Site of Drake's birthplace

Crowndale Farm, on the edge of Tavistock, is where Sir Francis Drake was born, an event usually dated to 1540 or 1542, the eldest of twelve children of tenant farmer Edmund Drake and his wife Mary. No parish register survives to confirm the exact date; it is known only because Drake told his contemporary biographer William Camden. The Drake family held the farm as tenants for generations, first of Tavistock Abbey and, after its dissolution in 1539, of the Russell family, later Dukes of Bedford.

The farmhouse Drake was born in no longer stands. It is recorded on Historic England's list (entry 1305246) as "the earlier house at Crowndale (demolished)"; the present farmhouse on the site dates from around 1830 and is itself Grade II listed. The Tavistock Canal footpath runs past Crowndale from the town centre, making the site an easy walk from the Drake statue on Plymouth Road.