East Allington

East Allington is a village and civil parish in the South Hams district of Devon, England, three miles south of Halwell and just off the A381 road. It lies about three miles from Kingsbridge and about ten miles from Totnes. The coast at Slapton Sands is about five miles to the south-east. Also in the parish is the hamlet of The Mounts, about a mile away.

The parish is surrounded clockwise from the north by the parishes of Halwell, Blackawton, Slapton, Stokenham, Frogmore and Sherford, Buckland-Tout-Saints and Woodleigh. Its population at 2001 was 596, up from 396 in 1901. The village is also part of the electoral ward named Allington and Loddiswell with a population at the 2011 census of 2,265. Historically, East Allington formed part of Stanborough Hundred, and for ecclesiastical purposes, it falls within Woodleigh Deanery.

The church, dedicated to St. Andrew, overlooks the village from a hillside position. The first rector here was presented in 1268, and Bishop Grandisson dedicated the altar in 1333. The present building, however, dates from the 15th and 16th centuries.

It was in East Allington Church, on 12 November 1943, that the announcement was first made to the people of a large part of the South Hams that they were all to be evacuated from the area by 20 December 1943. Although nobody was told the reason, it was because The War Office had chosen to use Slapton Sands to rehearse the D-Day landings, as the beach at Slapton is very similar to the beach at Normandy which had been chosen for the landings. Ultimately, 749 American soldiers lost their lives at Slapton Sands in April, 1944 in a German attack during the exercises.

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