[Report 1903] / Medical Officer of Health, Newton Abbot R.D.C., Newton Abbot U.D.C., Dawlish U.D.C.

  • Newton Abbot (England). Rural District Council.
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1903] / Medical Officer of Health, Newton Abbot R.D.C., Newton Abbot U.D.C., Dawlish U.D.C. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    1903, -♦- 1,-NEWTON ABBOT RURAL. PHYSICAL CHARACTERS.-A lake of the miocene (or late eocene) period, said to be the only one in England of irregul.ii shape, being in its greatest dimensions, 8 or q miles by 2 or 3, drained by the river Teign and its tributaries, constitutes what may be called the kernel of the district The soil of this former lake consists of beds of clay, quartzose sand and ignite, which have been estimated to attain a maximum depth of 300 feet ; there is however on record a boring which was extended to 525 feet without reaching the bottom of the formation. > bor the first 260 feet this penetrated strata of sand and clay fairly evenly distributed, with some scattered beds of igmte ; below this depth the sand almost entirely disappeared and from about 260 ^0420 feet clay alternated with lignite ; tnen the clay also failed and the last 100 feet of the boring showed lignite alone. 6 The sand and clay represent the washings of untold ages from the granite mountain range, of which Dartmoor, as we know it to-day, is the surviving remnant : while the lignite a substance m an intermediary stage between wood and coal bears witness to the forests which must at one time have grown in the valley. The present surface is little above sea level and it will be apparent therefore that considerable subsidence has taken place since this forest epoch—the main mass of lignite being 400 feet below the ordnance datum—with the result first of submerging the vegetation, and then imbedding it with granite debris brought down by the mountain streams and