French Prisoner of War Cemetery, Princetown

Historic England's register entry for the French Prisoner of War Cemetery at HM Prison Dartmoor (list entry 1427528, a registered park and garden) describes a burial ground laid out in 1866 to 1868 to commemorate the French prisoners of war who died at Dartmoor Prison during the Napoleonic Wars of 1809 to 1816. It is a rectangle of about 0.3 hectares just north of the prison, outside the prison wall, enclosed by a local granite retaining wall about a metre high, with farmland round it and rugged moorland beyond to the north and east. The American Prisoner of War Cemetery lies immediately east, made to a matching design. It lies in the parish of Dartmoor Forest, about 0.9 km east of North Hessary Tor and 0.8 km north of Princetown.

It is reached by a track along the outside of the perimeter wall, from east or west, and entered from the south by small steps in the wall or by an opening with decorative cast-iron spear-headed gates, given by Dartmoor Prison in 2002, leading by a gravel path to a commemorative obelisk. The ground is lawn with a perimeter walk, rising to a bank against the drystone wall, planted with a row of oaks. The granite obelisk in the middle commemorates the French prisoners of war who died at Dartmoor between 1809 and 1816. Convicts of Dartmoor Prison made it in 1865, and a photograph of about 1900 shows it on a granite rubble base planted as a fern rockery. It now stands on a circular stepped base added about 2002, with a flagpole 2 or 3 metres north-east of it.

Sources: Historic England list entry 1427528, which cites Joy, Dartmoor Prison: A Complete Illustrated History (2002), vol 2, page 43, James, Prisoners of War at Dartmoor (2013) and the Ordnance Survey 1:2500 map of 1884.

• Status: Listed building (Historic England list entry 1427528)
• Grid reference: SX 5874 7425 (approximate, from the listing's coordinates)