Claremont - former Turn Pike Toll House
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The Charmouth Historian, Reginald Pavey writes:
Claremont is a more modern building, In the mid nineteenth century it was occupied by a fortuneteller, whose predictions were so often true that she eventually refused to tell people what she saw. The bay windows were added by H..W. Pryer at the turn of the 19th century and later it was opened as a boarding house by Alfred Hodges, nephew of Charles, who gave the Playing Fields to the village. Hodges built a large dining room at the back and it remained a boarding house until 1962 and then the house was turned flats. The Bridport -Exeter Turnpike Road was opened in 1758 with gates opposite this property. The stumps were found in 1936 and in 1939 the remains of a post belonging to a small gate, also a halfpenny of George Ill's reign, probably dropped by a traveller. The gatehouse may have stood where 'Claremont "later built.
'Beauregard" and 'Foxley" were built in the early part of the nineteenth century. The latter was so named when George Grinter lived there when he farmed Foxley,
The two cottages on the knapp are ancient. In 1950 during some alterations large iron nails a foot in length were extracted from an old oak post, which had obviously been made by the local blacksmith. Behind there is another old cottage and outhouses.
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