Exeter RWC Fanzone: 5 facts you should know!

If you plan to visit Exeter's Rugby World Cup 2015 Fanzone, you will find yourself in one of the most historic parts of the city.

Whether you are a tourist or a local, here are 5 things you should know about Northernhay Gardens:

1) Incorporating a good stretch of Roman wall and the only length of Saxon town wall to be seen in England.

2) The site of Northernhay Gardens was quarried in Roman times for stone from which to build the adjacent city walls.

3) The early park was destroyed in the Civil War when, in 1642 large new defensive ditches were dug outside the walls for the city's defence.

4) in 1664, the city set about repairing the park; planting and maintaining hundreds of young elms and laying out gravel paths.

5) Northernhay underwent major re-landscaping in 1860, receiving its important group of monuments to major Victorian figures in the city's history in the period 1860-1895. Today the collection includes:

'The Deerstalker' by E. B. Stephens in 1875.
War Memorial, erected in 1923 by local sculptor John Angel
Statue of Sir John Dinham, created by Edward Bailey Stephens in 1866
Statue of 40 Devon MP, Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, created in 1861; installed in the park in 1930.
Statue of Sir Stafford Northcote, sculpted by Boehm, dating back to 1896

Inormation from Exeter City Council