Topic: Famous Cornish people, a poor list.
Allister
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Posted:
2.Nov 2007 - 10:45

I was having a discussion with a friend last night about famous Cornish people Vs famous Shropshire people. His trump card was Charles Darwin. I was pretty hard pressed to think of anyone significant other than Richard Trevithick, who he had not heard of.

Others included Philip Scofield, Nigel Martyn, Jethro and Phil Vickery.

Are there any other famous Cornish people?




I am awake at 4am to the terrifying undeniable truth that there is nothing I can do to stop the monster
Jack33
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Posts: 131

Posted:
2.Nov 2007 - 14:20

I have this list from something else I was working on:


Jack Clemo
poet of the clay country.

Nick Darke
Playwright film maker, lobster fisherman, environmentalist and visionary.

Nick Rescorla The man who predicted 9/11,Rick Rescorla born in Hayle, Vietnam veteran and Security Chief at the World Trade Center, his foresight and actions saved more than 2,700 lives on the eleventh of September

Charles Causeley, one of the best loved and most needed British poets of the last fifty years.

Alfred Wallis, as an artist his poverty prompted him to work on whatever materials came to hand, including driftwood and cardboard. His view of St Ives harbour on the Cornish coast, in the National Maritime Museum, London was painted on the side of a cardboard box

The cosmetics queen Elizabeth Arden was born Florence Nightingale Graham, in Hayle

Daphne du Maurier was a member of Mebyon Kernow

Michael Joseph (An Gof) and Thomas Flamank
These were the two leaders of the 1497 rebellion against Henry VII

Roger Grenville, captain of the Mary Rose

Sir Richard Grenville commander of the Revenge. Steeped in naval tradition, he was a cousin of Sir Walter Raleigh and a friend of Sir Francis Drake.

Sir Bevil Grenville. During the Civil war he raised an army in Cornwall to fight for the King. When he died his Cornish soldiers refused to fight under any other leader and returned home, carrying his body.

Admiral Edward Boscawen was born at Tregothnan and commander in chief of all military forces in India and the Far East.

Cheston Merchant, the last Cornish speaker

Ralph Allen, St Blazey conceived the nationwide postal service.

Henry Jenner, Celtic scholar, Cornish cultural activist and the chief originator of the Cornish language revival.

Samuel Wallis found the islands of Tahiti and Easter island, and his reports led to Captain Cook's later voyages.

John Passmore Edwards the Journalist, MP, Newspaper editor, champion of the working classes and benifactor extraordinary, he provided 70 Hospitals, Libraries, Schools, Convalescent Homes and Art galleries, many of which continue to serve the community to which they were given


General Sir Walter Raleigh Gilbert. Born in Bodmin in 1785, he became a cadet in the Bengal Infantry. He rose to major-general and became a national hero. The army issued a medal with his picture on it - only Wellington had the same honour.

Henry Trengrouse, the inventor of the rocket line apparatus that fired a rope to stricken ships on the rocks, and enabled the crew to be taken off, he also invented a type of life jacket, and built a model of an unsinkable lifeboat. He died penniless in 1854

Coxswain Trevelyan Richards
Second Coxswain James Stephen Madron,
Assistant Mechanic Nigel Brockman,
Emergency Mechanic John Robert Blewett,
Crew man Charles Thomas Greenhaugh,
Crew man Kevin Smith,
Crew man Barrie Robertson Torrie
Crew man Gary Lee Wallis.
Lifeboatmen of the Solomon Browne

John Carter, King of Prussia, a mixture of hard working fisherman, honest merchant and out and out rogue.

Dick Pearce, flew a powered aircraft before the Wright brothers

John Arnold, a Bodmin man, perfected the ships chronometer.

Sir Humphry Davy president of the Royal Society for seven years. Devised a safety lamp after an explosion had killed 89 miners in a coal mine, although he patented his invention, he let anybody use it.

William Bickford saved lives by inventing the safety fuse for igniting gunpowder.

Sir Goldsworthy Gurney In 1829 on of his steam coaches traveled from London to Bath and back at 15 miles per hour, he also invented a better form of lighting for lighthouses, giving each lighthouse a different flashing system, then sailors could know which lighthouse they were looking at.
He built Bude Castle to prove that a house could be built on sand with the use of a concrete raft. He died penniless in 1875, and was buried at Launcells Church near Bude. There is no memorial to him in Cornwall.

Robert James "Bob" Fitzsimmons made history as boxing's first three-division world champion

David Penhaligon MP who said that Cornwall needs more than just tourism, icecream and deckchairs.

Richard Trevithick invented the Steam locomotive, the traction engine and the first powered road vehicle.

Richard & John Lander, two brothers born in the Fighting Cocks Inn in Truro in 1804 and 1807 who grew up to become explorers.

Mary Kelynack, 84 years old, wanted to get from Newlyn to the Great exhibition but could not afford the fares, so she decided to walk. All the way to London.

John Couch Adams Solely by the application of mathamatics, he proved that there must be another planet circling the sun. The planet was Neptune. He became Professor of Astronomy in Cambridge in 1858. He turned down a knighthood and also the post of Astronomer Royal


Mary Bryant Transported to Australia with the first convicts, she escaped with her children, was captured and pardoned.

John Opie, in his day the most fashionable portrait painter in London, painting some 700 portraits.

Jack33
Allister
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Posted:
2.Nov 2007 - 18:44

impressive list, Jack. I was never aware that Crouch Adams was Cornish. I think Daphne du Maurier is the most famous.

QuoteNick Rescorla The man who predicted 9/11


I'm intrigued, in what way did he 'predict' 9/11?




I am awake at 4am to the terrifying undeniable truth that there is nothing I can do to stop the monster
TGG
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Posts: 1107

Posted:
2.Nov 2007 - 20:52

Allaister, read about it here. Quite a lot about it on-line "The man who predicted 9/11".

If you can get AOL Television, the programme is scheduled for 3rd November at 12:00pm [channel 17] icon_smile


TGG



edited by: TGG, Nov 02, 2007 - 08:52 PM

STOP THE CORNISH GENOCIDE!- The existence of divergent views occur because the lies and deception have a more profoundly negative, and contrived, consequence for the Cornish people than for anyone else within the UK.
sirdhume

Posts: 150

Posted:
3.Nov 2007 - 09:41

John Harris though he is not that famous he is still remember in Camborne and has to be one the best poet's that ever lived. He could not afford pen and paper he used blackberry juice and grocery bags. He started work in a mine at the age of 12 walked 3 miles to the mine and 3 miles back I think that would have been 6 days a week.

This is an extract from The Mine

Hast ever seen a mine? Hast ever been
Down in its fabled grottoes, wall' with gems,
And canopied with torrid mineral-belts,
That blaze within the fiery orifice?
Hast ever, by the glimmer of a lamp,
Or the fast waning taper, gone down, down
Towards the earth's dread centre,





edited by: sirdhume, Nov 03, 2007 - 09:44 AM
royred

Posts: 64

Posted:
4.Nov 2007 - 16:17

Jethro surely you are having a laugh
josephstead

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Posted:
6.Nov 2007 - 17:23

You seem to have forgotten Rev. Robert Stephen Hawker(1803-1875). He composed the Cornish Anthem and he was the first person ever to hold a Harvest Festival which all churchs do today. He also smoke copious amount of heroin but thats another story! See his cchurch etc. at Morwenstow
Allister
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Posted:
6.Nov 2007 - 18:38

QuoteJethro surely you are having a laugh


Unfortunately not. He is both Cornish and famous...ish.




I am awake at 4am to the terrifying undeniable truth that there is nothing I can do to stop the monster
P_Trembath
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Posted:
6.Nov 2007 - 23:07

josephsteadYou seem to have forgotten Rev. Robert Stephen Hawker(1803-1875). He composed the Cornish Anthem and he was the first person ever to hold a Harvest Festival which all churchs do today. He also smoke copious amount of heroin but thats another story! See his cchurch etc. at Morwenstow


He was also born in Plymouth.



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Our day will come!


"Everyone has their own particular part to play. No part is too great or too small, no one is too old or too young to do something."
chris
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Posted:
8.Nov 2007 - 11:17

Here's mine:
http://www.cornwalls.co.uk/history/people/

Any additions/comments/corrections always appreciated.
It also includes those associated with Cornwall. And there are a few dubious ones in their that might have just come from researching via Wikipedia!
HeamoorMan
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Posts: 141

Posted:
6.Dec 2007 - 21:10

How about the Police Officer who took the Trevithick Society's Puffing Devil off the Road On Trevithick day Camborne in 2001 The Anniversary of the Camborne Hill Run, The Replica engines Debut in Public on a Public Road, The Engine was deemed Unsafe and was not allowed to run on Trevithick Day, but was allowed to run on the Sunday After, (The Camborne Hill Run)after some alterations were made to the Engine overnight,,It was big news at the time, and thousands came to see it,,, But a Cornish Police Officer stopped it from running in the interests of Public safety,,,What a decision that was,,should that go down in History aswell??? Anyone know who he was??

Assumption, is the Mother of all Cockups!

Better to have it and not need it, than to need it, and not have it!
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