Budleigh Past and Present

  Notable among the visitors to East Budleigh’s 2025 Scarecrow Festival on 7/8 June was a figure from the distant past. Born in the village over four centuries ago, a generation later than its better known Sir Walter Raleigh, Roger Conant was very different from Queen Elizabeth I’s favourite courtier. Sailing across the Atlantic to America in around 1623, he founded the Massachusetts city of Salem.   Today, he is seen as a more modest and peace-loving character than many of the country’s European pioneers.  And so, ‘Roger Conant’  had come to the 2025 Scarecrow Festival to preside over its Duck Race, now named after him. Many  visitors to the American city are struck by the sight of Roger Conant’s statue with its tall hat and long cloak, unfortunately sited next to Salem’s Witch Museum. Understandably they think that its founder must have dabbled in the black arts. Some of East Budleigh’s visitors at the weekend probably thought the same.  So ‘Roger Conant’...

With the American city of Salem, Massachusetts, marking its 400 th  anniversary in 2026, we may see more visitors from the USA crossing the Atlantic to explore a particular link between Salem and East Budleigh. The village has quite a few other interesting transatlantic links.   Raleigh’s statue. The shadow tells us how he died  Born in East Budleigh where his statue stands near the church of All Saints, Sir Walter Raleigh (c.1552-1618) never set foot in North America, but he certainly encouraged early English colonisation of the continent. And there’s another aspect of his influence on America.   The title page of Raleigh’s History of the World, published in 1614 Raleigh’s  History of the World angered King James I (1566-1625) who believed in the Divine Right of Kings and described the work as ‘too saucie towards princes’. With its criticism of tyrant rulers, the book inspired American revolutionaries like Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), one of the US...

Continued from  https://budleighpastandpresent.blogspot.com/2024/06/around-town-and-over-pond-05-american.html AROUND THE TOWN AND OVER THE POND A walk around Budleigh Salterton to interest transatlantic visitors. Every so often there’s a diversion which may inspire you to visit places like East Budleigh, Exeter, Sidmouth, Colyton or even places in the United States and Canada.        The walk is set out in parts. Here’s the sixth part: Still at the Raleigh Wall. 0.6 'EAST BUDLEIGH'S OTHER GREAT ELIZABETHAN' Another blue plaque? Maybe that Raleigh Wall plaque needs another to mention the two locally born notables who link the Budleigh area to America. Both are closely associated with cities in the US. The baptismal font in All Saints Church, East Budleigh Both were born in East Budleigh during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, but only Roger Conant is recorded as being baptised in All Saints Church, the date being given as 9 April 1592. So this baptismal font ha...