Volunteers Help Care for Local Archaeology in Torridge, North Devon

The Torridge Monuments Management Scheme (MMS) is a partnership initiative jointly funded and managed by Historic England and Devon County Council's Historic Environment Team (DCHET). It aims to improve the condition of around 30 scheduled monuments across the district, including some on the Heritage at Risk Register.

The scheme also works with local communities – schools, parish councils, archaeological societies, and landowners – to offer opportunities for people to get involved with the heritage in their area.

The Torridge MMS will run until 2026 and follows earlier schemes run with Devon County Council and the North Devon National Landscape, which have secured several at-risk monuments.

Findings at the Bronze Age round barrow cemetery at Wrangworthy Cross, near Bideford

The 2025 season started in January with the first 21st century investigations into the Bronze Age round barrow cemetery at Wrangworthy Cross near Bideford, a group of burial mounds dating to between 2,000 and 1,500 BCE. The group of round barrows – turf and clay mounds covering single or multiple burials – would have dominated a high plateau near East Putford.

Archaeologists from Historic England and Devon County Council worked with volunteers from North Devon and Devon Archaeological Societies and the Archaeology Club of Eggesford, training them to examine the condition of the monuments using techniques including analytical earthwork survey and test pitting (small-scale archaeological excavations). Volunteers have also cleared scrub from one barrow mound, allowing it to be investigated for the first time in decades.

Initial survey results show a high degree of variation in size and shape amongst the barrow mounds. A ground-based investigation has also confirmed a previously unrecorded barrow mound recently detected on lidar (aerial laser scan) data.

The findings will be used to inform the future management of the barrows and included in a new interpretation panel planned for the nearby nature reserve.

2025 projects

10 more projects are planned for 2025, including:

• Further condition surveys at Merton Medieval Moated Site and Godborough Castle
• Scrub clearance work and investigations at sites in Winkleigh, Leeworthy and Welsford Moor
• A programme of work to address monuments at risk on Lundy Island

Local schools will participate in some of the activities, and there will be open days throughout the year.