History Hub permalink
Friday quiz
This discussion has been closed.
-
Message 1.Â
Posted by Andrew Host (U1683626) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Morning all!
Didn't expect to be doing this again so soon but I've been asked to stand-in for Katy, who'll be back next week.
Here goes!
A young girl living in Lyme Regis in the 18th century became the inspiration for the rhyme "She sells seashells on the seashore".
Who was she and what was her significance?
Cheers
Andrew -
Message 2
Posted by Stoggler (U14387762) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Welcome back Andrew!
Just so happens that I was reading about her just yesterday in the book I'm reading - Mary Anning. She was not only a very good fossil hunter on the Jurassic coast of Dorset who found a whole ichtyosaur (or an almost whole one) among other important discoveries, but was was granted an honorary membership of the Royal Society in the days when women were not normally admitted. -
Message 3
Posted by islanddawn (U7379884) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Go on and admit it Andrew, you missed us!
-
Message 4
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Mary anne something… in 1750ish was famous for her fossil collecting along the beaches at Lyme… she was very young when she found her first a big dinosaur and people still find them. it’s fantastic to wander along the bollom of the cliffs after a storm and pick up fossils. Every other shop in town sells fossils… don’t know about nursery rhymes thou… -
Message 5
Posted by Andrew Host (U1683626) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Hi Stoggler,
You got there first - spot on!
Her trade in selling fossils - he livlihood in her early years, especially after her father's premature death inspired the well-known tongue-twister.
Your go.
Andrew -
Message 6
Posted by Andrew Host (U1683626) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Ha ha! I'd only just got my pipe and put my slippers on!
-
Message 7
Posted by Andrew Host (U1683626) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Hi Bandick,
Stoggler beat you to it. But correct. My son and I picked up an ammonite impression in a loose stone on the beach in summer - he's now hooked!
Best wishes for a speedy recovery.
Andrew -
Message 8
Posted by Stoggler (U14387762) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Who was given the chance to be the Duke of London, and said no? According to a poll in 2008, a fifth of British teenagers believe this person was a fictional character.
-
Message 9
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Hi Stoggler
Only two people in recent British people could have been offered such a prestigious title: the Duke of Wellington or Winston Churchill. I know that WSC turned down a peerage so he would be my number 1 choice.
TP -
Message 10
Posted by Stoggler (U14387762) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Yep, that's it TP. Apparently his son was pursuing a career in politics and had daddy been a peer than he wouldn't have been able to stand in the House of Commons. However, some say that Randolph's political career was already over by that point!
Either way, Churchill turned it down.
Your turn -
Message 11
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Thanks Stoggler.
OK an easy one. Which is the odd one out of these dates, all AD, and why?
69, 1066, 1483, 1936
TP -
Message 12
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Friday, 28th January 2011
AD 69?* Four* different emperors (regret do not know names)?
All the others were years of three rulers.
Edward - Harold - William
Edward IV - Edward V - Richard III
*George V - Edward VIII - George VI -
Message 13
Posted by TwinProbe (U4077936) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Hi SST
Good enough for me. The four emperors who ruled Britain, and the rest of the Roman Empire, were: Galba, Aulus Vitellius, Ortho and Vespasian,
Have you a little something for us?
Best wishes,
TP -
Message 14
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
The Queen offered Churchill a dukedom on his retirement as Prime Minister in 1955 and it would have been the first non-royal dukedom to have been created since 1874 when Hugh Grosvenor was made Duke of Westminster in 1874 (although strictly speaking that was an elevation as Grosvenor was already Marquess of Westminster and it was done on the advice of the outgoing Prime Minister, W.E.Gladstone, in his Resignation Honours list).
Churchill himself picked the title of Duke of London (Duke of Westminster might have been more appropriate but that title was already taken) but was very reluctantly persuaded to withdraw his acceptance by his son, Randolph, who still hoped for a political career (he had represented Preston in the wartime Parliament but had been defeated in the 1945 General Election and had lost to Michael Foot in Plymouth Devonport in 1950 and 1951) which would hae been blighted as there was then no provision for the disclaiming of peerages.
Ironically, Randolph never contested another parliamentary seat, turning to political journalism instead, and died only 3 years after his father in 1968
However his son, also called Winston, who would have succeeded as the 3rd Duke, was elected to the Commons as MP for Stretford in Manchester in 1970 and remained an MP until defeated in the 1997 General Election (although by the time he was first elected he would have been able to disclaim his peerage).
One of his grandfather's last political writings was a letter of support to the then Anthony Wedgwood Benn in his campaign to disclaim his father's viscountcy. Of the 20 former PMs since A.J.Balfour (1902-5) Churchill is one of 9 (the others being Campbell-Bannerman, Bonar Law, Ramsay Macdonald, Neville Chamberlain, Ted Heath, John Major, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown - to date) who have turned down the subsequent offer of a peerage. -
Message 15
Posted by bandick (U14360315) on Friday, 28th January 2011
69… Boudicca…?
1066… Duke William…
1483… Richard lll…
1938… George V…
Well 1936 was a leap year, the others weren’t… but I can’t imagine that’s the answer. -
Message 16
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Drat - just for today I will not post on the History Hub and I just did. Hopeless.
But another easy question.
1066 - 1483 - 1936.
How does 1536 fit in (sort of)?
SST.
PS Hope you are feeling cooler and more comfortable now, bandick. -
Message 17
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Might have added 1553 if you count Lady Jane Grey.
-
Message 18
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
I think you must mean the year of 3 Queens - Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII's first wife (although Henry had had the marriage annulled three years earlier), died at Perborough in January, Anne Boleyn was executed in May and Henry married Jane Seymour a fortnight later.
-
Message 19
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Of course - it was far too easy.
Over to you, Allan D. -
Message 20
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Maybe, maybe not. Anyway, I'll disguise this question without making it too obtuse, I hope.
Still on the subject of threes, what's the year that connects W.E.Gladstone's native city, what Charles Dickens called "the child of the Victoria Docks" and the first diocese to be created after the Reformation (although soon to disappear).
If you get the first clue right and bearing in mind the theme of the thread the rest should follow fairly easily or you could make an educated guess. -
Message 21
Posted by Temperance (U14455940) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Is this a sneaky trick question, Allan D? Wild guess - something to do with the building/opening of a railway or a canal that connected Liverpool with somewhere?
Haven't a clue actually. -
Message 22
Posted by George1507 (U2607963) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Liverpool was Gladstone's birthplace I think, and Canning Town was the child of the Victoria Docks according to Dickens.
I don't know what the third place is, nor the connection I'm afraid. -
Message 23
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Canning followed Lord Liverpool as PM in a year with 3 PMs, but I'm struggling to link in Westminster - the Archdiocese is later than Canning's death, surely?
-
Message 24
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
You're almost there, U-L, I think you're confusing a Catholic with an Anglican diocese. I meant an Anglican diocese - the answer is Ripon - created in 1836 but shortly to merge into that of Wakefield. You've got the main point of the question - all you have to do is give the year.
-
Message 25
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
The answer isn't 1836, btw. Ripon, like the other two place-names has a double meaning.
-
Message 26
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Aha. I was sidetracked by Westminster as it was one of Henry VIII's new diocese, but got zapped a decade later, and I wondered if you were conflating the two. There must have been a PM between Canning and Wellington, who took over in 1828, but I've no idea who - perhaps Lord Ripon, from your comments, and the year would have been 1927.
-
Message 27
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Check before sending warning #316. 1827 not 1927.
-
Message 28
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 28th January 2011
Spot on. The Year of 3 PMs was indeed 1827 - Lord Liverpool, who had been PM since the assassination of Spencer Perceval in June 1812, resigned (or was deemed to have quit) after a disabling stroke in February1827, George Canning his successor died in office, probably from emphysema during a particularly hot August and there was indeed a PM between Canning and Wellington - the hapless Frederick John Robinson aka Viscount Goderich and later created the Earl of Ripon, hence the Ripon connection, who was so susceptible to criticism he often burst into tears and was succeeded by Wellington the following January.
Canning Town was probably not named after George Canning but after his son, Charles John, who was Viceroy of India at the time of the Indian Mutiny in 1857. Both Canning and Godetrich (or Ripon) had children who would later become Viceroys of India. Goderich (as Ripon) was later Gladstone's boss at the Board of Trade in Peel's Administration from 1841-3. Gladstone was also placed on Canning's lap as an infant.
1827 was not the last time there were 3 UK PMs in a 12-month period which was the more recent period of 18 October 1963 when Harold Macmillan resigned until 16 October 1964 when Harold Wilson was appointed, the intervening PM being Sir Alec Douglas-Â鶹ԼÅÄ (it also occurred in 1923-24 when there were 3 PMs in 8 months) but it was the last calendar year to see a "hat-trick" of PMs come and go. Since then the Premiership has proved, on the whole, more durable.
Your go, U-L. -
Message 29
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 28th January 2011
The aircraft carriers USS Langley and HMS Furious shared a nickname - what was it?
-
Message 30
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Covered Wagon?
-
Message 31
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Spot on Allan.
Move 'em out, pardner! -
Message 32
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Thanks, U-L. Apologies for absence. Bit slow on the round-up!
Back to PMs again.
Which Prime Minister described himself as "an Irishman born in London" and which PM, in response to a question as to whether, having been born in Ireland, he considered himself Irish made a famous (or infamous) comparison with stables and horses? -
Message 33
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
I'm going to say Lord Palmerston as the 'Irishman born in London' - pure guess.
For the second half of the question then that would obviously be Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington. That said - the 'stables and horses' story is said to be apocryphal. Or at least it was never said by Wellington himself but by someone else taking about Wellington. -
Message 34
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
I'd agree about Wellington - but the other half is someone already mentioned in this thread IIRC.
-
Message 35
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Quite right, Viz, on both counts. The quote is most likely attributable to the Irish Nationalist politician, Daniel O'Connell in 1843:
The poor old Duke! what shall I say of him? To be sure he was born in Ireland, but being born in a stable does not make a man a horse.Â
In fact Wellington served as an MP in the Irish Parliament (before the Act of Union in 1801) . -
Message 36
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Yep, very close to Wellington chronologically (if not politically) although Wellington enacted a cause he supported which had great significance for Ireland and its importance in British politics.
-
Message 37
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
The "Irishman born in London's" most famous achievement was bringing in the New World's existence to restore the balance of the Old.
-
Message 38
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Thanks Allan.
It was a toss up between Palmerston and George Canning. I had thought that it might have been Lord Castlereagh but then remembered that he was never Prime Minister but was Foreign Secretary. Am I the only one who has to keep reminding themselves about this regarding Castlereagh? For some reason it just 'feels' as though he should be in the list of Prime Ministers. That said - I've no idea where Castlereagh was born. Mount Stewart, County Down maybe? In which case he wouldn't have fitted the criteria anyway. He was neither Prime Minister nor was he born in London.
It's significant, however, just how many of the leading UK parliamentarians from the early to mid 19th Century had Irish or Anglo-Irish backgrounds - Wellington, Palmerston, Castlereagh, Canning, Robert Peel etc. -
Message 39
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Saturday, 29th January 2011
Part of the Protestant Ascendancy, Viz.
Canning's father, like Catlreagh, came from Ulster (in his case Londonderry) but was much more impecunious as he had to surrender his right to inherit his estates in order to pay off his debts. He also abandoned young George and his mother (nee Costello, so presumably also Irish but south of the present divide) who became an actress to support herself and her child. Eventually George was given to his wealthy uncle, Stratford Canning, which enabled him to attend Eton and Christ Church, Oxford and become a member of the political elite.
The fact that Canning's mother had been an actress was often used by his political opponents as an indication of his lowly origins (although in fact his mother only became an actress after George was born out of financial necessity). It became as celebrated a political slur as the fact that John Major's father had been a music-hall performer (although he had long retired when his son was born).
Castlereagh led the Liverpool Government in the House of Commons after the Napoleonic Wars (like Palmerston his title was an Irish peerage and so was still qualified for election to the House of Commons until he succeeded to become Marquess of Londonderry shortly before his death) and, despite being Foreign Secretary, introduced the repressive legislation following the defeat of Napoleon for which he took his share of the blame (as in Shelley's poem, "The Mask of Anarchy"). Canning, although a Tory, was opposed to government policy and refused office.
Castlereagh's suicide, after a crude blackmail attempt, in 1822 enabled Liverpool to replace him with Canning at the Foreign Office and Sidmouth with Peel at the Â鶹ԼÅÄ Office liberalising his administration.
Although Castlereagh (in his early career) and Canning had supported Catholic Emancipation - the right of Roman Catholics to sit as MPs (Catholics already had the vote - if they fulfilled the property qualification - Pitt wanted to introduce Catholic Emancipation at the time of the Act of Union but was vetoed by George III) it was Wellington, who had fiercely opposed Catholic Emancipation, who finally introduced the measure, at the urging of Peel, another former opponent, after O'Connell had been elected in a bye-election for County Clare.
When Wellington became PM at the beginning of 1828 many of Canning's former supporters left the Tories and joined the Whigs in expectation, that was not realised, that his administration would be as repressive as LIverpool's had been before 1822. The most notable was Viscount Palmerston (despite the fact that he had been a minister in that government).
Wellington (born in Dublin) is one of two UK PMs who was born outside the present borders of the UK. The other is Andrew Bonar Law born in New Brunswick, Canada in 1858.
Your go, Vizzer, tomorrow perhaps.
About this Board
The History message boards are now closed. They remain visible as a matter of record but the opportunity to add new comments or open new threads is no longer available. Thank you all for your valued contributions over many years.
or  to take part in a discussion.
The message board is currently closed for posting.
The message board is closed for posting.
This messageboard is .
Find out more about this board's
Search this Board
Â鶹ԼÅÄ iD
Â鶹ԼÅÄ navigation
Â鶹ԼÅÄ links
Â鶹ԼÅÄ Â© 2014 The Â鶹ԼÅÄ is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read more.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.