From the North Foreland to Penzance

by Clive Holland

At all events the “stirring and veracious history of ‘the King of Prussia’ and his comrades” forms not the least entertaining and informing narrative of the old smuggling days in these parts.

The town of Penzance, except for its picturesque fishing fleet, and certain old associations, is not a place of any particular charm. To use the words of a local historian, “It is a town of to-day, and has little or no history.” But it is not, after all, of such entirely mushroom growth as the said historian would be held to imply. Its seal, which dates from 1641, is an extremely interesting one. St John the Baptist’s head on the charger appears in its design; with the legend “Pensans,” which by some is thought to give a clue to the origin of the town’s name, Penzance—pen being Cornish for head, and sans meaning holy. Some more prosaic folk, however, assert that the name has nothing to do with St John, and try to derive it from the ancient chapel to the patron saint of fishermen, St Anthony, which once stood on the land near the quay.

In the present town, which, even from the sea, is not as picturesque as ports usually are, there is preserved in Alverton Street the old name of the district, which comprised not only Penzance, but also Newlyn and Mousehole.

In the Domesday Book it is referred to as Alwaretone, and was at that period one of the most valuable estates in Cornwall. In ancient times there stood at Penzance, Castle Horneck, the home of the lords of the place; and from the middle of the fourteenth century a weekly market and a seven days’ annual fair have been held. Existing records tell us that the town prospered to some considerable extent during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries; but at the end of the latter, although news was brought to Penzance of the Armada’s approach, the Spanish galleons did not even put into the bay, but stood up Channel for Plymouth and the English fleet. Perhaps the inhabitants of the town were lulled by this providential escape from molestation into a sense of security which was to cost them dear. For in the year 1595 on a July morning, when the sea and bay alike were veiled in all too secretive mist, as Carew narrates the event, “four gallies of the enemy presented themselves upon the coast over against Mousehole, and there in a fair bay landed about two hundred men, pike and shot, who forthwith sent their forlorn hope, consisting of their basest people, unto the straggled houses of the country ... by whom were burned not only the houses they went by, but also the parish church of Paul, the force of the fire being such that it utterly ruined the great stone pillars thereof. Others of them in that time burned that fisher town Mousehole; the rest watched as a guard for the defence of these firers.”

PENZANCE

After which we gather from another account the galleys moved away to Newlyn, when, after setting that village on fire, the men who had been landed for the purpose marched on Penzance. Here had gathered a little band of the inhabitants—terror-stricken as they undoubtedly were—headed by Sir Francis Godolphin, who was urging them to offer a stout resistance. But alas! the defenders that should have been were so consumed by fear that when Sir Francis came into the market place to organize his force and appoint to them their several duties, he found only “two resolute shot, and some ten or twelve others that followed him, most of them his own servants. The rest, surprised with fear, fled, whom neither with his persuasion nor threatening with his rapier drawn, he could recall.”

This is not a very flattering account of Penzance valour; but the result of the cowardice shown must have been a heavy punishment. In a few hours the town was but a mass of smoking ruins. Having accomplished what they had set themselves to do, the Spaniards re-embarked; and appeared to have seen the wisdom of not proceeding further along the coast. At all events, ere the English Fleet, which was hastening to give them battle, could arrive, they had set sail for Spain and made good their escape. In this wise came to pass and ended the most complete and serious invasion of these shores ever made by Spaniards.

Penzance arose Phœnix-like from its ashes, and in the middle of the seventeenth century “was become a place of some importance and size, so that King James granted it a charter of incorporation.” Till then, at least, Marazion across the Bay, behind St Michael’s Mount, had continued the most important town in the immediate neighbourhood. Leland speaks of it as a “great long town,” and whatever the origin of the name may be, and whether (as tradition asserts) Joseph of Arimathea was connected with it and its tin trade, does not nowadays much matter.

Penzance, during the Civil War, remained for the King, and the town and its inhabitants were destined to pay a heavy price for the privilege of loyalty. The place was seized by the Parliamentarians—at the time they were attacking St Michael’s Mount—and they plundered, partially burned, and sacked as though foreign invaders had landed and had been permitted to wreck their vengeance unmolested.