The Story of our Church Building

There has been a church building here since Saxon times, when the village was known as Southbuoy. Viking raiders came up the River Teign and burnt the church down in 1000AD.

Archbishop Thomas a Becket was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170 by William de Tracey and two other men, who thought this would please the King. Sir William had to go on a crusade to show that he was truly penitent, and a stone church was built here by the de Tracey family, from whom our town gets the name Bovey Tracey, but this one too burnt down.

The church tower is part of the 14th Centruy church, but the main body of the present building dates from the 15th Century when Bovey Tracey was a rich town.

At the Reformation there were many changes. Statues were taken away, and the Monuments in the Chancel were given by Alice Bray to remember her two husbands. During the Civil War there were more changes, some of which were undone later.

In the 19th century Canon Courtenay was Vicar for 45 years and built the North Aisle, removed the galleries, installed the pews, rebuilt a Church School and also built St John's Church at the other end of Bovey, Devon House of mercy, and a Mission House in Fore Street (now Pink's Place). The cross in front of the Church is his memorial.