Stonehouse, Plymouth

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Stonehouse
Stonehouse from Mount Edgcumbe.jpg
Stonehouse from Mount Edgcumbe
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Stonehouse
Location within Devon
Unitary authority
Ceremonial county
Region
Country England
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Post town PLYMOUTH
Postcode district PL1 3xx
Dialling code 01752
Police Devon and Cornwall
Fire Devon and Somerset
Ambulance South Western
List of places
UK
England
Devon
50°22′15″N4°09′45″W / 50.370833°N 4.1625°W / 50.370833; -4.1625

East Stonehouse was one of three towns that were amalgamated into modern-day Plymouth, in the ceremonial county of Devon, England. West Stonehouse was a village that is within the current Mount Edgcumbe Country Park in Cornwall. It was destroyed by the French in 1350. The terminology used in this article refers to the settlement of East Stonehouse which is on the Devon side of the mouth of the Tamar estuary, and will be referred to as Stonehouse.

Contents

History

Settlement in the area goes back to Roman times and a house made of stone was believed to have stood near to Stonehouse Creek. However other stories relate to land owned in the 13th century by Robert the Bastard. This land subsequently passed from the Durnford family, through marriage, to the Edgecombe family in the 14th and 15th centuries. The site of the original settlement of Stonehouse is now mostly occupied by the complex of Princess Yachts. [1]

During the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries the areas of Emma Place and Caroline Place were home to many of the west country's top-ranking admirals, doctors and clergy. Those streets together with Millbay Road used to form Plymouth's red light district. Union Street, originally built across marshland, was for almost a century the centre of the city's night life with about a hundred pubs, a music hall and many other attractions. Much of it was destroyed by bombing in World War II. After the war the area between Union Street and the dock has been used by small factories, storage, car dealers and repairers. For decades it remained underdeveloped compared with other parts of Plymouth. [2]

Administrative history

Stonehouse was historically a chapelry of the parish of Plymouth St Andrew's, covering the part of the parish which lay outside Plymouth's borough boundaries. Stonehouse was made a separate parish in 1746. [3] The parish of East Stonehouse was made a local government district in 1872, governed by a local board. [4] Such local boards were reconstituted as urban district councils in 1894. [5]

East Stonehouse Urban District was abolished in 1914, being absorbed into the county borough of Plymouth, along with neighbouring Devonport. [6] East Stonehouse remained a civil parish until 1 April 1974, [7] but as an urban parish it had no practical functions, being directly administered by Plymouth Corporation. [8] In 1951 the parish had a population of 7770. [9]

Notable buildings

Significant buildings include the Royal William Victualling Yard, [10] the Royal Marine Barracks, Stonehouse [11] and the Royal Naval Hospital, Stonehouse. [12] Of these three defence complexes only the Barracks remain in Naval possession. [11]

During the reign of Henry VII defences at the mouth of the Tamar were strengthened by the building of cannon-bearing towers. One of these, the Artillery Tower at the sea end of Durnford Street, has been preserved and is now a restaurant. [13]

Two of the surviving buildings close to the dock at Millbay are the red brick Portland stone-faced Georgian assembly room that is still called the Long Room, and the exquisite late Georgian or early Victorian Globe Theatre 300 metres north within the barracks. [14]

On the higher ground towards North Road are two major churches. Firstly the Anglican St Peter's with its tall spire in the centre of Georgian style Wyndham Square. A few hundred metres east is the mid Victorian Roman Catholic cathedral of St Mary and St Boniface (1858). [15]

During 1882, Arthur Conan Doyle worked as a newly qualified physician at 1 Durnford Street, East Stonehouse. Plaques bearing passages from his works featuring Sherlock Holmes have since been set into the pavement in Durnford Street. [16]

Regeneration

Between 1993 and 1998 the part of Stonehouse to the west of Durnford Street (including the Royal William Victualling Yard) was designated as one of the three areas of the city under control of Plymouth Development Corporation. Gradually affluent residents are moving back into the district which has been comparatively poor since the Great War. Durnford Street is being regentrified. The former Naval Hospital (adjacent to the Millfields – formerly part of Stonehouse Creek) is a gated community with security guards. [17] However, Royal William Yard, also a walled site, welcomes the public freely (apart from car parking charges) to its increasing number of food outlets, and has part of the South West Coast Path running through it, using a staircase specially constructed in 2013. [18] In 2013 a marina was opened within Millbay Docks. [19]

On Stonehouse Creek, a branch of the Tamar, off the estuary known as the Hamoaze are the modern shipbuilding sheds occupied by the luxury motor-yacht firm Princess Yachts who employ hundreds of local tradesmen to construct and fit out expensive vessels. [1] The creek now ends at Stonehouse Bridge (for many years a toll bridge) and to the north east the wide river bed which led up past Millbridge to Pennycomequick and beyond to the bottom of Ford Park Cemetery, was reclaimed and infilled in 1973 [20] to provide the playing fields of Victoria Park and rugby pitches for Devonport High School for Boys. [21]

Stonehouse is the site of Plymouth's international ferry port at Millbay with at least daily sailings to Roscoff in Brittany (except in winter) and frequent ferries to Santander in northern Spain. [22]

There is a regular passenger ferry from the tidal landing Admiral's Hard to Cremyll in Cornwall which is used by visitors to the Mount Edgcumbe Country Park, and commuters to Plymouth. [23]

Notable people

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hamoaze</span> Section of the River Tamar in southwest England

The Hamoaze is an estuarine stretch of the English tidal River Tamar, between its confluence with the River Lynher and Plymouth Sound.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Plymouth</span> City and unitary authority in England

Plymouth is a port city and unitary authority in Devon, South West England. It is located on Devon's south coast between the rivers Plym and Tamar, about 36 miles (58 km) southwest of Exeter and 193 miles (311 km) southwest of London. It is the most populous city south of London.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">River Tamar</span> River in southwest England

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Devonport, Plymouth</span> District of Plymouth, Devon

Devonport, formerly named Plymouth Dock or just Dock, is a district of Plymouth in the English county of Devon, although it was, at one time, the more important settlement. It became a county borough in 1889. Devonport was originally one of the "Three Towns" ; these merged in 1914 to form what would become in 1928 the City of Plymouth. It is represented in the Parliament of the United Kingdom as part of the Plymouth Sutton and Devonport constituency. Its elected Member of Parliament (MP) is Luke Pollard, who is a member of the Labour Party. The population of the ward at the 2011 census was 14,788.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Union Street, Plymouth</span> Street in Plymouth, Devon

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Edgcumbe House</span> Stately home in Cornwall, England

Mount Edgcumbe House is a stately home in south-east Cornwall and is a Grade II listed building, whilst its gardens and parkland are listed as Grade I in the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal William Victualling Yard</span> Site of Grade I and II listed buildings in Plymouth

The Royal William Victualling Yard in Stonehouse, a suburb of Plymouth, England, was the major victualling depot of the Royal Navy and an important adjunct of Devonport Dockyard. It was designed by the architect Sir John Rennie and was named after King William IV. It was built between 1826 and 1835 and occupies a site of approximately 16 acres (65,000 m2) being half of Western Kings, north of Devil's Point.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cremyll</span> Human settlement in England

Cremyll is a small coastal village in the civil parish of Maker-with-Rame, in south-east Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. Cremyll is on the Rame Peninsula facing Plymouth Sound. The village is about 9 miles by road or 0.5 miles by boat from Plymouth.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maker, Cornwall</span> Village in Cornwall, England

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">HMNB Devonport</span> Operating base in the United Kingdom for the Royal Navy

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Exeter to Plymouth railway of the LSWR</span>

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Plymouth</span> History of the city in Devon, England

The History of Plymouth in Devon, England, extends back to the Bronze Age, when the first settlement began at Mount Batten a peninsula in Plymouth Sound facing onto the English Channel. It continued as both a fishing and continental tin trading port through the late Iron Age into the Early Medieval period, until the more prosperous Saxon settlement of Sutton, later renamed Plymouth, surpassed it. With its natural harbour and open access to the Atlantic, the town found wealth and a national strategic importance during the establishment of British naval dominance in the colonisation of the New World. In 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers departed from Plymouth to establish the second English colony in America. During the English Civil War the town was besieged between 1642 and 1646 by the Royalists, but after the Restoration a Dockyard was established in the nearby town of Devonport. Throughout the Industrial Revolution Plymouth grew as a major mercantile shipping industry, including imports and passengers from the US, whilst Devonport grew as a naval base and ship construction town, building battleships for the Royal Navy – which later led to its partial destruction during World War II in a series of air-raids known as the Plymouth Blitz. After the war was over, the city centre was completely rebuilt to a new plan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cremyll Ferry</span> Ferry route in England

The Cremyll Ferry is a foot passenger ferry across the Hamoaze from Admirals Hard in Stonehouse, Plymouth, Devon to Cremyll in Cornwall. It is operated by Plymouth Boat Trips, and runs approximately every 30 minutes, with an 8-minute crossing time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tramways in Plymouth</span> Tramways in Plymouth, Devon, England

The tramways in Plymouth were originally constructed as four independent networks operated by three different companies to serve the adjacent towns of Plymouth, Stonehouse and Devonport in Devon, England. The merger of the 'Three Towns' into the new borough of Plymouth in 1914 was the catalyst for the three companies to join up under the auspices of the new Plymouth Corporation. The network was closed in 1945, partly as a result of bomb damage during World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thomas Parlby</span>

Thomas Parlby (1727–1802) Stone Hall, Stonehouse, in Plymouth "the big house overlooking Stonehouse Pool", was a civil engineering contractor described in his obituary in the Gentleman's Magazine as "Master Mason of HM Docks".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fortifications of Plymouth</span>

The fortifications of Plymouth in Devon are extensive due to its natural harbour, its commanding position on the Western Approaches and its role as the United Kingdom's largest naval base. The first medieval defences were built to defend Sutton Harbour on the eastern side of Plymouth Sound at the mouth of the River Plym, but by the 18th century, naval activity had begun to shift westward to Devonport at the mouth of the River Tamar. During the Victorian era, advances in military technology led to a huge programme of fortification encompassing the whole of Plymouth Sound together with the overland approaches. Many of these works remained in military use well into the 20th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal Naval Hospital, Stonehouse</span> Former British hospital

The Royal Naval Hospital, Stonehouse was a medical facility for naval officers and other ranks at Stonehouse, Plymouth. It was opened in 1760, so becoming the second Royal Naval Hospital in Great Britain. When in operation, it was officially known as Royal Hospital, Plymouth.

References

  1. 1 2 "Sailing out of Plymouth loaded to the gunnels with luxury". The Telegraph. 29 August 2015. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  2. "Is there any hope left for Union Street?". Plymouth Herald. 19 August 2017. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  3. Youngs, Frederic (1979). Guide to the local administrative units of England, Volume 1: Southern England. London: Royal Historical Society. p. 98. ISBN   0901050679.
  4. Kelly's Directory of Devon and Cornwall. London. 1914. p. 497. Retrieved 13 August 2023.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  5. "Local Government Act 1894", legislation.gov.uk , The National Archives, 1894 c. 73, retrieved 13 August 2023
  6. "Local Government Board's Provisional Order Confirmation (No. 18) Act 1914" (PDF). legislation.gov.uk. The National Archives. Retrieved 30 December 2023.
  7. "Plymouth Registration District". UKBMD. Retrieved 31 May 2024.
  8. "East Stonehouse Civil Parish / Chapelry". A Vision of Britain through Time. GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth. Retrieved 13 August 2023.
  9. "Population statistics East Stonehouse Ch/CP through time". A Vision of Britain through Time . Retrieved 31 May 2024.
  10. "Clarence Store Royal William Victualling Yard, Plymouth, City of Plymouth". www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk.
  11. 1 2 "Cuts could force Royal Marines from Stonehouse Barracks and hand site to developers". The Herald. Retrieved 12 November 2016.
  12. "Royal Naval Hospital". Pastscape. Retrieved 30 May 2016.
  13. "Artillery Tower" . Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  14. Historic England. "Royal Marine Barracks The Globe Theatre (1244645)". National Heritage List for England .
  15. "History of The Plymouth Cathedral". Cathedral of Saint Mary and Saint Boniface website. Archived from the original on 4 May 2008. Retrieved 23 November 2008.
  16. "Walk 72 – Plymouth Waterfront Walk". Devon County Council. Retrieved 4 May 2010.
  17. "Introduction". Millfields. Retrieved 30 May 2016.
  18. "Stairway to Devon opens up at Plymouth's Royal William Yard". South West Coast Path. 18 June 2013. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  19. "UK's first new marina in five years opens in Plymouth". Motor Boat and Yachting. 2 October 2013. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  20. "Ancient and Modern". Devonport High School. Archived from the original on 3 January 2004. Retrieved 16 August 2016.
  21. Historic England. "Devonport High School for Boys (1386309)". National Heritage List for England .
  22. "Contact details for reservations". Brittany Ferries. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
  23. "Cremyll Ferry". Plymouth Boat Trips. Retrieved 26 February 2018.