The Branscombe Project

2023 July - Talking Heads Video

To view the video click on the image above.

2014 April - Grave Matters

WW1, St Winifred Church & Methodist Chapel

• The home front in WW1 - Appeal tribunals, recruiting drives, farming, fund raising etc.
• Church and chapel - what the records tell us and the stories to be found on the gravestones.
• HEAP Project - the story so far.

2012 October - Collections & Discoveries

• Bill Carpenter’s collected reminiscences
• Lillie Gush’s suit-case
• Orlando Hutchinson’s diaries
• 18 newly discovered WWI pewter tankards
• Prehistoric flint tools
• A Victorian Tea Party

2011 October - Branscombe's War

A look at the parish in wartime - Rations and rabbits, the Home Guard, evacuees, RAF Branscombe, local fascists, the munitions factory, farming, Searchlight Battery, Girl Guides’ salvage collections, WI bottling fruit, Whitcot - wartime household paraphernalia, wartime tea, evening of wartime themed entertainment, evening dance, local wartime film, memories and more.

2011 April - 3 Houses

• Chicks at Hazelwood
• Lethbridge at Hole
• Wadhams at Edge

Included an archaeological road show on the first day (with Tom Cadbury curator of Royal Albert Memorial Museum Exeter)

2010 April - Farming Then and Now

Farms, cliff-plats, allotments, orchards, water supplies and more...   

2009 November - Lace Exhibition, Lace Making &

Chudleys & Cream

To launch the reprint of:

Margaret Tomlinson

'Three Generations in the Honiton Lace Trade'

2009 September - Disappeared Houses Walk (2)

From Square to Church.

Led by Barbara Farquharson, John Torrance & Ike Dowell

2008 October - Village Medley

Stanley Squire: A great Branscombe Schoolmaster

• The story of Kingsley Squire
• Interactive Tithe Map
• Water Meadows

2008 September - Disappeared Houses Walk (1)

Beach - Square - Lower Lane - Gays.

Led by Dave Rockey, Ralph Cox, Sid Sweetland, Sue Dymond, Phil Planel, Barbara Farquharson

2007 October - Branscombe and the Wreck of the Napoli

2006 October - Farming & More

• Farming & cliff plats
• Branscombe War Memorial
• Tithe map
• Snapshot of Weston
• T.E. Lawrence

2005 Farming & Plats (part 2)

• Diary of an eighteenth century farmer
• Archaeological survey at Watercombe
• Temple-Cotton & Fascism
• Ralph Cox’s electrical shop

2005  Make Poverty History Concert

The Stadler Ensemble, Chris Gradwell & organist Robin Davis

2004 Farming in Branscombe (part 1)

• Burnt House at Weston
• Hedgerow dating

2003 Banana Blush

Chris Gradwell & 16 piece jazz band, with Oliver Bernard reading Betjeman

2003 Archaeological Excavation

Test pits in field north of Hooken

2004 Archaeological Excavation

Weston Burnt House, led by Mark Edmonds

2003 Mills

• Gypsum
• A Weston land-girl
• Cider making
• Seaton Junction

2003 Valentine’s Day Celebration

Auction to raise money for the communal cider press

2002 Field Walking  & Flint Washing

In Berry  Barton fields, led by  Martin Tingle

2001  Orchards

Shutes & outdoor loos

2002  Thirteen Branscombe Gardens

(With nine Branscombe gardens open to the public)

2000 Lace Making & Smuggling in Branscombe

1998 Cliff Plats & Cliff Farmers  

1997 Village Ghosts

1999 Shops, Trades & Getting By

2017 April - The Napoli Revisited & Book Launch Take Three Hundred Snails

2014 December  - Book Launch Cliff & Beach at Branscombe and Tales from the Plats

2015 April - War Years Poetry 1914-1918

2016 March  - Village Lives

• Prehistoric flints
• 18th Century recipes
• Coastguards
• 50 Years a-fishing
• 48 Years of variety nights
• 25 Years at the old bakery
• Favourite places & landscapes

2018 April - A Tale of Three Pubs

2014 August - Postman’s Walk - In the Footsteps of Harry Layzell

2014 August - A Churchyard Event - Rev Hilary Dawson & The Branscombe Project

• Tales from the Grave
• The nameless
• Poetry 7 music

2013 October - A Walk Through Time - HEAPs/The Branscombe Project

Kiln Lane, Berry Camp, Cliff Plats

2013 June - Tea & Book Launch Branscombe’s War 1939-1945

2013 May - Branscombe Through Time: Walk - HEAPs/The Branscombe Project

St Winifred’s to Manor Mill

2022 April - Branscombe Farm Outbuildings

2022 September - Branscombe History in the Making

The Branscombe Project created an installation called ‘Branscombe - History in the Making’ that was on display in the church during the St Winifred’s Autumn Arts Festival.

Click here to view the display and the accompanying notes.

2023 July - Talking Heads - 60 Years of Change

The Branscombe Project’s ‘Talking Heads’ recording was on display at the AONB’s celebration of their 60th anniversary at Kennaway House.

Click here for the recording notes.