Rattenbury died in 1833
after receiving the princely sum of one shilling per week pension
during the last years of his life from Lord Rolle. During this period
he dictated his memoirs for publication in Sidmouth, to an editor who
unconsciously gave the book a delicious touch of humour by putting
into the mouth of this son of a Devon shoemaker the grandiloquent
phrases of an early Victorian divine.
[Illustration: BEER.]
The picturesque and unspoilt little beach and the village street
leading down to the sea are in great contrast to the new houses built
on the hill behind, and the fine new church erected at the instance of
the Lord of the Manor, one of the Rolle family. This replaced an
ancient chapel dedicated to St. Michael, from which two old memorial
tablets were transferred; one is to "Edward Good, late an Industrious
fisherman," who left twenty pounds in trust for the poor of Beer and
Seaton in 1804, and the other to "John, the fifth sonn of William
Starr of Bere, Gent., and Dorothy his wife, which died in the plague
was here bvried 1646." The dwelling of this Starr family was the Tudor
house at the end of the main street which bears on it the design of a
star, the rebus of the one-time owners.
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