Princetown

This article is about the village in England. For other uses, see Princetown (disambiguation).

Princetown
The Jubilee Memorial and Railway Inn, Princetown.
OS grid reference	SX588736
• London	181 miles (291 km)
Civil parish	Dartmoor Forest
District	West Devon
Shire county	Devon
Region	South West
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	YELVERTON
Postcode district	PL20
Dialling code	01822
Police	Devon and Cornwall
Fire	Devon and Somerset
Ambulance	South Western
UK Parliament	Torridge and West Devon

Princetown is a village on Dartmoor in the English county of Devon. It is the principal settlement of the civil parish of Dartmoor Forest.

The village has its origins in 1785, when Sir Thomas Tyrwhitt, Secretary to the Prince of Wales, leased a large area of moorland from the Duchy of Cornwall estate, hoping to convert it into good farmland. He encouraged people to live in the area and suggested that a prison be built there. He called the settlement Princetown after the Prince of Wales.

Princetown is the site of Dartmoor Prison. At around 435 metres (1,430 feet) above sea level, it is the highest settlement on the moor, and one of the highest in the United Kingdom. The Princetown Railway, closed in 1956, was also the highest railway line in England, its Princetown terminus being 435 metres (1,427 ft) above sea level.

History

In 1780, a farm was reclaimed on the site of an ancient tenement near the Two Bridges, and in 1785, Sir Thomas Tyrwhitt set about improving the moor at a place which he named Tor Royal, about 1 km (0.62 mi) south-east of Princetown. He made an estate and built a house in 1798. Later the road from Tavistock to Princetown was built, as well as the other roads that now cross the Moor.

Photograph of prisoners at the Dartmoor Prison tied together carrying a cart out the gates, circa 1900.

He also proposed that a prison be built on Dartmoor to house the thousands of captives of the Napoleonic Wars and the later War of 1812, who had become too numerous to lodge in the prisons and prison-ships at Plymouth. The site was given by the Prince of Wales, who held the lands of the Duchy of Cornwall to which all the Moor belonged. This is why the settlement is named Princetown. Dartmoor Prison was built in 1806 at a cost of £130,000 and at one time had a capacity between 7,000 and 9,000 prisoners.

A small town grew up near the prison. Two large inns were built during the war. Many of the prisoners had prize-money to come from their own country; many others made their own in their hammocks at night, even forging Bank of England and local bank notes, which they passed off in the great daily market held in the prison. With the closing of the prison in 1816, the town almost collapsed, but the completion of the Dartmoor Railway in 1823 brought back many people to the granite quarries. The prison remained derelict until 1851, when it was reopened for prisoners serving long sentences. It has since been considerably extended.

Geography

Princetown
Climate chart (explanation)
J F M A M J J A S O N D     219     6 1     168     6 1     162     7 2     109     10 3     100     13 6     116     16 9     112     18 11     133     18 11     156     15 9     215     12 6     234     8 4     251     7 2 █ Average max. and min. temperatures in °C █ Precipitation totals in mm
Imperial conversion J F M A M J J A S O N D     8.6     42 34     6.6     42 33     6.4     45 35     4.3     49 37     3.9     55 43     4.6     60 47     4.4     64 51     5.2     64 52     6.1     59 48     8.5     53 44     9.2     47 39     9.9     44 36 █ Average max. and min. temperatures in °F █ Precipitation totals in inches

The village is located on the B3212 road between Yelverton and Two Bridges, and is surrounded by moorland. Several footpaths across the moor pass through the village, including one leading west to Sampford Spiney and one leading south to Nun's Cross and Erme Head.

Tor Royal Lane is a dead end road which leads down from the village to the site of the disused Whiteworks tin mine, about 3 km or 2 miles to the south-east, which overlooks Fox Tor Mires, the presumed site of the Grimpen Mire to be found in Arthur Conan Doyle's tale The Hound of the Baskervilles. Conan Doyle stayed at the Royal Duchy Hotel whilst writing and researching the story with his friend, Bertram Fletcher Robinson. The hotel has long since closed and the building now houses the High Moorland Visitor Centre which provides a wealth of information and exhibits for those visiting the moor.

Other points of interest in the village include the prison museum and the churchyard which includes the graves of French and American prisoners of war who were housed at the prison. The Church of St Michael has the distinction of being the only one in England constructed by POWs and is dedicated, as are many churches in high locations, to St. Michael. It was taken out of use due to structural problems and damp and is now maintained by the Redundant Churches Fund, although the building has been stabilised and made safe. Services are held nowadays in the Methodist chapel at the other end of the village.

The village is overlooked from the north-west by North Hessary Tor upon which is a tall transmitting mast that provides a useful guide point for walkers from miles around.

Demography

Princetown is the most deprived ward in Devon, as when the Home Office changed its rules on where prison officers should live, staff moved away and much poor-quality housing became available, which was then offered to the disabled, the unemployed and one parent families. After this, Princetown went into significant economic decline and gained a poor social reputation. With few facilities and little public transport these people became isolated. A charity was formed, called "High Moorland Community Action", which aimed to improve the situation. This now appears to be bearing fruit, as a considerable quantity of new housing has been built and more is under construction on the vacant lots where council properties used to stand, some of considerable size. This influx of private housing has had a beneficial effect on the village as a whole, as has the relocation of the Post Office to new premises (at a time when many villages are losing their POs).

Economy

The Plume of Feathers

In terms of tourism, Princetown is popular with walkers and the sight of large groups of young people with rucksacks is especially common during the summer months. A bunkhouse, bed and breakfast and camping facilities are available in the village and there are also a handful of local shops.

Princetown has a brewery producing the appropriately named Jail Ale and Dartmoor IPA. This used to be housed in the Prince of Wales pub, but now occupies a modern purpose-built building on the edge of the village, close to the former railway. The other pub is the Plume of Feathers (the Railway inn - "The Devils Elbow" - has closed as a pub recently) and there are also a couple of cafes, one of which is in what used to be the police station.

In recent years Princetown has seen the opening of both the Princetown Centre for Creativity in Duchy Square (currently closed due to lack of funds), on the site of the former village supermarket, and a new village Community Centre, which also houses a GP's office.

Transport

A summer bus service, the Transmoor link from Plymouth to Exeter and vice versa, passes through the village and there is a daytime service linking Princetown to Yelverton and Tavistock, but in general public transport is poor. The Transmoor link operates in the winter, but only on Sundays.

External links

• Princetown at Curlie