Besides these villages there are groups of cottages, such as Corntown, Tor and Yeo, there are also the larger houses, the Vicarage, Blachford, Delamore and Slade, with their dependant cottages, which would account for many of the inhabitants, so would several other houses, which, though of less size, are occupied by families of a standing similar to that of those mentioned by name. There are also a considerable number of farms, some of which, by their architecture or connection with families of repute, were evidently the houses of a class higher than that of tenant farmers, for instance Cholwich Town, Fardel, Hanger, South Hele and Wisdome. There is the old Vicarage (now called the Glebe House) and opposite the School stands a picturesque thatched cottage which has the reputation of being the oldest in the village, in fact there is a tradition that it was the Vicarage in olden times.

In 1894 a portion of the parish, lying in the valley of the river Erme, was severed, to help in the formation of the parish of Ivy Bridge, which included important buildings, for instance the Ivy Bridge Church, Vicarage, Railway Station and Lady Rogers' School for educating orphans, founded by Dame Hannah Rogers of Blachford under her will dated 8th September, 1764. It was first conducted in leasehold premises in Plymouth, but in 1888 was transferred to a schoolhouse at Ivy Bridge, erected on a site given by Lord Blachford for the purpose.

Besides the agricultural and inhabited parts there are extensive moorlands. These running past the lofty peak of Pen Beacon (1407 ft.) reach the loftier peak of Shell Top (1546 ft.) where the parish boundary divides it from Shaugh Prior and bending southwards separates it from Plympton St. Mary, until it joins the Yealm a little distance above Lee Mill Bridge. In the opposite direction from Shell Top it runs at a high level and in a North Easterly direction to Broad Rock, at the head of the Erme, thence following the course of the river southwards, as far as the Hall Estate, in the parish of Harford, it embraces Staldon Moor the highest part of which is 1324 feet.

At a considerably lower level, Hanger Down, with its charming views and Headon, with its China Clay works, deserve special notice.

Though the working population is mainly agricultural, there has been fresh scope for labour in the clay industry, as from land formerly considered of little value, China Clay is obtained and sent not only to the potteries and paper mills of England, but also to the Continent, India and America.

The Yealm, occasionally in old times written as 'Ye Alm', rises in boggy ground forming the watershed between it and one of the tributaries of the Plym and flowing southwards through the lovely gorge of Hawns and Dendles, quickly reaches the fertile meadows of the Blachford valley. Continuing it's course through the country, every yard of which is beautiful, it arrives, after being augmented by the Piall from the Delamore and Slade valley, at the tidal waters of the estuary between Puslinch and Kitley, some thirteen miles from it's source.

There has been a great deal of discussion as to the derivation of the name 'Hawns and Dendles', and although the origin of the word Hawns is obscure, Dendles is undoubtedly a corruption of Daniels, for Lord Blachford, on referring to his title deeds, found that the glen had been called Daniels many years ago, probably after some former tenant.