabitants, but beware, you cannot call yourself a Brixhamite until you have at least three generations of your ancestors buried in the churchyard here. 

Wherever you go in Brixham, there are reminders of the old days.  In summer, you will be invited to Cowtown carnival, but you won’t find this address on the street map.  Its name is a reminder of times long ago when Brixham was two separate communities, with only a marshy lane to connect them.  Cowtown was where the farmers lived, at the top of the hill, while, about a mile away, the seamen made their homes near the harbour in Fishtown.  To-day, the ancient rivalries have (mostly) been  forgotten, but old Brixham is still there, and, if you keep your eyes open, you can find it.

FISHING

In the Middle Ages, Brixham was the largest fishing port in the South-West, and at one time it was the greatest in England.  Known as the "Mother of Deep-Sea Fisheries", its boats sailed all round the coats and helped to establish the fishing industries of Hull, Grimsby and Lowestoft.  In the 1890s there were about 300 trawling vessels here, each owned by one man who was often the skipper of his own boat.  There is still a big fishing fleet, and you can seen them coming in and out of the harbour, followed by flocks of seagulls.  The fish market is open to the public on two special days in the summer, when the finer points of catching and cooking fish will be explained to you.  The modern boats are diesel-driven, but several of the old sailing trawlers have been preserved and are being brought back to life.  It is not uncommon to see them under sail in Torbay, and you may be able to take a trip yourself. 

There was once an important boat building industry here, as well as all the associated trades such as rope walks, anchorsmiths, iron founders, tinsmiths, coppersmiths, sawyers, chandlers, coopers, riggers, sail lofts and so on.  Walk around the narrow streets behind the Tourist Office and see something of the area long ago, or visit Brixham Heritage Museum to look at the tools used in building the ships, models and pictures of them and a reconstruction of a fisherman's cottage living room.

STORMS AT SEA

People who live by the sea know how dangerous it can be.  It may look calm and peaceful from on shore, but storms can come out of nowhere.  Hundreds of ships have been wrecked on the rocks here.  Brixham men always have known the dangers but even they were taken by surprise by the terrible storm that blew up on the night of January 10th, 1866.  The fishing boats only had sails then and could not get back into harbour because gale force winds and the high waves were against them.  To make things worse, the beacon on the breakwater was swept away, and in the black darkness they did not know where they were.  According to local legend, their wives brought everything they could carry, including furniture and bedding, to make a big bonfire on the quayside to guide their men home.  If their husbands and sons perished, there was no future for the rest of the family so what did it matter if they burnt all their poor possessions.  Fifty vessels perished and more than one hundred lives were lost in the storm;  when dawn broke the wreckage stretched for nearly three miles up the coast. 

Hearing of this tragedy, the citizens of Exeter gave money to set up what became the RNLI's Torbay lifeboat, which has rescued hundreds of people.  You can visit the boathouse and look at all the memorials to the brave deeds;  on special occasions you can go on board, see how survivors are cared for, and wonder at all the high-tech equipment.  You may perhaps, one day or one night, hear two maroons fired.  That is the signal for the lifeboat to be launched and within a few minutes you will see the crew, rushing from their jobs or their beds, ready to save the lives of strangers with no thought of any danger to themselves, as they have done for the last 130 years. 

At one time, every port had a unique design for the knitting of its fishermen's jumpers. This was so that if a corpse was found, people know where he was from and could inform the sorrowing family.

BRIXHAM SMUGGLERS

There have always been smugglers at Brixham.  It was more profitable than fishing, but if the men were caught, they were hanged.  There are many legends about the local gangs and how they evaded the Revenue men.  One humourous poem describes how a notorious local character, Bob Elliott, could not run away because he had gout and was hidden in a coffin, but later that same night the coastguards were frightened by meeting what they thought was his ghost.  (For the full story of "Resurrection Bob", see the website of the Smugglers Haunt Hotel, Brixham).  Another old villain was caught in possession but evaded capture by pretending to be the Devil, rising out of the morning mists.  On another occasion when there was a cholera epidemic, some Brixham smugglers drove their cargo up from the beach in a hearse, accompanied by a bevy of supposed mourners following the cortege drawn by horses with funerial muffled hooves. 

If you explore the picturesque narrow streets, you will see how the smugglers could dodge the preventive men, by running up the steps, going through the old courts and alleys, slipping from house to house, in at the front door and climbing out of a back window.  The town might all have been specially designed for the purpose.

SHIPS IN TORBAY

Warships have been seen in Torbay from the days of the Vikings up until 1944 when part of the D-Day fleet sailed from here.  In 1588 Brixham watched Sir Francis Drake attacking the Spanish Armarda after he had finished his game of bowls on Plymouth Hoe, and we saw, anchored in Torbay, the enormous galleon, “Nostra Senora del Rosario” that he had captured.  Today in Brixham harbour there is a full-sized replica of the ship, the “Golden Hind”, in which Drake circumnavigated the globe, and you can go aboard to see how his sailors lived. 

For centuries, ships going down the English Channel have come into Torbay to seek refuge from the storms and to get food supplies.  Sometimes these were merchants, taking cargoes to far away places and bringing back exotic goods and rare spices;  sometimes they were carrying pilgrims, or gentlemen on the Grand Tour.

  During the long series of wars against the French that began in 1689 and lasted until 1815, the Navy often came into Brixham to get supplies of fresh vegetables, beef and water.   There might have been twenty or so of the big men-o'-war lying at anchor in Torbay, recovering from exploits of the sort described in the books about Hornblower, Bolitho or Jack Aubrey.  As you walk along the harbourside towards the marina you pass a grey stone building on your right which today is the Coastguard headquarters;  then, it was the King's Quay where His Majesty's vessels were provisioned.  Local farmers brought vegetables to ward off scurvy, and a great number of cattle were slaughtered and their meat packed into barrels.  The water came from a big reservoir situated near the crossroads in the middle of town;  from there a pipeline carried it under the streets and under the harbour to the King's Quay. 

Many of the well-known Admirals of the day were here.  Not only Nelson, but also Lord St. Vincent, Cornwallis, Hood, Rodney and Hawke.  There was also Earl Howe, who earned the nickname of Lord Torbay because he spent so much time ashore in Brixham.  Our most notorious visitor at that time was Napoleon Bonapart himself, who, as a prisoner on HMS “Bellerophon”, spent several days off Brixham waiting to be taken to exile on St. Helena.

BERRY HEAD

Ever since the days of Henry VIII Brixham has played a part in the defence of the Nation.  The beautiful headland known as Berry Head is now a National Nature Reserve, but it is also a famous military site where guns were once positioned to defend the naval ships that were re-victualling at Brixham.  Twelve guns were put there during the War of American Independence, but were removed when peace came in 1783.  Just ten years later, when we were at war with France, guns were again deployed around the town.  The major position was at Berry Head, but this time fortifications were built to defend the gun positions.  These can still be seen, and are now some of the best preserved Napoleonic forts in the country. 

During the summer, conducted tours of the forts are carried out every Wednesday afternoon by the Berry Head Master Gunner.  For further information about the forts or to arrange tours at other times, ring 01803 654416.

QUARRYING AND MINING

Apart from fishing, most of the other local industries were connected with our rocks.  Limestone was once quarried extensively.  It was used to build the breakwater, for houses and roads, and was sent to Dagenham to make steel for Ford cars.  It was also burnt in limekilns to reduce it to a powder which was spread on the land in other parts of Devon as an agricultural fertiliser.  You will see the old quarries and the limekilns as you walk around the town. 

Another mineral found in Brixham is ochre.  This gave the old fishing boats their "red sails in the sunset", but the purpose was to protect the canvas from seawater, not to be picturesque. It was boiled in great caldrons, together with tar, tallow and oak bark, the last ingredient giving the name of barking yards to the places where the hot mixture was painted on to the sails, which were then hung up to dry.  

The ochre was also used to make a very special paint.  This was invented in Brixham in about 1845 and was the first substance in the world that would stop cast iron from rusting.  None of the well-known scientists of the day could find a way of doing this, and, when the paint began to be made here, it sold all round the globe.  Other types of paint were made here as well, and the works were in existence until 1961. 

There were iron mines at Brixham, and for a while they produced very high quality ore but the last one closed in 1925.  Most of the sites have been built over and there are now no remains of this once important industry.

CHURCHES

As you look into Brixham from the harbour, you see the tower of All Saints' Church standing guard over the town.  It was founded in 1815, and its most famous vicar was the Rev. Francis Lyte, composer of "Abide with me".  He lived at Berry Head House, now a hotel, and when he was a very sick man, near to dying, he looked out from his garden as dusk fell over Torbay, and the words of that beautiful hymn came into his mind as the evening of the day and of his life approached. 

The main church in the town is St. Mary's, about a mile from the sea, it is the third to have been on the site, which was an ancient Celtic burial ground.  The original wooden Saxon church was replaced by a stone Norman one that was in its turn built over in about 1360.  Many of the old Brixham worthies are buried in the churchyard, but, remember, it is very unlucky indeed to walk widershins, or anti-clockwise, around the church. 

Apart from St. Mary's and a small Victorian chapel, all the other Brixham churches and chapels - and once there were seven of them - were built near the harbour.  Perhaps because this was the area of greatest population growth, or perhaps because those who earned their living from the sea felt a great need of Divine protection.

LOOK OUT FOR

There are many interesting things to see in Brixham.  Can you find the Old Coffin House ? 

The street names tell you about the history.  Pump street is where the village pump stood. Monksbridge was a bridge built by the monks of Totnes Priory.  Lichfield Drive reminds us that this was the route that the dead (from the Anglo-Saxon ‘lich’ meaning a corpse) were taken for burial at St Mary’s churchyard.  Salutation Mews, near that church, dates from when England was Catholic, and the salutation was to the Virgin Mary.  Similarly, Laywell Road recalls Our Lady’s well.  The first building that you see when you come into Brixham from Paignton is the old white-boarded Toll House where all travellers had to pay a fee to come into the town and to keep the roads repaired.  Just what the government is thinking about introducing today.  What’s new ?  The past is all around us, especially in Brixham.