Community researcher – Diane Blake
If you have ever wondered why Mount Dinham in St David’s is so called, it is named after John Dinham. A Devon local all his life, Dinham bought the land with self-made funds and developed it for the use of the local community.
He was born in Kenton in 1788. His father, Thomas, was a farm bailiff at Powderham Castle and his mother, Sarah, ran a small shop. John went to a selective parish school in Chudleigh run by William Bond and at the age of fourteen he moved to Exeter to become an apprentice grocer to a Mr Tucker in the High Street. He married in 1808 and began his own jewellery business. However, shortly after his wife’s death in 1823 he got into financial difficulties and was bankrupt three years later.
The following year the London Tea Company opened a branch in Exeter and John was appointed as the manager. After a few years in this role John married his second wife Susannah and started a new company as a tea merchant, with the support of some wealthy friends. The company was called Wilcocks, Dinham and Westron. Unlike the jewellery business, this company was very successful. Tea was a very fashionable and sought-after drink at this time. While no records could be found for this summary in relation to John’s tea business, the use of indentured local populations in India and smuggling had typically been used to make tea a very profitable commodity.
John was very religious and his wealth enabled him to be a benefactor to many church societies, Sunday Schools and institutions to help the deaf, dumb and blind.
He helped to set up the YMCA in Exeter in 1846 which was the second one to be established in the world. The land now named after him in St David’s was bought to prevent it from being used for public amusements such as fairs and travelling shows which were against John’s puritan views. To help others less fortunate than himself, John named the site ‘The Charity Land’ and built forty- two Free Cottages as retirement homes for the poor. He gave some of the land to the Episcopal Charity Schools for the building of a school and a large plot was reserved for the building of a new church.
Dinham died on the 27th June 1864 and the church bells rang out across the city in mourning. His funeral took place on the 2nd of July and was a very elaborate affair.
The people of Exeter came out in their thousands to watch the procession. Fourteen employees carried his coffin from The Charity Land to Bartholomew Street Cemetery. Following John’s death, the ‘Charity Land’ was renamed Mount Dinham in his honour and a white marble statue of him was unveiled on the 26th March 1866 in Northernhay Gardens, on a west facing slope from where it was possible to see the Free Cottages he had established. The church of St Michael and All Angels was completed in 1868 and was funded by William Gibbs.