The name Torbay came from
a town of the same name in Devonshire, England, called Torquay. The word is, of course, well known, being the old Anglo-Saxon "Tor"
which means a tower, and in a secondary way, a tall cone-like mountain, presenting
some appearance of a tower. On Mason's map (1625) the name is given as Torbay
and on all subsequent maps, also by Abbe Beaudouin in 1696-97.
Torbay was first settled by valiant Devonshire men and named in memory
of their beautiful Bay, of the same name.
An extract from Bishop Feild's Journal states "indeed there seems to be a little
colony of Devon folk in Torbay".
The Torbay population has grown fro S.P.G. Report in 1762 of 23 Englishmen, 5 Irish,
8 Women, 9 Boys and 6 Girls to a present day population of
5,300.
The community started off as a planters station in 1696 wutg two family names
being the Codners and the Gosses. The beginning might be small but today you
will find people of Torbay in almost all parts of the world doing all sorts
of jobs. Total area of Torbay is 1,345 square miles.