by Colin Burbidge
James Perrott was born in the parish of Throwleigh in 1815. The family moved shortly after to Chagford, where he remained his entire life, until his death in 1895. According to Edward Barnwell’s Notes on the Perrott Family, he was from an ancient family of Norman ancestry.
In 1839 he married Mary Harvey, they would go on to have four sons and three daughters. His wife’s family were descended from Sir Robert Jason, whose 1588 coat-of-arms James Perrott is said to have kept on the wall of his home.
Census records show him as a wheelwright, and later three of his sons also as worked wheelwrights. It is not until the 1891 census that he is recorded as a Fishing tackle manufacturer. However, his son, Richard later recalled in an article in the Western Times that they would make fishing rods from old lancewood spokes salvaged from damaged or old coach wheels.
James was for over 50 years a Dartmoor touring guide, a renown angler and a maker of fine fishing tackle and flies, such as Blue Grizzle, Red Palmer, Blue Upright and Red Maxwell.
In 1869 he joined the newly formed Upper Teign Fishing Association, chaired by the Earl of Devon and including many of the riparian landowners of the Upper Teign, including Rev. John Ingle, owner of St. Olaves, Murchington. Perrott carried out the role of water bailiff for them and supervised the care and condition of the river and its banks, in addition to selling Day Permits to anglers.
He was a supreme angler and encouraged many a well-known client. The writer Charles Kingsley was a regular companion, as was novelist R.D. Blackmore who fictionalised Perrott in some of his novels, and he is also featured in Fisherman’s Fancies by F.B. Doveton. On their golden wedding in October 1889 Mr. & Mrs. Perrott received a congratulatory address from the townspeople of Chagford.
Upon the news of his death in May 1895 the editor of the Western Morning News launched into fulsome praise:
“Rugged, frank and of cheery disposition, his sterling worth caused him to be respected by those who made his acquaintance. There was not a tor or hill to which he could not conduct his visitors, nor a stream in which he knew not the pools and stickles most likely to afford sport. A deft fisherman himself and entering keenly into the pleasures of the gentle art, he was always desirous that those who accompanied him should realise the delight of returning with a well filled creel”.
In Chagford churchyard there is a polished granite tomb, erected to the memory of this Dartmoor worthy, by the Rev. A.G. Barker, one of Ingle’s successor’s as owner of St. Olaves, Murchington.
His son, Richard carried on his father’s work as Dartmoor guide, expert angler, and tackle maker throughout a long life – he died aged 96 years.
For a fuller account see Devon perspectives.