The Biggest Memorial Stone that Passmore Edwards contemplated raising did not, however, materialise.
R S Best “The Life & Good Works of John Passmore Edwards, 1981.
A short time after I erected the Falmouth Hospital, and when I was presented with the honorary freedom of the borough in September, 1893, I said, at the complimentary dinner which followed, that, as Cornwall was mainly surrounded by the sea, I should like, in the interests of sailors of all lands, to build a lighthouse somewhere on the Cornish coast; and as there was a point near by – the Manacles, notorious for the disastrous shipwrecks they occasioned – it might be a fitting place for such a lighthouse; and, if built, I should like to dedicate it to the memory of Couch Adams, the distinguished mathematician, and joint discoverer with Le Verrier of the planet Neptune.
I should also like to pay a similar tribute of respect to Le Verrier, and erect to his memory a similar lighthouse on the coast of France. Such sister lighthouses, if erected, might complacently glance at each other, and mutually promote a friendly feeling between two sister nations-England and France. The matter was subsequently talked over with the Mayor and others of Falmouth, when it was decided that I should provide a free library for the town in preference to building a lighthouse.
Passmore Edwards had originally planned to build a lighthouse on the North Cornish Coast, at St Agnes Beacon but this offer was also declined by Trinity House.
It is interesting to note that, subsequent to a loss of a vessel on the Manacles the Falmouth Harbour Commissioners petitioned Trinity House for a Lighthouse, or lightship to be stationed there. The West Briton of 29 May 1890 reported that the Harbour Commissioners had received a response from Trinity House rejecting the request. It was argued that during weather conditions when the existing lights were visible, they would be sufficient to enable mariners to avoid the Manacles whilst in weather when no lights were visible “the lead is the only safe guide”.