and here I quote from Crossing’s Guide to Dartmoor where he says ‘Risdon speaks of a noted place called Saddletor from the hills near which the Lomen or as we now call it , the Lemon “ fetcheth her fountain” .
The nearest stream to the tor is the Sig which rises on Bag Tor Down about a quarter of a mile South of it , it falls into the Lemon the springs of which are near Lud Gate just below Sigford, and immediately after having received the waters of the Langworthy Brook .’ All of which we shall be investigating in due course.
This particular stream, which becomes the River Sig, runs past Bugtor cottages and is typical of these moorland streams, deep set in ferns and bright flowers among the rocks as they chatter busily onwards, and it was here that Syd Wills, now living at St Budeaux, spent many happy hours of his childhood, and where he told me, ‘It was an unwritten law to let the foxes drink before you collected the duy’s water supply from the brook.’ He went on to tell me of the two Indies who once ran Bagtor House and the Barton as guesthouse
and farm, their names Miss Blankiron and Miss Cross. Memories of them too came from Miss Catherine Haines, now in her 80s and living at Bridford. She was a groom at Bagtor House in the 1920s. And here once again the tragedy of fire touched the Lemon’s tributary, the Sig .
Early one morning she got up at five to go cubbing and saw clouds of smoke coming from the neighbouring farm of Westabrook, an old thatched house standing near the banks of the river.
She rushed down to wake up the Retallick family, who lived there, and to help the oldest member of the family from his bed and into the barn for safety.
Eventually the fire engine arrived, ‘But,’ she said, thore was some problem over getting the pump started to take water from the stream, and I had to chase off to another farm for fuel.
Meanwhile Mr Retallick was concerned about his watch which, as was his habit, he had tied to the bedpost for the night.
It was resn ii‘(l — only to be stolen from him later. His son, Mr H. Retallick, now farms Bagtor Barton and he told me that recently when they
were doing some repairs at Bagtor cottages they took down a partition and uncovered a small cubby hole like the ones from which
lickots are sold at railway stations. ‘My guess is that is where they
paid the men who worked in Newtake and Crownley Mines,’ he said and there are also the remains of a blacksmith’s shop and blowing house on the common.’
lie too remembered the two ladies from the Big House. ‘Proper which have occurred on its banks.
Here, at its beginnings, controversy once raged, for water used to
be taken from it to feed the leat or pot water, the sole supply for Ilsington village, and Dick Wills, parish historian of Narracombe, whose family have farmed there for fourteen generations, told me there were many accusations from the thirteenth century onwards
that too much water was taken, thus depriving the manor mill,
Bagtor, of its supply, whilst the leat was feeding the mills of Ilsington, Liverton and Pool.
‘It seem s,’ he said ‘that there was a trough at the source and from a hole in this the water ran through the fields to Ilsington.
The villagers used to go and make the hole bigger so more water ran their way.
This caused a certain amount of ill feeling! ’
But for a moment we come back to the present century.
On the night of 6 March 1970, when the Bovey police and their 250 guests were enjoying their twenty-
The police tackled the fire with extinguishers until ten appliances arrived with sixty firemen, but all they could do was to stop the blaze from entirely destroying the hotel.
A large section of the upper floor was wiped out and extensive damage caused to the ground floor.
It was thought that the fire had started as the result of faulty wiring, but fortunately at least there were no casualties, four children who had been asleep upstairs being carried to safety.
The following morning the police had to open up a special depot for people to pick up their coats at the police station in Newton Abbot, among them a silver mink.
Much to everyone’s relief the draw money and prizeshad also been saved!
It was the biggest hotel fire in the area for years, and now it is known as the Hotel with no Guests, for it has remained an empty shell ever since.
All you can hear as you stand looking over the gate is the whistling of the wind through the glassless windows.
The owners did want to rebuild it on a bigger scale, but the plan was turned down by the Dartmoor National Park Comm ittee.
At the entrance is a board which states CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
Could it perhaps be forever
Let us look now at something beautiful instead, for it is only fair to visit the Lemon’s main tributary while we are on this part of the moor — the River Sig which rises in Bagtor……
