“Hitherto the Jacobites had tried to persuade the nation that the French would come as friends and deliverers; would observe strict discipline, would respect temples, and the ceremonies of the established religion. The short visit of Tourville to our coasts had shown how little reason there was to expect such moderation from the soldiers of Louis. They had been on our island only a few hours and occupied only a few acres, but within a few hours and a few acres had been exhibited in miniature the destruction of the Palatinate.” The terror of a French invasion lasted for many years; it was, indeed, revived, and it became again prevalent at the time of the long war with Napoleon. But for more than a hundred years the history of Teignmouth was uneventful and even tranquil, save for the doings of the smugglers who gained some prominence in the latter half of the eighteenth century, and of whom there were many famous desperadoes along the Devon and Cornish coasts. Then came another scare of possible French invasion at the time when, indeed, the whole of the south coast from the Foreland to Land’s End was agitated by the spectre of “Boney.” And at Teignmouth, “though the place was now provided with a battery as a wall of defence,” on at least one occasion during the year 1797, the inhabitants suddenly forsook their homes and once more fled in confusion and affright to the recesses of Little Haldon. Some, we are told euphemistically, “in a state bordering upon that in which they entered the world. By the which at least one unfortunate maid died of a cold so contracted.” The origin of the scare on this occasion, when it was confidently asserted that the French had landed near Torquay, and were burning and ravaging the countryside, was the accidental ignition of a stack of furze on Stoke Common over the Ness. But no invaders came to disturb the peace of the affrighted town, and after a few hours of discomfort and dismay, the crestfallen inhabitants slowly by twos and threes returned to their homes.