I HAVE just come across a cutting from the Okehampton Times of September 2 2010, featuring an old photograph captioned 'Those Were The Days', and supplied by Alan Perrott.

The photograph is of the Chagford Autumn Sheep Fair which at that time apparently used to take place in Rackfield off Mill Street, a field now occupied by my own house, Baileys Hey, North Hey, Rackfield Cottage and Braeside. The field is now divided and the part visible in the photograph is still a pasture field owned by the owner of Braeside.

I cannot identify the date of the photograph but, having other photographs of the same field, showing the first ever Chagford Show (then called the Chagford Flower Show) in 1899, which took place in the same field before the current houses were built, it is highly likely that it was taken before the first world war, probably pre-1913. My own house was built in 1913, being a conversion of five former woollen mill workers' cottages, and it is highly unlikely that the sheep fair would have been carried on in the reduced field area after that - unless any reader has any better information.

The white house with the prominent gable shown in the right hand side of the picture is the back of Southcombe House at the corner of Southcome Street and Lower Street.

The other buildings shown in the picture are no longer there, at least in their entirety, although there are ruins and foundations still visible. Beyond, in the distance on the left hand side of the picture, is Rushford Wood, with the River Teign (not visible because of the steepness of the valley at this point) running through the wooded valley at the bottom of the fields below Rushford Wood, a view I look at every day.

It is highly likely that the impressive personage standing in the car, who appears to be conducting the auction, is Mr Arthur Coe, who was the sole principal of Arthur Coe, Auctioneers, forerunner of Coe and Amery and then Rendells, in Chagford, the firm from which I have recently retired as a partner to become a consultant.

Timothy Garratt

Chagford

l The Times is grateful to Mr Garratt for this detailed explanation of the photograph.