Although there is no doubt that throughout the distant centuries known as the Middle Ages a handful of scattered dwellings of yeomen, fisherfolk, and the like constituted all that is now known as Torquay, to this hamlet, whose very existence was so largely dependent upon that of the great religious house which dominated its life, came at times more than an echo of passing stirring events. Not far distant from it on occasion were enacted some great and strenuous events of history. The Wars of the Roses, and later the storm and stress of the coming Armada, amongst them. Tor Abbey, indeed, has more than a legendary connexion with the destruction of the great fleet of Philip of Spain, for upon the capture of the Spanish flagship _Capitana_, the huge vessel and her crew were given over into the care of Sir John Gilbert and George Cary, an ancestor of the Sir George who became the purchaser of the Abbey. The prisoners, numbering upwards of 400, were landed, and confined in the granary of the Abbey, which in consequence even to-day is known as the Spanish barn. For these and other services, including the command of a couple of regiments raised for the defence of the country, Cary was knighted by Queen Elizabeth. It is only a little more than a century and a quarter ago that Torquay commenced to attract attention as a place of any importance, at this period its modern history may be said to begin. Certainly as late as the third quarter of the eighteenth century it was little more than a small village with perhaps a couple of inns, and a few houses of a better sort on the heights. But soon the importance of the Bay, the trade with Newfoundland which had come into being, and the fishing industry in which a considerable number of people were now engaged, caused the inhabitants of neighbouring inland villages to gravitate to Torre--as it was then commonly called. There was at this period, too, a quay of some size and convenience, and it was chiefly in the neighbourhood of this that the new houses were built, so that the life of the rapidly growing town centred round the quay. About this time the place was called Fleet or Fleete, which, derived from the Saxon, means a spot where the tide comes up; and for some time this name (preserved nowadays in that of its principal street) remained unchanged. Then at length Tor Key--modernized into Torquay--came into common use, and eventually entirely superseded the older name.