Three years ago I've been in Plymouth and I've been a little taken aback by the fact that the city is proud...

Question

...of being the port from which sir Francis Drake started to defeat the spanish armada (I can agree with that proudness), and was also proud of being the port from which Fathers Pilgrims started their trip to America, few centuries ago. Not a word about the fact that Darwin started form Plymouth his first trip to South America. I was really surprised of that fact; maybe it's just fault of the italian teacher that bring us to Plymouth - he is catholic and we know that they don't really love Darwin - but I saw in the harbour the commemorative plaques about Fathers Pilgrims and no more...

Now I ask to myself (and to you), how can a city be proud of people who escaped in America (most of the first Pilgrims were little ciminals or political opposers; why else would somebody leave his homeland to risk life in a trip across the ocean?), where, I could add, they started to steal other people's holding and kill that people in the progress?

Sorry if I made some mistakes, it's a long time since I studied english.

Answer 1

I only visited Plymouth once and liked the Port at first sight. You could firmly  breathe the tradition in every cranny. The nearest I got to being stationed there was RAF Hullavington  to the North and RAF Gosport, on the coast near Portsmouth. The entire coast is steeped in Naval tradition, but Plymouth Ho always had a special place.

Why?  How do traditions take root? Why one theme (Francis Drake) overshadow others? People are just proud of one and not the other.

Pudsey, where I grew up was proud of Len Hutton.

Not an easy question and certainly nothing to do with the Church.  The Elisabethan Era has always been something special, when the Royal Navy started becoming  a factor to be reckoned with all over the world. Perhaps that is why people have a soft spot for Plymouth.

Darwin?  Certainly important, but not as  fascinating a character as Drake and his other pals.

Answer 2

ITS THE HOME OF THE BRITISH NAVY MY SON

Answer 3

People still dispute the Darwin teachings, there has been a programme on British Television about that tonight. Darwin was a controversial figure, so probably Plymouth has dissociated itself from this over the generations as the inhabitants try to attract tourists.

The pilgrims were a minority group, persecuted in this country. Perhaps some of our ancestors were politically correct even back then! Also they are credited with the founding of the modern USA. Whenever did British conquerors worry about stealing natives' land and murdering?

Answer 4

Plymouth was one of several main ports used by British naval vessels over a long period of time. Darwin's voyage on the Beagle started there, but that was hardly unusual.

Actually, the Catholic church - at least the upper hierarchy - has no problem with Darwin. They learned to keep their noses out of science after the Galileo debacle.

Answer 5

Lots of facts about Plymouth are hidden from direct view - such as the fact that hundreds of American prisoners of war were kept at Dartmoor prison and only released at the end of the American war of independence.  Many of these Americans were sailors and a lot ended up working in the Royal Dockyards at Devonport as Dockyard Maties.

[PDF] Devon TrailFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML

7 Dartmoor Prison: many black prisoners ... wars and the American War of. Independence. ... Plymouth. celebrated the. diversity of black. women‘s lives ...

http://www.exeter.gov.uk/media/pdf/i/c/D... - Similar pages

History of Devon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaPlymouth played an important role as a naval port in both World War I and World ... at Princetown on Dartmoor to hold French and American prisoners of war. ...

http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History...

What the people of Plymouth have conveniently forgotten, is that people like Francis Drake were heavily involved in the Slave Trade.  But no mention of that, after all, he's a hero, ain't he?