Bovey Tracey.
The great source of Devonshire clay used in most of the potteries of the kingdom is the district near the estuary of the river Teign. This clay is known by various names—“Black clay,” “Ball clay,” “Devonshire clay,” “Kingsteignton clay,” or “Potter’s clay;” and is sent off in immense quantities to the various seats of earthenware manufacture. Yet in the whole of this district where the clay is raised, and one would expect to find earthenware extensively made, only one pottery exists, and that one not on a large scale. Coal, which is such an important item in the manufacture of earthenware, is wanting in the district; and it is found more economical and advantageous to take the clay to the coal, than to bring the coal to the clay. Although no true coal is found in this district (that is, coal of the Carboniferous formation), a lignite is found on Bovey Heath field. The beds of this lignite crop out in a line running east and west for about the length of half a mile in the vicinity of the present Bovey Tracey Pottery Works. In the middle of the last century these beds had been but little worked, and lignite could easily be obtained by open pits. In consequence of the sandy and soft nature of the beds which alternate with the lignite, it has been found impossible to work underground on the plan adopted in ordinary coal-mines. The raising of Bovey lignite has, therefore, been almost given up—all the coal near the surface having been worked out. The existence of a cheap fuel in the proximity of the potters’ clay no doubt led to the establishment of potteries at Bovey Tracey. This lignite is a light bituminous coal which occurs in the Miocene formation, being the same geological formation in which the potters’ clay is found. This lignite is highly gaseous, but only possesses about a third of the heat-giving power of average English coal. It is the same as the Norwegian “Surturbrand,” and emits a disagreeable odour in burning. Large pieces of fir-trees are occasionally found perfect in it.
Indiho Pottery.—About 1772 a pottery was established at Indiho, or Indio, or Indeo, in the parish of Bovey Tracey, and continued to be worked until 1841, when it was superseded by the Bovey Pottery, which had been established a few years previously to that time. The Indiho Pottery was a small manufactory, and is supposed to have been commenced by one George Tufnell, and was afterwards in the hands of proprietors of the names of Inglett and Steer. About the beginning of the present century a really good earthenware was made at Indio; the printed ware was of a superior class, and some tea and coffee cups of a brown body with an interior enamelled with white slip and painted outside with small sprigs are characteristic and pretty. Nothing remains of the buildings of the manufactory at Indio—a modern house, the seat of Charles Aldenburgh Bentinck, Esq., standing on its site.
Bovey Pottery.—The first pottery at Bovey Tracey was not on the site of the present pottery known under this name, but was carried on in some houses, which are parish property, near the modern railway station. The house is at present a carpenter’s shop, and is at a corner just where the road turns off to the Bovey Heathfield. Tradition states that this pottery had mills to grind materials close to Bovey Bridge, and the remains of a mill and water-wheel existed on the left bank of the stream up to 1844. These works were carried on by a family of the name of Ellis; they were probably commenced in the earlier half of the eighteenth century and certainly were in work in 1755, and lasted for thirty years after that period. Nothing certain is known of the character of the ware of this first attempt at Bovey Tracey. Clay pipes are said to have been made, and jugs of a yellow body which are attributed to this period are to be found in houses in the neighbourhood.
In 1842 the Bovey Pottery was purchased by two Devonshire gentlemen, Captain Buller and Mr. J. Divett, who enlarged the works, and obtained the lignite from underground workings. The supply of this substance, however, proving insufficient for the increased requirements of the manufacture, ordinary coal was substituted in its stead; and, after the opening of a railway to the works, Somersetshire coal has been used to the entire exclusion of the lignite. The works are still carried on by Messrs. Buller and Divett, under the style of the “Bovey Tracey Pottery Company.” In general character they are similar to those of the pottery district, and on the average five glost-ovens are fired each week. The quality of the ware is about equal to the ordinary and commoner classes of Staffordshire goods. It consists of all the ordinary services and articles in white, printed, and coloured wares, and is principally supplied to the home markets in the West of England, and to Mediterranean ports.
The Folly Pottery.—Another pottery in Bovey Tracey parish was the “Folly Pottery.” This pottery may be looked upon as the origin of the present Bovey Tracey Pottery. No doubt the site was chosen for its proximity to the main outcrop of the lignite. Considerable uncertainty exists as to the date of this manufacture. It was probably commenced in the last years of the eighteenth or the first years of the nineteenth century by a man of the name of Mead. It was then for a considerable period contemporaneous with the Indio Pottery. The earthenware, however, seems hardly, at any time, to have equalled in quality that of the last-named pottery. In 1835 the works were carried on by Messrs. John and Thomas Honeychurch. It is thus described in an advertisement of sale:—“To be sold by public auction, as directed by the assignees of John and Thomas Honeychurch, bankrupts, at the Union Inn, Bovey Tracey, on the 2nd May, 1836, the Folly Pottery, situate in the parish of Bovey Tracey, in the county of Devon. This may be designated one of the largest and most complete potteries in the West of England, 14 miles from Exeter and 28 from Plymouth; its situation being in the land of clay, from which nearly all the potteries in Staffordshire draw their supply, with coal-mine and railroad, &c.” The advertisement, after giving particulars regarding the processes, &c., speaks of a glost-kiln, and a biscuit-kiln, capable of containing 1,600 saggers of ware; flint kilns; a quantity of Cornish clay and flints, copper-plates, moulds, &c. No purchaser was found until 1842, when the concern was bought by Captain Buller and Mr. J. Divett, and converted into the “Bovey Tracey Pottery Company,” as last described.