Mary Newman

It is interesting that Mary Newman's Cottage is in Culver Road, Saltash because she almost certainly never lived there. Mary married Francis Drake on the 4th July, 1569 at the church at Higher St Budeaux and this is recorded in the parish records. The records also show the marriages of three other women with the name Newman between 1552 and 1571, within the St Budeaux Parish, and it is assumed that they are all related. Stories passed from generation to generation by word of mouth say that Mary was born at Agaton Farm and was the daughter of the important Newman family.However, John Drake, the cousin of Francis, in a deposition to Spanish inquisitors in 1587, stated that Mary was born in London. It has been suggested that Mary was actually the sister of Drake's shipmate, Harry Newman, who it is recorded, came from St Budeaux.

Little seems to have been written down about Mary and much of her life is a mystery. There are said to be no pictures of Mary but, with her being married to such an important figure of the day, a painting may well exist, perhaps mistakenly listed as someone else. It has also been suggested that Mary, who would have been brought up in the parish of St Budeaux, may have lived at the old barn that still stands off Normandy Hill (see picture). Although the barn is from the 1500s, there seems to be little to support the story though it would be a better bet than the house in Saltash.

Drake was knighted in 1581 and was elected Mayor of Plymouth in the same year. Mary became Lady Drake and Mayoress. Drake bought Buckland Abbey in 1581 and they both lived there. They had previously lived at Looe Street in Plymouth. Mary, however, died two years later in 1583.

Two funeral services were held for Mary. One was at St Andrew's Church and the other was at St Budeaux, where her body was said to have been buried. Today, there is no sign of her grave at St Budeaux and past attempts to find it have failed.

Sir Francis Drake and Mary Newman had no children and there are no direct descendants of Drake. He married Elizabeth Sydenham in 1585.

Sir Francis Drake died in 1596 of dysentery while anchored off Panama. He was just 56 years old. He was buried at sea in a lead coffin off the Portobelo coast.

The Silver Mine Under Saltash Passage

Many people walking around Saltash Passage today might notice the subsidence that appears in the area. The wall beside The Ferry House Inn has been cordoned off for some time now. Above the wall, the path, serving the houses above, is falling away. This subsidence was thought to have been explained many years ago when local historian, Marshall Ware, suggested that this was the area where the pipe from the American fuel tank, kept in the old orchard, ran down towards the quay. However, subsidence has also been noticed in Little Ash Gardens and near the old wall facing the River Tamar. Even further up the road at Vicarage Gardens the pavement is showing signs of sinking.

A house in Little Ash Gardens has had to be under-pinned in the past and this all seems to be due to the underground mining that once took place in the area.

In 1837, Charles Trelawny excavated for lead-silver deposits under Saltash Passage. The mine tunnel ran from Kinterbury Creek under, what is now, the main road and up towards the quarry that is now Little Ash Gardens. It is believed that the house affected lies above this mine as does many of the homes within the area. With the disturbance of the bombing during the Second World War (an armaments barge was hit on the River Tamar), the mineshaft was probably disturbed.

Many years ago, the entrance to the mineshaft was sealed up to stop children from entering. The mines are still there but remain a secret to many visitors to the area.

Titanic Survivors

The Titanic,1912. On 28 April 1912, the Titanic survivors were brought back to Millbay Docks, fourteen days after the ship had sank. At 8am, the SS Lapland moored at Cawsand Bay with the 167 members of the Titanic who hadn't been detained in New York for the American inquiry. Three tenders left Millbay Docks to collect the passengers and the 1,927 sacks of mail that had been scheduled to be carried by the Titanic. The third tender, the Sir Richard Grenville, carrying the survivors, killed time in the Sound while the dock labourers and porters were paid off and escorted out of the dock gates at West Hoe. After midday, the tender was given the all clear and the survivors were allowed to disembark in an air of secrecy. They were then put on a special train from Millbay Docks to Southampton where they arrived at 10.10pm that night.

Little Ash Tea Gardens in Saltash Passage

Little Ash Tea Gardens was a very popular beauty spot and was visited by over twenty thousand people in one year. Now long gone, its location would have been at the far end of where Little Ash Gardens now stands. In the background of the photo, steps lead down from near to the fields at the Kloof. With the steep bank, it's easy to imagine this as Little Ash Quarry. Though it's hard to see, there are huge queues of people both on the steps and at the top of the steep drop. In the picture, there is a larger tent, with Little Ash Tea Gardens painted on the top in large letters, and a smaller tent with seats laid out underneath. Several large flag poles, with flags flying, mark its location. All around, there are coloured bunting flags and also a wooden picket fence along the edge. The van on the left of the picture belongs to a company called 'Day'. A programme of music was played by the band of the Plymouth Corporation Tramways and Transport. The conductor of the band, in the 1920s, was a Mr C E Lewenden and some of the tunes of the day that were played included; 'She Don't Wanna', 'I Want to be Alone with Mary Brown' and 'Trail of the Tamarind Tree'. Some of the patrons who attended the event included Vice-Admiral Sir Rudolph Bentinck, Major Leslie Hore-Belisha MP and Rear Admiral Oliver Backhouse, as well as many other Naval Officers. Combined with the Regatta, it was quite an event.

Here’s an advert for the tea gardens. It was then described as Devonport’s beauty spot (Saltash Passage, at the time, was classed as part of Devonport). It served high class teas and refreshments, had brass bands and park rides such as swings, roundabouts and see-saws. Frequent tramcars ran from Stuart Road, Morice Square and Tor Lane. The return fare for adults was 5d and for children 3d. Advertised as the ideal place for Sunday School outings. The Officials included the Lord Mayor who, in the 1920s,was Councillor W H Priest, G A Daymond of Mount Tamar Villas and Walter Wyatt of Baden Terrace. James Ware who lived at the Kloof, was treasurer until ill health stopped him taking part after 1928.

Dancing on the Hoe

Al fresco dancing on the Hoe began during the first week of May 1941 and was a success from the beginning. The idea was first suggested by the Lord Mayor, Lord Astor. Lady Nancy Astor regularly took part and among her dancing partners was the Duke of Kent.It raised people's spirits and brought everyone together.

Noel Coward, who was a friend of the Astors, said at the time, 'After all that devastation, on a Summer evening, people were dancing on the Hoe. It made me cry - the bravery, the gallantry, the Englishness of it!' The dances continued for many years. A huge dance was held on the Hoe, at the end of the war, to celebrate VE Day. Lady Astor was born in America in 1879.She married Waldorf Astor in 1906 and they lived at 3 Elliot Terrace on the Hoe. She was the MP for Sutton from 1919 to 1945. During the Second World War, Lord and Lady Astor were the Mayor and Lady Mayor of Plymouth. Lady Astor was well known for her straight to the point way of talking. She had once said to Winston Churchill, ’If I was your wife I would give you poison!’ to which Churchill replied, ’If I was your husband, I’d drink it!’

Lady Astor died in 1964.

Saltash Passage and the US Army base, 1944

In January 1944,the US army set up camp at Vicarage Road in preparation for the D-Day landings. Altogether, it housed 60,000 troops on their way to the Normandy landings. It was also a reception centre for returning troops from July 1944. The whole operation was highly secret and from May 1944, anyone who wanted to visit relatives in the area had to apply for a permit and would be escorted to the address by military police. They would also have to give a specific time when they would be leaving. The mission was codenamed Operation Overlord. The codename for the many US bases around Plymouth was 'sausages'. During this time, the river was full of ships loading men and equipment. One day the river was full of ships and the next day, it was completely empty as the troops headed towards the beaches of Normandy. Children in the area loved the American troops and would pester them for sweets, chewing gum, chocolate, food and cocoa etc. The Americans weren't affected by rationing and were very generous to the locals especially the children. In the city, they even paid for and organised parties for them. The large majority of troops in Plymouth were from the 29th Armoured division which went on to land at the Omah and Utah beaches. Omah beach was the codename for one of the main landing points for the troops on 6 June 1944. Unfortunately, it is where the Americans suffered their heaviest casualties. The Vicarage Road camp was decommissioned in September 1945. Tamar Terrace was later renamed Normandy Way and Vicarage Road was renamed Normandy Hill to commemorate the troops that passed this way on their way to the D-Day landings. A monument stands in Saltash Passage to commemorate where a slipway was built for the departure of the US troops. They constructed slipways or 'hards' which were known as 'chocolate box hards' to the troops. Sections can still be seen there, some are scattered along the foreshore. A tablet commemorating the event was unveiled on Normandy Hill, known as US Army Route 23, by the Mayor of Cherbourg in May 1947. A memorial was later erected in the gardens and the plaque on it reads: 'This tablet marks the departure from this place of units of the V and V11 corps of the United States Army on the 6th June 1944 for the D-Day landings in France and was unveiled by His Excellency John Hay Whitney, the Ambassador of the United States of America. May 1958'.

Gog and Magog

One of the earliest recorded mentions of the Hoe area comes from Geoffrey of Monmouth who wrote about Plymouth Hoe in 1136 when he told the story of the giant, Gogmagog (which he originally calls Goemagot). The story of Gogmagog's Leap told how Brutus, the great-grandson of the Trojan hero, Aeneas, came to Albion with his followers and decided to settle. He called the land ‘Britain’ which was meant to be a derivation of ‘Brutus’. Brutus drove out the giants who inhabited the land sending them into the mountains in the west. One day, while holding a festival at the port where they first landed, Brutus and his men were attacked by a group of giants who they killed all except one who was called Gogmagog. He was said to be 12 cubits high. A cubit would have been about one and a half feet which would have made Gogmagog about 18 feet tall. It was said that Gogmagog could wield an uprooted oak tree as a weapon. Brutus kept Gogmagog alive so that he could wrestle with Corineus, the then Duke of Cornwall, who loved to wrestle with giants. When the opponents met for the first time, Gogmagog gripped Corineus so tightly around his middle that he broke three of his ribs. This enraged Corineus who then threw Gogmagog off nearby cliffs and he fell to his death on the jagged rocks below. This was all said to have happened on Plymouth Hoe and the chalk giants that once appeared on the Hoe represented this wrestling match. There is a record of the chalk cut giant being on Plymouth Hoe in 1486 and a record in the City Archive shows a receipt for a bill for cleaning and weeding the giant. The bill was paid by the Earl of Edgcumbe. It is uncertain when the figure first appeared. Town records from 1486 onwards call the figure Gogmagog but in Carew's Survey of Cornwall in 1602, he refers to there being two figures on the slopes of the Hoe, both wielding clubs. One was bigger than the other and he calls them Gog and Magog, splitting the name into two halves. Several years later though, the smaller figure was being referred to as Corineus so the figures obviously commemorated the earlier wrestling match mentioned by Geoffrey of Monmouth . The figures were unfortunately destroyed when the Citadel was built in the reign of King Charles II.