The Plymouth Connection Trivia Quiz

Answer: Derry's Clock

Derry's Clock was given to the city in 1862 by the Mayor, William Derry.
It got its nickname because on each of its four sides there is a water fountain - but no water. The fact that all of its four clocks have been known to tell a different time might also have something to do with it.

Answer: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Born in Scotland in 1859, Doyle studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh. In 1882 he set up a medical practice in Plymouth with a classmate called George Budd, but it didn't work out, and Doyle left for Portsmouth. The rest is history.

Answer: HMS Bellerophon

HMS Bellerophon was named after the Greek hero who rode Pegasus and slew the Chimaera. Her crew nicknamed her the 'Billy Ruffian' and she fought at the Nile and at Trafalgar. Napoleon was taken aboard her and went first to Torbay and then to Plymouth, where they waited while a decision was made whether to grant asylum to Napoleon. There were hundreds of small boats circling the ship, hoping to catch a glimpse of him, and finally he did emerge in his old green campaign coat. When he realised that there was an artist on one of the boats (it was Sir Charles Eastlake) he struck a typical Napoleonic pose, and held it until the sketch was finished, afterwards sending one of his coats and some decorations ashore for the artist to use.
Then the news arrived that Napoleon would not be allowed to stay and was bound for St Helena - and after that he refused to come out on deck again. History does not record whether this was a grand sulk at not getting his way! Bellerophon left the Sound and Napoleon was taken aboard HMS Northumberland, which was the ship that transported him to St Helena.
Interestingly, when Bellerophon was broken up, the timber were sold and there is a lovely little Grade ll listed house in Plymstock called Burrow Lodge, with the date 1835 on its gable end, that is partly built from it.

Answer: William Bligh

Bligh was actually born in St Tudy, Cornwall in 1754, but baptized in St Andrew's Church in Plymouth. He was a strict disciplinarian who made his men eat the saurkraut and drink the lemon juice that prevented them from getting scurvy. It did not make him popular even though they kept healthy.

The mutiny on HMS Bounty is well known, and came about during a voyage to collect breadfruit trees from Tahiti, to be transplanted in the West Indies to provide food for the slaves. The ship spent four months in Tahiti, loading the trees and then waiting for a favourable wind, and the resultant lack of discipline as the sailors succumbed to the temptations of local life caused them to resent the strict regime that Bligh tried to enforce. The ship was seized by mutineers led by Fletcher Christian, who set Bligh and 18 of the crew adrift in an open boat; in a brilliant feat of navigational dead reckoning, Bligh took the boat 3618 miles to Timor. Bligh was subsequently cleared totally in the court martial that followed as a result of losing his ship, and went on to have a distinguished Naval career.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his services to Navigation and Botany. He retired in 1814 as a Vice Admiral of the Blue.

Answer: Plymouth Gin

Gin has been distilled at the Blackfriars distillery since 1793. The building dates back to the 1400s was once part of a monastery, until the time of Henry Vlll's Dissolution of the monasteries in 1536. After that it had many uses including as a non-conformist chapel.

It is said that the Pilgrim Fathers spent their last night ashore there before sailing for Virginia in 1620. Plymouth Gin is the gin of the Royal Navy, and thanks to this the gin is known all over the world. A book called 'Stuart's Fancy Drinks and How to Make Them', dating back to 1896, gives the first known recipe for a dry martini - and specifies the use of Plymouth Gin.

Answer: Gipsy Moth lV

Chichester was a Devon man, born in Barnstaple.
His aim was to circumnavigate the globe using the same route as the old clipper ships, and to beat their time. He did it in 226 days, landing again in Plymouth on 28th May 1967.
A few weeks later, Chichester was knighted by the Queen, using a sword that once belonged to that other great Devonian circumnavigator, Sir Francis Drake.

Answer: Cora Pearl

East Stonehouse didn't actually become part of Plymouth until 1914, when the Three Towns of Plymouth, Devonport and Stonehouse were amalgamated. Cora may or may not have been born in Stonehouse as she claimed, though it is thought she was actually born in 1835 in London.

She wouldn't be the first woman to knock a few years off her age. But it is true that she lived in Stonehouse/Plymouth when her parents and her 15 siblings moved there in 1837. Cora was one of the many 'Grandes Horizontales' who inhabited the Parisian demi-monde at the time. Among her lovers she counted Prince Willem of Orange, Prince Achille Murat and Prince Napoleon.

She charged 5000 francs a night for her favours - an enormous sum when you think that a skilled craftsman would be lucky to earn 4 francs a day - and became immensely rich.

However, the money was spent on gambling and high living, and by the time she retired most of it was gone.

Answer: T.E. Lawrence

T.E. Lawrence is, of course, better known as Lawrence of Arabia. Tiring of his fame, he left the army and joined the air force under the pseudonym 'Aircraftsman Shaw'; he was posted to Mount Batten where in 1930/31 he was part of the team trying to develop high-speed air/sea rescue launches.
My family lived not far away, and I can remember my mother telling me how he was often to be seen racing round the area on his big motor bike. Lawrence died in Dorset in 1935 - in a motor bike accident.
As a child I remember seeing the Sunderland Flying Boats overhead as they came and went from Mount Batten.
RAF Mount Batten was decommissioned in 1986 and subsequently handed over to Plymouth City Council. These days it's a marina and watersports centre.

Answer: Sir Richard Grenville

Sir Richard Grenville, 1541 -1591, was also a cousin of Sir Walter Raleigh.
In 1585 Grenville was knighted and appointed Warden of the Stannaries of Devon and Cornwall. In 1591 Grenville, in the Revenge (which has been Drake's flagship in 1588 when he fought the Spanish Armada) was at Flores in the Azores, with a fleet of six ships under the command of Sir Thomas Howard. A huge fleet of 53 Spanish ships was sighted, and knowing that they would stand no chance in a battle, Howard decided to sail away. Grenville's crew were sick and the ship needed repairs, but he decided to engage the Spanish in order to buy time for the rest of the fleet to escape. He sailed straight into the centre of the enemy fleet, firing ceaselessly and causing massive damage, until the Revenge was was almost a wreck, and then Grenville was shot dead. The Spaniards took the ship but it was later wrecked on the rocks during a storm.
There is a poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson, called 'The Revenge' which tells the tale of this heroic exploit.

Answer: Eddystone Lighthouse

There have been four lighthouses on the Eddystone Reef, and the one shown on pennies from 1937 to 1971 is Smeaton's. The tower was built in 1759 and dismantled when the rock beneath became undermined by the sea. It was re-erected on Plymouth Hoe in 1882 and is one of the great landmarks of South Devon.