Ponsworthy Cottages, Dartmouth – In Memoriam

How a potential agency sale led David to meet Ena Smerdon, a lifelong resident of one of these pretty cottages in Dartmouth

- David Clapp

Back in 2010, my fascination with Dartmoor was in full flow. My hiking, exploring and B photographing, both day and night, was a source of endless excitement. It was also a time of great potential, of experimental landscape photography. My good friend Mark and I could often be found in a thatched pub nestled in the South Devon countryside where I lived, planning our next moonlight adventure, poring over OS maps and books, while sinking a few ales.

Ponsworthy Cottages, a beautiful terrace of thatches, are iconic, the houses rising up a steep hill with a small ford at the bottom. Early on in my career, I received a phone call from a picture editor explaining that a worldwide bank wished to use an image of Ponsworthy that I'd shot in moonlight (top right), for an advertising campaign on the London Underground. It was worth a considerable amount of money, but there was a catch: they want a signed property release on a cottage, to avoid any "legal complication".