"All who have travelled through the delicious scenery of North Devon must needs know the little white town of Bideford, which slopes upwards from its broad tide-river paved with yellow sand, and many-arched old bridge where salmon wait for autumn floods, toward the pleasant upland on the west."One of the most interesting things about living in Devon is the amount of classic literature that has come out of the area.
Lorna Doone by Richard Blackmore (celebrating its 150th anniversary this year), poems by Shelley, Wordsworth, Coleridge and Southey and of course, the novel Westward Ho! This is always a great pub quiz question – “which English village is named after a book” or “which is the only village in England to have an exclamation mark after the name”.
While visiting the charity shops in Minehead, we came across a beautiful copy of Westward Ho!, published by Nelson around the turn of the last century and this made us think about the book and the naming of the village subsequently. Author Charles Kingsley of The Water Babies fame wrote the eponymous book in 1855 and set it in Bideford. The book was instantly a best seller and entrepreneurs saw the opportunity to develop tourism in the area, as indeed Thomas Hewitt, George Newnes et al in Lynton and Lynmouth did a little later in the Victorian era.
The Northam Burrows Hotel and Villa Building Company, chaired by Isaac Newton Wallop, 5th Earl of Portsmouth, was formed in 1863, and its prospectus stated:
"This Company has been formed for the erection of a Family Hotel, on an Estate purchased for the purpose immediately contiguous to Northam Burrows, and of Villas and Lodging Houses for Sale or Lease. The want of such accommodation has long been felt, and as no attempt to supply it has hitherto been made by individuals, it is deemed to be a legitimate project to be undertaken by a Company. The salubrity and beauty of the North of Devon have long been known and appreciated. Sir James Clark has placed it in the highest position for health-giving qualities; and the recent publication of Professor Kingsley's "Westward Ho" has excited increased public attention to the western part, more especially, of this romantic and beautiful coast. Nothing but a want of accommodation for visitors has hitherto prevented its being the resort of families seeking the advantages of sea bathing, combined with the invigorating breezes of the Atlantic.... "
The hotel was duly named Westward Ho! and the village grew up around it, with the same name. And so Westward Ho! was born.
Going back the quiz question. The other place in the world with an exclamation mark is Saint-Louis-du Ha! Ha! in Quebec.
Who knew.
