Dunsland

It was successively home to the Arscott, Bickford, Coham and Dickinson families and, although the ownership records are incomplete, it is very likely that the estate passed in an unbroken line from the time of the Norman Conquest until 1947.

[5] In his work The Visitations of the County of Devon of 1895, John Lambrick Vivian set out a pedigree chart for the Arscotts of Dunsland.

[10][11] Her son Arscott Harvey Dickinson, said to have been the 29th owner in direct succession, sold the estate in 1947,[14] having been unsuccessful in his struggle to keep the mansion house in good repair.

[11] The house with part of its estate was purchased at auction by a London speculator Mr de Savoury who was interested in the timber in the woodlands.

It was then bought by Philip Tilden, an architect who attempted to restore the house, a job that remained incomplete on his death in 1954.

[17] During the night of 17 November 1967 the house was destroyed by fire, with the walls left standing in such a precarious state that the decision was taken to demolish the whole structure and to fill up the basement with the rubble and level the site.