English People Trivia

1. Which Torquay-born author's lesser-known novels include "One, Two, Buckle My Shoe" and "A Caribbean Mystery"?

From Quiz People from Devon

Answer: Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay, Devon on 15th September 1890, as Agatha Miller. She rose to fame in the 1920s after she published her first mystery novel "The Mysterious Affair at Styles" which featured her famous Belgian sleuth, Hercule Poirot. She wrote 66 novels and hundreds of short stories by the time of her passing in 1976. Her legacy lives on as the so-named "Queen of Crime" as she introduced a number of twists that influenced generations of mystery authors.

From Quiz Turning Crawley Blue, One Plaque at a Time

Answer: Caroline Haslett

Dame Caroline Haslett was born in Worth. At the time the village of Worth was not part of Crawley and wasn't even the next settlement. Three Bridges stood in between. Following World War 2 when Crawley New Town was created from the existing towns and villages both Three Bridges and Worth became part of Crawley. During World War 1, Dame Haslett learnt electrical engineering. She saw electrical devices as a way to relieve the drudgery of women. However it is the safety standards of UK household electronics that probably constitutes her greatest contribution to the day to day life of most people. In Crawley, the road named in her honour, Haslett Avenue, originally ran from Three Bridges railway station to Crawley High Street. I put that statement in the past tense as when the shopping centre, County Mall, was built in the early 1990s the road was split in two, Haslett Avenues East and West. The plaque is close to Three Bridges railway station along Haslett Avenue East, on the wall of the electrical distributor. The company operating it may change but the infrastructure will remain at the same location.

From Quiz London Calling My Children Home

Answer: King Charles III

Buckingham Palace was acquired for the British royal family by George III in 1761. Princess Elizabeth gave birth to Prince Charles there on 14th November 1948 while his father, Prince Philip, was playing squash elsewhere in the palace grounds. The baby Prince Charles apparently looked like a "plum pudding", according to Prince Philip! When Princess Elizabeth became queen in 1952, Prince Charles became the heir apparent at just three years old. In 2011, after over 59 years, he became the longest serving heir apparent to the British throne. He became King Charles III in September 2022 upon the death of his mother.

From Quiz Cumbria's Favorites

Answer: Fletcher Christian

Fletcher Christian was born in 1764 in the village of Eaglesfield, just southwest of Cockermouth in what is now west-central Cumberia. He first went to sea as an 18-year old ship's boy aboard the Royal Navy's HMS Cambridge. By the time he first boarded the small merchant vessel designated HM Armed Vessel Bounty in September 1787, he had advanced to the rank of Masters's Mate. He was invited to join the crew by Captain William Bligh for the 2-year voyage carrying breadfruit from Tahiti to the Caribbean. Six months into the trip, Bligh promoted Christian to acting Lieutenant, his second-in-command. The Bounty arrived in Tahiti in October 1788 and spent five months in port. Departing in April 1789, the crew were in the region of Tonga, some 1,300 miles into their journey, when Christian led the crew in a mutiny. Blight and 18 of the 22 crew who remained loyal to him (about half of the crew) were set set afloat in a small boat. They would eventually reach Coupang in what is now Indonesia, from where they returned to England to report the mutiny. Meanwhile, Christian and the other mutineers returned to Tahiti, where they picked up a number of women, before continuing on to Pitcairn Island in the southern Pacific. Fletcher died there at the age of 28 in 1793 and, by the time the Royal Navy ship Topaz arrived in 1808 only one of the original mutineers remained alive, along with nine of the Tahiti women they had brought to the island with them.

From Quiz We're the Men from Sussex!

Answer: William Shakespeare

Southampton was born at Cowdray House, near Midhurst. Shakespeare's early poems, "Venus and Adonis" and "The Rape of Lucrece", were dedicated to him, and he is sometimes said to be the "Mr W H" to whom the first printed edition of the Sonnets is dedicated (his initials being allegedly reversed). He may or may not also be the "friend" to whom many of the Sonnets are purportedly addressed. Southampton also patronized other poets and played an active part in the political and military adventures of the age. His involvement in the Earl of Essex's rebellion against Queen Elizabeth I led to his imprisonment, but he was released when James VI & I ascended the English throne. He died of a fever while commanding English troops in a war against Spain in the Low Countries. If you're wondering how to pronounce "Wriothesley", the BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British names gives five variants, and so you can't really go wrong.

From Quiz Legendary People from the Wirral

Answer: The Cult

Ian Astbury was born on 14th May 1962 in Heswall, Wirral. He is best known as the lead vocalist of the band The Cult. The Cult have been active since 1982 and are best known for their single "She Sells Sanctuary" which was released in 1985.

From Quiz Guess Who Was Born in the East End

Answer: Barbara Windsor & Windsor

Barbara Windsor played Peggy Mitchell the landlady of the Queen Vic in Eastenders off and on for nearly sixteen years. She also appeared in several 'Carry On' films. Barbara Windsor was born in Shoreditch.

From Quiz Blue Plaques: We're Not Just Londoners

Answer: Rudyard Kipling

Kipling was born in Bombay (now Mumbai) in 1865 and was sent to England at the age of five, with his three-year-old sister. They lived as boarders with Captain and Mrs Holloway at Lorne Lodge, Campbell Road, Southsea, Portsmouth for six years, and it is this house which bears the Blue Plaque. Kipling was extremely unhappy during his time there, which he described in his autobiography as a mixture of cruelty and neglect and 'calculated torture'. He did go on to say that it might have formed the basis of his ability to create stories since he learned to tell lies to avoid punishment. Kipling received the Nobel Prize for Literature, becoming the first writer in the English language to be awarded the honour. Among his works are the 'Just So Stories' and 'The Jungle Book'.

From Quiz People From Yorkshire

Answer: Barbara Hepworth

Barbara Hepworth was one of Britain's leading modernist visual artists. She was born in Wakefield. She studied in Leeds, London and Italy. She is closely associated with St. Ives where she had her studio and where she also died. Her studio is now a museum dedicated to her life's work. Henry Moore was born in Castleford. He studied at Leeds School Of Art alongside Hepworth. He was hugely successful and made a fortune, most of which went straight to the Henry Moore Foundation, with the aim of promoting visual arts. The foundation now runs Moore's house in Hertfordshire where you can see his studios and wander in the huge grounds looking at his work. David Hockney was born in Bradford, West Yorkshire. He lived in the USA for many years but is now a UK resident again. Salt's Mill in Saltaire includes a gallery dedicated to his work. Victorian painter Atkinson Grimshaw was born in Leeds. He is known for his grim scenes of the his home town, but he also painted London, Liverpool and Glasgow.

From Quiz Famous Northumbrians

Answer: St Cuthbert

St Cuthbert, who lived between 634 and 687, was born in Dunbar, Scotland. One night he had a vision of Saint Aidan and so decided to go and join a monastery. He became the prior of Melrose in 664 but, following the Synod of Whitby, was sent to the Holy Island of Lindisfarne in Northumbria. He was known as a man with gifts of healing and insight. In 676 he adopted the solitary life of a hermit and lived in a cave on one of the Farne Islands. He had a special law passed to protect the seabirds and eider ducks (now known as Cuddy's ducks after Cuthbert) which nested there. In 684 Cuthbert was elected bishop of Lindisfarne so returned to the mainland. However after Christmas of 686 he went back to his cave on Inner Farne where he eventually died. He was buried on Lindisfarne but his remains were later removed to Durham cathedral. Thanks to Wikipedia for biographical information. Saints Aidan, Bede and Oswald also have association with the Northumbria region.

From Quiz Derbyshire's Own

Answer: William Roache (Ken Barlow)

William Roache (b. 1932) was raised in Ilkeston and is one of the original cast members of the soap that first appeared on television in 1960. In 2000, he was awarded a lifetime achievement award and the following year an MBE.

From Quiz Famous Yorkshire People

Answer: Geoff Boycott

Geoff Boycott was famously dropped from the England test team after he had scored a double century!

From Quiz Born in Norfolk

Answer: Diana, Princess of Wales

Diana Frances Spencer was born in Park House,Sandringham, Norfolk on 1st July 1961. Her stepmother is the Countess of Dartmouth, the daughter of the novelist Barbara Cartland. Of the alternatives, Sophie Rhys-Jones was born in Oxford in 1965, Sarah Ferguson was born in London in 1959, and Prince Andrew was born in Buckingham Palace in 1960.

From Quiz Sons of Stoke-on-Trent

Answer: Stanley Matthews

Born in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, Sir Stanley Matthews (1915-2000) played football for his home town club, Stoke City FC, from 1932-1947 and 1961-1965. In between these two stints, he played for Blackpool FC, with whom he won the FA Cup in 1953. When he finally hung his boots up in 1965, he was fifty years old, the oldest man ever to be playing top-flight football. As well as being the first recipient of the European Footballer of the Year Award, he was also the first recipient of the Football Writers' Association Footballer of the Year Award and was the first footballer to be knighted for services to sport.

From Quiz Famous People from the Midlands

Answer: The Whitsun Weddings

Philip Larkin (1922-1985) was born in Coventry. In 2003 he was chosen as the nation's best loved poet of the past 50 years beating Ted Hughes & Sylvia Plath into joint second place. In "Whitsun Weddings" Larkin describes a train journey in Yorkshire where at each stop the train is joined by parties of newly weds.

From Quiz From down there in the West Country

Answer: Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby

Actor John Nettles was born in St. Austell, Cornwall in 1943. He began playing Tom Barnaby in 1997. The series is set in the fictional town of Causton, in Midsomer county. We should all be glad that Midsomer is not a real county -- would you want to live somewhere with such a high crime rate? From 1981-1991, Nettles had played the title character in 'Bergerac', a detective series set in Jersey, Channel Islands. Of the other alternatives, Inspector Morse was played by the late John Thaw and Inspector Frost by the inimitable David Jason.

From Quiz Hampshire & Isle of Wight Natives

Answer: Sheila Hancock

Sheila Hancock OBE was born in Blackgang, Isle of Wight on February 22, 1933. In 'Eastenders', she played Barbara Owen, mother of Steve and Jackie, for a year before dying in July 2001. The other three alternatives also appeared in 'Carry On' films... Joan Sims, born in 1930, was an Essex native. Amanda Barrie was born in Lancashire in 1935. Barbara Windsor is a true 'Eastender', born in Shoreditch in 1937.

From Quiz The Hastings Link

Answer: William the Conqueror

St. Martin's Abbey (more commonly referred to as Battle Abbey), is a partially ruined complex in the small town of Battle, East Sussex. William the Conqueror vowed to build an abbey on the spot where King Harold fell in battle in 1066. William died before the building was completed. Some parts of the abbey built between 13th and 16th century are still standing. King Ethelberht ruled Wessex and Kent for 5 years until his death in 866. King Arthur fought against invading Anglo-Saxons sometime in the late 5th to early 6th century. William Rufus, son of William the Conqueror, ruled England from 1087-1100.

From Quiz Kentish Heroes

Answer: Saint Augustine

Saint Augustine of Canterbury, a Benidictine Monk, (not to be confused with Saint Augustine of Hippo) was the prior of a monastery in Rome was chosen by Pope Gregory I (Saint Gregory the Great) in 595 to lead a mission of some 40 monks to Britain to convert the pagan King Æthelberht of Kent to Christianity. Saint Augustine's feastday is celebrated in England on 26th May, the aniversary of his death in 604

From Quiz The Brum Connection

Answer: Alec Issigonis

Sir Alexander (Alec) Issigonis was born in Smyrna (now Izmir) Turkey in 1906. His grandfather, Demosthenis, was an engineer who had been granted the status of a British subject for his work for British companies. Issigonis and his parents were evacuated from Smyrna to Malta in 1922, when the Turks re-possessed the city at the end of the Greco-Turkish war. Alec's father died shortly thereafter, and Issigonis and his mother moved to the UK, where he studied engineering. He is certainly most famous for designing the Austin Mini, but prior to working for Austin he worked for Morris and was the designer of the Morris Minor, which he regarded as his proudest achievement. Issigonis was knighted in 1969. He died in Edgbaston in 1988. Alfred Bird is very popular at my house because I use Bird's Custard Powder to make - what else? - custard. Bird was born in Digbeth, Birmingham in 1811 and died in 1878. F.W. Lanchester was a British pioneer of aeronautics and automobiles, but he was a Londoner and not a Brummie. Herbert Austin (later Lord Austin) was the Yorkshire-born founder of the Austin Motor Company, which is headquartered in Longbridge near Coventry.

From Quiz Famous People Linked to Leicestershire

Answer: Graham Chapman

"He's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy." Chapman was born in Leicester in 1941. He studied medicine at Cambridge, and qualified at Barts, but he never practiced medicine professionally. Whilst at Cambridge he was a member of Footlights, and there he first met John Cleese. Sadly, he passed away in 1989.

From Quiz Staffordshire People and Places

Answer: Tutbury Castle

Mary was imprisoned twice at Tutbury Castle. She was also held in Staffordshire's Chartley Castle. Windsor Castle is in Berkshire. Mow Cop is a 'Gothick Folly' rather than a genuine castle and dates from the 1750s.

From Quiz The Famous Folk of Cumbria

Answer: Stan Laurel

He changed his name after realising his real name - Stan Jefferson - contained 13 letters. It's rumoured he chose the name Laurel after his companion found a wreath made from the tree of the same name.

From Quiz Battle of Britain Fighter Ace

Answer: He shot down a Heinkel 111 and a Messerschmitt 109

When he returned with his gun covers blown off to 501's airfield at Betheniville, he was not believed, but this pilot proved it was no fluke later in the day when he shot down a Messerschmitt 110, and the two he had shot down in the morning were verified that evening.

From Quiz 'Don't Lose Your Head!'

Answer: Charles I

Charles I has the unfortunate distinction of being the only English king to be publicly executed. He lost his head in 1649 after first losing the English Civil War. Richard III was the last English king to die in battle, being defeated by Henry Tudor at Bosworth in 1485. Edward II was murdered in 1327 by Roger de Mortimer and his henchmen at Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire. Henry VI was murdered in The Tower of London in 1471 on the orders of the Duke of York who had usurped the throne to become Edward IV.

From Quiz Famous Cornish People

Answer: Mick Fleetwood

Mick Fleetwood is the drummer in 'Fleetwood Mac' and was born in Redruth, Cornwall. Mick, along with bassist John McVie were original band members and are its namesakes. Roger Taylor was the drummer in 'Queen' but only moved to Cornwall after he was born. Andrew Ridgeley from 'Wham' and Bruce Foxton from 'The Jam' own property in Cornwall but were born elsewhere.

From Quiz Famous People from Lancashire

Answer: Robert Peel

Robert Peel was born in Bury on 5th February 1788, the son of a wealthy cotton manufacturer. In 1809 his father bought him the Parliamentary seat of Cashel in Tipperary and he entered the House of Commons when he was just twenty-one. In 1829, as Home Secretary, he founded the Metropolitan Police Force in London, and as a result the new policemen were given the nicknames of 'Bobbies' or 'Peelers'. Peel had a short period as Prime Minster from 1834 to 1835, and then returned to the office in 1841. In 1846 he repealed the Corn Laws (which had previously protected British agriculture from foreign imports) but because of intense opposition to this policy, Peel was forced to resign in the same year. He died in 1850 after a fall from his horse.

From Quiz Famous People from Lincolnshire

Answer: Margaret Thatcher

Mrs Thatcher was born on 13 October 1925 in Grantham and died on 8 April 2013. She was elected leader of the Conservative Party in 1975 and became the UK's first female Prime Minister in 1979. She was the only British Prime Minister in the 20th century to be elected for three successive terms, finally resigning in 1990 and letting John Major take over. During her time as Prime Minister she became known as the 'Iron Lady'.

From Quiz A Blue Plaque Guide to London [2]

Answer: Henry Irving

Henry Irving was born in 1838 and died in 1905. During his lifetime he also ran London's Lyceum Theatre, which was managed by his secretary, Bram Stoker (yes, the author of "Dracula"). He also wrote a number of plays, none of which are remembered today, I'm afraid to say.

From Quiz A Blue Plaque Guide to London [1]

Answer: Thomas Arne

Arne was born in London in 1710 and died in 1778. More recently, this address was the home for many years of the British Communist Party: not an organisation who would have agreed with many of the sentiments of Arne's most famous work!

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