As this 1844 map shows, Pilton and Ashford were once separate villages and parishes. As the years went by, an expanding Barnstaple absorbed Pilton within its suburbs together with the little hamlets of Bradiford and Raleigh. Today, Ashford still retains some of its former village identity but recently, the Diocese of Exeter, to which both parishes belong, combined these two places into a single Parish which it has named Pilton with Ashford.