News

We are very lucky to be able to welcome back the talented Angel Heart Theatre, who have provided Littlehempston with many memorable shows in the Community Space. This year, The Tales of Robin Hood are brought to life with dynamic puppetry, colourful acting, comedy and interactive archery. Angel Heart guarantees that it will be more fun than The Plague and entirely suitable for young and old and the middle ages! And after the performance, children (of all ages) are welcome to take a closer look at the puppets and find out more about theatre and puppetry.

It’s a lovely opportunity for our younger village members to get together and there’ll be cakes and refreshments available after the show. And there’ll also be the chance to win a beautiful Giant Panda in the raffle. How can you resist?

It’s best to book early if you can to avoid disappointment – the last show was completely booked out. And if you have to cancel due to Covid, don’t worry – you’ll get a full refund. Doors open at 4.30pm and the show starts at 5pm. There are full details on how to get your tickets, on our Events Calendar. All proceeds help keep our beautiful church and Community Space open for all.

This is not strictly true, as not everyone wins a prize in the quarterly Lottery draw. But half the proceeds are donated to local activities that help make Littlehempston a better place to live. Still not seeing the benefit? Why not nominate a parish activity to receive a donation? The Lottery has now been running for 10 years and over that time has raised an amazing £6,300 for community activities. And the same amount has been paid out in prizes!

If you fancy a flutter, tickets cost £10 per draw and the first is on Wednesday 30th March at the Tally Ho. Why not come along and have a meal at the same time? For full details on how to enter, click here or contact Ali Taylor. And if anybody can help run the Lottery, Ali would love to hear from you!

Littlehempston has its own public defibrillator. It was installed by Will Smith in the porch of the Tally Ho at the beginning of February, and is also connected to an electricity supply, so that an internal heater is triggered if the temperature drops to freezing. It is now officially registered with The Circuit – The National Defibrillator network.

Many thanks to the Parish Council, Devon CC and South Hams DC and all the people who made generous donations through the Gofundme page to make this project happen. Enough extra was raised to buy both spare defibrillator pads and to replace the internal battery in 5 years time. Thanks also to Kelly and Mike Joiner, Tally Ho landlords, for enabling it to be so accessible in the pub porch.

Although previous experience or first aid qualification/training is not necessary, for those that want to be fully prepared, here is a link to an online training video (7 minutes) which can be shared remotely with others.

It seems that we in Littlehempston are not the only ones enjoying a revival of an old custom – the Wassail. Apparently there’s a resurgence going on all over the country.

So on January 29th, the good folk of Littlehempston, and a few from further afield, gathered to make merry, celebrating last year’s harvest of apples in the form of cider and looking forward to the coming year’s crop.

Littlehempston came together as a community and bought the land on which lies the Community Orchard in 2018. Since then they have held three Wassail events, which begin with a gathering together to eat apple cake, toffee apples and drink cider and mulled apple juice. They are joined by the Dartington Morris Men who treat everyone to their energetic and joyful dancing. Then the Littlehempston choir entertain everyone with their singing.

When the light starts to fade, an entrancing Green Man appears and brings an atmosphere of mystery and magic to the scene.

Then everyone lights up their lanterns and making a raucous noise, whooping and stomping and banging pots and pans with wooden spoons (to frighten away any evil spirits) – they process along the road through the village to the Community Orchard.

By then it is fully dark and a hushed atmosphere pervades the scene. The Green Man (this year Henry Everett) with the help of the newly crowned queen of the Wassail (this year we had two queens, Darcy and Nieve) pours cider into a crust of bread and stuffs it into one of the apple trees. Then the queen(s) pours cider all around the tree onto its roots. This is to nourish the tree with last year’s harvest and wish it well for the next time. The community then sings our very own Littlehempston wassail song to the tree with more singing from our choir.

The grand finale is for everyone to troop happily back through the village to the Tally Ho for Sausages and Mash and apple sauce. And more cider!

Thank you to all for a wonderful evening – and may there be many more!

Anna Ash, Lot 7 Trustees