A WEST Devon woman, who was lucky enough to call the National Trust's Buckland Abbey 'home' while growing up, has captured her experiences in a book.

Marie Cumming has penned her book 'An Abbey Childhood', detailing of how her father Alex Cumming, curator of Plymouth Museum, was given the task of preparing the Abbey to become a tourist attraction as a Drake and Maritime Museum with the National Trust in 1951.

The book includes a short history of the Abbey and its owners and gives a nostalgic insight of what life was like for Marie, growing up in the iconic building from the age of two until she married at 22.

Marie recalls various stories, including their first day at the Abbey in which she ran 'helter-skelter' down the lawn delighted with the expanse of space, the fun she had in the playroom in the tower, which housed an indoor swing, her 18th birthday dinner party in Drake's Drawing Room, entertaining royal guests and taking friends on a journey into a damp, dark tunnel to tell fictional tales of torture.

Marie also includes details of all the rooms in the Abbey, the grounds, other people involved in the abbey, her time at school at what was St Michael's Primary school in Tavistock, Tavistock Comprehensive and Edgehill College in Bideford, the Abbey's summer season, legends linked to the Abbey and the art and artists associated with the building.

l 'An Abbey Childhood' is published by Lulu ISBN 978-1-291-54122-9 and is on sale at Buckland Abbey and Bookstop in Tavistock.