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Settlement Association

Calthrop

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Coventry is another settlement where a Carthusian religious house was established.

Bath was also the target of heavy and destructive World War II air raids, a couple of years later. In Bath's case, because of its beauty and cultural value -- part of the "Baedeker raids" campaign, intended to hurt British morale (I don't think even Coventry's keenest defender could call it a place of great aesthetic delight -- that attack was just "business".)
 
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Calthrop

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Swainswick's name is thought possibly to be derived from England's Scandinavian king Sweyn Forkbeard, who conducted military operations in the area. A settlement with a likely name-derivation from another such personage of that era, is Knutsford: after King Canute (he of the tide), who was briefly active in that part of England.
 
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Each June, the children of Appleton Thorn bawm the thorn - decorate and sing and dance around a Hawthorn tree, grown from a cutting of the sacred Glastonbury Thorn.*


* Or so tis said.
 

Calthrop

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There is a supposed thing -- believed by some to exist, but doubted by more -- called a "landscape zodiac": a map of the stars on a gigantic scale, set out by such features as roads, streams, and field boundaries. Those who set store by such matters claim that there is one of these near Glastonbury; and another close to Nuthampstead (near Royston, Hertfordshire).
 
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Whistling songster Roger Whittaker lived in Rickling for a while; he is perhaps best known for his 1969 hit 'Durham Town (The Leavin')', in which he places the city (not town) on the banks of the Tyne, to general north-eastern annoyance.
 

Calthrop

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Two small and rather exotic islands -- British Overseas Territories, non-self-governing -- each of which have, or have had, capitals named after UK cities (in one case, with modifications): are Tristan da Cunha (capital Edinburgh of the Seven Seas); and Montserrat (capital was Plymouth until 1995, when the town and much of the island were devastated by a volcanic eruption -- the capital now Brades, in the unaffected part of the island).
 

EbbwJunction1

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Bury-born Sir Robert Peel was Prime Minister and founded the Metropolitan Police. The Peel Memorial stands outside Bury parish church and the Peel Monument is on Holcombe Hill, Ramsbottom.
 

Calthrop

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We learn re Quaking House that "a colloquial name for the village was 'banana goat island', perhaps reflecting the livestock kept in the extensive allotments and grazing area around the village". Another Northern allusion to culinary slight exotica, is the street in Kingston upon Hull called The Land of Green Ginger.
 

Calthrop

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Harwich gets a mention in a song in a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta; so does Portsmouth (different song and operetta).
 

EbbwJunction1

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The waterfront and Portsmouth Harbour are dominated by the Spinnaker Tower, which is one of the UK's tallest structures at 560 ft. It was previously known as the Emirates Spinnaker Tower, but the sponsorship deal has now ended. The same cannot be said of the Emirates Stadium, the home of Arsenal FC in Highbury, London.
 

johnnychips

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Hector Garcia Ribeyro was the mayor of Lima in Peru in the 50s and lived in Herne Bay once. Another famous person (?) who came from Peru was Paddington, a fictional character named after the station situated in that part of London.
 

johnnychips

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The previous Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, was MP for Buckingham. The present Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, is MP for Chorley.
 

Springs Branch

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In the past Chorley was blessed with a Yates's Wine Lodge.
Another settlement which had a now defunct Yates's Wine Lodge is the Cheshire village* of Bosley.

* Bosley, a rural village, was a unique location for a Wine Lodge - these large-scale boozing establishments being associated with large industrial towns and cities. This is due to the nouveau riche Yates family having bought a country estate in the vicinity.
 
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