Ball Clay Heritage at
Decoy Country Park
and Local Nature
Reserve
For further details about Clay Events or Mud Walks at
Decoy please speak to the on site Ranger
01626 215773 or contact:
Green Spaces and Active Leisure
Teignbridge District Council,
Forde Road Depot, Forde Road,
Newton Abbot, TQ12 4AD
or call 01626 215751
www.teignbridge.gov.uk
Email: [email protected]
For further information on Ball Clay please refer to
Ball Clay Heritage Society
Dunderdale Lawn
Penshurst Road
Newton Abbot, TQ12 1EN
or call 01626 354404
www.clayheritage.org
Email: [email protected]
Text and photographs reproduced with
grateful thanks to the Ball Clay Heritage
Society and local resident Terry Tucker
The Decoy area was once part of the parkland
that surrounded Forde House, an Elizabethan
mansion (currently part of the Teignbridge
District Council Offices). It was originally
owned by the Courtenay family (the Earls of
Devon). The name Decoy comes from a kind
of net and wattle tunnel on selected ponds
used to catch water fowl.
The name ‘ball clay’ derives from the old way of
cutting the clay from the floor of an open pit in
cubes. Because of the clay’s high plasticity the
cubes held together, but after being handled
several times the corners became knocked in
and the cubes turned into balls.
The Decoy area was mined by Devon and
Courtenay Clay Company and later Watts,
Blake, Bearne and Co from 1850 until 1966.
When quarrying ceased the pit filled with
water and the land around slowly regained
much of its natural vegetation.
How did the clay get here?
30 million years ago the ‘Sticklepath’ fault
created depressions in which swampy, fresh
water lakes formed. Rivers carrying sediments
from the uplands of Dartmoor entered the
lakes, dropping first the heavier sands and
sandy clays and then the extremely fine
ball clays. Beds of ball clay filled the deep
depression between Bovey Tracey and Decoy
– forming the ‘Bovey Basin’.
How did they get it out?
The basic system of extraction was to dig
a shallow trench. After removing unwanted
overlying material the ‘claycutters’ cut the clay
floor into a criss-cross pattern of 9 inch (23
cm) squares using heavy iron spades known
as ‘thirting’ irons. Following this, another
claycutter used a weighty, ash-handled tool
like a wide-bladed pick or mattock called a
‘lumper’ to undercut each square to a depth
of 9 inches (23 cm) and lever out the resultant
cube of clay.
Newton Abbot Urban District Council
purchased the Decoy site on 20th December
1967. Through the 1970s and 80s further
land was purchased and the Country Park
was created in 1988 with help from the
Countryside Commission. Decoy Country Park
has wide open spaces, tranquil woodlands
with marked trails, a large play area and a
lake. The park receives over 450,000 visits
each year and continually flies the Green Flag
awarded to quality green spaces.
Each cube or ‘ball’ weighed about 36lbs (16.3
kilos): 70 balls made a ‘tally’ of 22 ½ hundred
weight (1.14 tonnes).
A tool called a ‘poge’- a curved iron spike set
into a stout pole was then used to pitch the
cubes up the stepped sides of the pit to the
surface and onto a packhorse or cart. A lighter
version of the lumper known as a ‘tubil’ was
used to trim the working. In this way the whole
floor area was removed to reveal the next layer
for extraction.
Decoy Lake 2010
Ball clay is rare, white-firing ‘plastic’ clay, of
which there are few deposits in the world. The
word ‘clay’ is derived from the Old English
‘claeg’ meaning sticky. Clay can still be found
on site at Decoy and various workshops are
run throughout the year showing where the clay
can be located.
Local man Burt Tucker working at
the Decoy site in approx 1950’s
What is Clay used for?
Ball clays from the Bovey Basin were first
used in the 17th century to make clay tobacco
pipes for smoking the tobacco introduced by
Sir Walter Raleigh. In the 18th century famous
potters such as Wedgewood found they
needed ball clays to produce their new white
bodied pottery.
Many local people worked at
Decoy Pit or at South Pit situated
at Kingskerswell Road.
What is Ball Clay?
pits at ‘Magazine Pond’ and ‘South Quarry’
(now a football pitch). There were ‘square pits’
and shafts for underground mining near Vale
Road and under the present Decoy playing
fields. Much clay was taken to the Town Quay
and loaded onto barges for shipment from
Teignmouth harbour. In the 1930’s a vertical
shaft called ‘the odeon’ was used to hoist
Main Quarry clay to the surface. By the 1950’s
it was hauled up on rail-mounted wagons, and
finally excavators and dumpers took over.
The Decoy workings extended from ‘Main
Quarry’ towards Kingskerswell, with smaller
Ball clay is an essential component of
most types of ceramics such as tableware,
sanitaryware and tiles: it is easily mouldable
and is white or near white when fired at a high
temperature.
Several important ceramic factories were
established in the Bovey Basin. Bovey Pottery
in Bovey Tracey produced tableware on a large
scale. Candy and Co (today known as BCT) in
Heathfield and Hexter Humpherson in Newton
Abbot used the less valuable stoneware clays
to produce wall tiles, drain pipes and pale
cream bricks. However, from the mid 19th
century the local ball clay industry became
increasingly international, and today continues
to supply the ceramics industries in both the
UK and about 80 countries worldwide.