Brian Thomas, of Abbotskerswell, writes:

Regarding the idea to rebuild the old Priest's House on the newly-acquired Golden Lion Square plot opposite Newton Abbot Library, proposed in your letters column of March 4. Sadly, it is too late by at least two decades.

As I wrote in my 1996 book Newton Abbot in the News (Obelisk):

In April 1975 the 13th-Century Priest's House was demolished in East Street to make way for a road widening scheme which also saw the demise of the less-historic adjoining Vacservices premises... At the time, Newton Abbot historian Trixie Lamb fought strenuously to have the listed building retained and collected a 1,190-signature petition to Save the House.

But the property was bulldozed and the 124 stones of the front wall were numbered and stored at Teignbridge Council's Forde Road depot. The site was cleared for an archaeological dig in December when members of the Devon Committee for Rescue Archaeology uncovered a floor level estimated to be 17th-Century.

Just before the dig neared its end in August 1976, archaeologists revealed that Highweek Street had been raised by three or four feet in the 17th-Century to avoid flooding from the nearby River Lemon. However, they had come across no evidence that the building had any religious connection, though it was clearly once the home of a man of means.

During the market square redevelopment, it was suggested by councillors that the Priest's House facade could be rebuilt as a feature in the new shopping centre. This failed to materialise but, in July 1984, district policy members said it should return to Highweek Street as part of that redevelopment, once a site had been found, with the contractor footing the bill.

In January 1991, open-mouthed Teignbridge councillors were told that over half the stored stones had been used in a sewage scheme, to build the head wall of a culvert, and what was left of the place, about fifty stones, was unsuitable for rebuilding or using in further engineering schemes. The remainder was offered to the town museum.

One stone, however, returned to Highweek Street. It was placed in a gable end of the St Mary's Court sheltered housing development, completed in 1992.THIS AND OTHER LETTERS IN OUR ONLINE EDITION