Scenes from Torquay
Setting for Gentian Hill by Elizabeth Goudge
“Torquay looked a fairy place that you could have picked up in your hand...”
🌿 Elizabeth Goudge, Gentian Hill
Welcome to Torquay!
Elizabeth Goudge set her Napoleonic-period novel around Torbay, where the war’s namesake would later be held by the British fleet.
The story goes that there was a Devon baker, Michelmore, that rowed his small boat up the fleet to deliver their daily fresh bread. But he was turned away by the officers on duty! Then he noticed:
“At one of the lower-deck ports a man nodding violently to us... His eyes caught mine for an instant as he put his fingers to his lips with a warning gesture.”
Michelmore continued to row away, only for the man to throw a bottle into the water. They keep an eye on the bottle and, after making sure the sentries are no longer watching, they make a detour and collect it.
Smart grabs the small black bottle from the water, uncorks it and stares in amazement at the six words scrawled on it:
"We have got Bonaparte on board.”1
This wild and verdant countryside lends a vivid, colorful backdrop to the scenes of Gentian Hill. We have already taken a look at St Michael’s Chapel and Weekaborough Farm…
Join us for a look at its coastal location and its picturesque villages for our Goudge Readalong of Gentian Hill!
Devon Villages
“Stella went slowly up the little flight of stone steps that led to the iron gate in the garden wall, savouring the loveliness of coming home. A stone-paved path led between yew trees, clipped to the shapes of peacocks, to the green-painted front door set deep within the old stone porch, with the parlour window to one side of it and the kitchen window to the other…
“…The flower garden was bright with Michaelmas daisies and late roses, and the sun was distilling the scent from the lavender and rosemary bushes that grew among them….”
“…The stone wall enclosed the flower garden on the south, the house enclosed it to the north, to the east and west two yew hedges had archways in them leading through into the kitchen garden and the orchard.”
🌿 Elizabeth Goudge, Gentian Hill
Torre Abbey
“Coming round the bay from Torquay, sandstone cliffs and pasture land edged the sea with a ribbon of red and green, and in the fields between Torre Abbey and the sea the deer were feeding behind the strong sea wall that George Carey of the Abbey had built to protect his land...”
Torbay
“They were driving very slowly down a lane with high banks crowned with gorse bushes and storm-twisted oaks that arched over their heads, but so steep that down below, between the grey lichened branches, they could see the sea, pale blue and aquamarine, soft as silk, with golden lights upon it. Then the lane took a turn to the left and flattened out a little, taking the curve of the hill, the bank changing into a low stone wall, and the whole stretch of Torbay was spread out below them….
“…Dr Crane stopped the gig. "Take a good look, Stella,' he said gently. 'I have sailed from one end of the Mediterranean to the other but I have never seen any sight as beautiful as this. To my mind the Bay of Naples can't touch it, nor the coast of Corsica, nor Crete. Keep still. Take a good look.'..”
“…The coast swept in a great half moon about the gleaming sea, from the rocks beyond Torquay to the amethyst coloured heights of Berry Head above the ancient port of Brixham. It was so clear today that they could just make out the tall old houses of Brixham climbing the rocky cliff behind the harbour, and the splendid hulls and towering masts of two frigates riding there at anchor, with sails hanging loose to dry. Torquay looked a fairy-place that you could have picked up in your hand.”
🌿 Elizabeth Goudge, Gentian Hill
I am in Canberra right now, the capital city of Australia and there is a Cockington Green miniature village at a tourist spot. The buildings look very similar. I am also reading a novel by Miss Read and one of the school teachers in Thrush Green is taken to Torquay for a respite at the sea. It really is an incredibly beautiful area and I am grateful for the visuals.
My friend and I went as children to stay in the summer holidays with her grandmother near Torquay. Happy memories have been evoked by reading this.