Place:Bittadon, Devon, England

the following text is based on an article in Wikipedia Bittadon (#6 on map) is a village, very small civil parish and former manor in the North Devon District of Devon, England. Before 1974 it was in the Barnstaple Rural District. According to the 2001 UK census it had a population of 45. The village is about seven miles north of Barnstaple, between the parishes of Berrynarbor and West Down. [edit] Descent of the manor [edit] de Bittadon During the reign of King John (1199-1216) the manor was held by the de Bittadon family, which took its surname from the manor. They remained seated there for six generations. The later descent of this family was as follows: Richard de Bittadon (fl.1242) Walter de Bittadon (fl.1295) John I de Bittadon (fl.1314) John II de Bittadon (fl.1345)

Lovering

The Lovering family next acquired Bittadon, by means unknown. John Lovering held it during the reign of King Henry VI (1422-1461) and Thomas Lovering held it during the reign of King Henry VII (1485-1509). A possible descendant of this family was John I Lovering (died 1675) of Huxhill in the parish of Weare Giffard, and of Hudscott, Chittlehampton, a merchant.

Luttrell

The Luttrell family purchased Bittadon following the tenure of the Loverings. This was a junior branch of the Luttrells of Dunster Castle in Somerset, and also held in the 17th century the nearby Devonshire manor of Saunton, purchased from Arthur Chichester, 1st Baron Chichester (1563-1625), a younger son of the Chichester family of Raleigh, Pilton, near Barnstaple.

Chichester

In about 1635 Bittadon was held by the Chichester family, the senior branch of which was seated at Raleigh, Pilton, near Barnstaple.

Historic estates

Northcote

Pointz

The Pointz family of Northcote, Bittadon, was a junior branch of the ancient and prominent Norman family of Poyntz, feudal barons of Curry Mallet in Somerset and later of Iron Acton in Gloucestershire. Little is known about the Pointz family of Devon. In the 16th century Edward Pointz, "son and heir of Richard Pointz" married Margaret Chichester, a daughter of Amias Chichester (1527-1577) of Arlington in North Devon, by his wife Jane Gifford. It is not recorded where Edward Pointz resided. A mural monument survives in Bittadon Church of a later Edward Pointz (d.1691). and shows the arms of Poyntz of Iron Acton, Barry of eight or and gules, and the Poyntz canting crest of a clenched fist (French: poing). The Pointz arms were later quartered by the Barbor family of Fremington, as is visible on several funeral hatchments in Fremington Church.

Barbor

The Barbor family originated at the manor of Upcott in Somerset.

• William I Barbor, an eminent physician educated at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, was the first of the family to settle at Barnstaple. He married the daughter and heiress of the Pointz family of Northcote. It is not known whether the Barbors lived at Northcote, but certainly William I's son moved to Fremington House, near Barnstaple, having married the heiress of Fremington.
• William II Barbor (1723-1800), son and heir. He attended school at Barnstaple under Mr Lucke for six years, then attended Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, as had done his father and his brother John. He married in 1748 Susanna Acland, heiress of Fremington and other estates.
• George Barbor (1756-1817),[15] youngest surviving brother and heir. His other two brothers were Richard Barbor, a captain in the British army who fought in the American War of Independence and died in Pennsylvania at the Battle of Brandywine in 1777; and Arthur Barbor, Chaplain to the East India Company, who died in India. George also owned the estate of Croscombe in the parish of Martinhoe, Devon. He served in the army of the East India Company in India and in 1810 held the rank of Major. He married (as his second wife) Jane Jeffreys (1779-1845), eldest daughter of Gabriel Jeffreys of Swansea, Wales, who survived him and died at nearby Raleigh House, Pilton, as is recorded by her mural monument in St Peter's Church, Fremington.

For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Bittadon.

The remainder of the article explains the heraldic shields on the church at Fremington. References are given in Wikipedia.

Research Tips

(revised Jul 2021)

• Ordnance Survey Map of Devonshire North and Devonshire South are large-scale maps covering the whole of Devon between them. They show the parish boundaries when Rural Districts were still in existence and before the mergers of parishes that took place in 1935 and 1974. When expanded the maps can show many of the small villages and hamlets inside the parishes. These maps are now downloadable for personal use but they can take up a lot of computer memory.
• GENUKI has a selection of maps showing the boundaries of parishes in the 19th century. The contribution from "Know Your Place" on Devon is a huge website yet to be discovered in detail by this contributor.

• Devon has three repositories for hands-on investigation of county records. Each has a website which holds their catalog of registers and other documents.

• the Devon Heritage Centre at Exeter
• the Northern Record Office at Barnstaple
• the Plymouth and West Devon Record Office at Plymouth which is independent of the other two.

• There is, however, a proviso regarding early records for Devon. Exeter was badly hit in a "blitz" during World War II and the City Library, which then held the county archives, was burnt out. About a million books and historic documents went up in smoke. While equivalent records--particularly wills--are quite easy to come by for other English counties, some records for Devon and surrounding counties do not exist.

• Devon Family History Society Mailing address: PO Box 9, Exeter, EX2 6YP, United Kingdom. The society has branches in various parts of the county. It is the largest Family History Society in the United Kingdom. The website has a handy guide to each of the parishes in the county and publishes the registers for each of the Devon dioceses on CDs.

• This is the home page to the GENUKI Devon website. It has been updated since 2015 and includes a lot of useful information on each parish.
• Devon has a Online Parish Clerk (OPC) Project which can be reached through GENUKI. Only about half of the parishes have a volunteer contributing local data. For more information, consult the website, especially the list at the bottom of the homepage.

• The FamilySearch Wiki provides a similar information service to GENUKI. An index of parishes leads to notes and references for each parish.

• Brett Langston's list of Devon Registration Districts and parishes within each registration district from 1837 to the present can indicate where to find details of civil registration entries since the process began in England.

• Magna Britannia, Volume 6 by Daniel Lysons and Samuel Lysons. A general and parochial history of the county. Originally published by T Cadell and W Davies, London, 1822, and placed online by British History Online. This is a volume of more than 500 pages of the history of Devon, parish by parish. It is 100 years older than the Victoria County Histories available for some other counties, but equally thorough in its coverage. Contains information that may have been swept under the carpet in more modern works.

• There is a cornucopia of county resources at Devon Heritage. Topics are: Architecture, Census, Devon County, the Devonshire Regiment, Directory Listings, Education, Genealogy, History, Industry, Parish Records, People, Places, Transportation, War Memorials. There are fascinating resources you would never guess that existed from those topic titles. (NOTE: There may be problems reaching this site. One popular browser provider has put a block on it. This may be temporary, or it may be its similarity in name to the Devon Heritage Centre at Exeter.)