Page:Devon & Cornwall Notes & Queries.djvu/554

 Of Dartmoor and its Borderland, 171 Bridge/'' and are thus able to mark its continuance to Widecombe. Returning to the summit of Dartmeet Hill and retracing our steps over the road, we soon reach a point known as Ouldsbroom Cross, where a road branches to Ashburton. The old stone that formerly marked it, and which has given to the place its name, though no longer on its ancient site, is fortunately not lost. Mr. Dymond first brought it to my notice, and informed me where I should find it. It serves as a gate-post at the entrance to the yard of Town Farm, which is situated just below the church at Leusdon, on the confines of the common, and very nearly two miles from the spot from which it was taken. I learnt from Mr. Dymond that an old man named William French, who had spent all his life in the vicinity, said that this cross when standing on its original site, was fixed upon as the limit to which the French officers, detained as prisoners of war at Princetown prior to 1815, were per- mitted to extend their walk on parole of honour. It would seem from this that the prisoners located at Princetown who were allowed outside the prison walls on parole, were not restricted in their walks to such narrow limits as were those quartered in the various towns in the district, for in the latter case they were not at liberty to go beyond one mile from the town, while this old cross is more than seven miles distant by road from Princetown. William French gave Mr. Dymond some particulars relative to the removal of Ouldsbroom Cross, and said that it was brought away from its site more than sixty years before, which would be about 1825, by Thomas Hext, at that time the occupier of Town Farm, French then living with him as a parish apprentice. It was conveyed to the fiarm on a slide drawn by four oxen. The arms were knocked off after its arrival there, on its being found that they interfered with the purpose to which the cross was put. Passing Ouldsbroom Farm on the Ashburton road, we make our way by Leusdon Church to Town Farm, that we may examine this old cross. We shall notice with regret that the work of Farmer Hext was only too complete. One of the •p. loi, ante.