Cornwall Kernow
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Cornwall Kernow
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King Edward mine and mining museum Treslothan Church Memorial Records USEFUL LINKS | The following article has been published in the Journal of the Cornwall Family History Society, March 2003.
THE
CORNISH IN WES Diane Hodnett (copyright) ‘Wherever in the world there’s a hole in the ground at the bottom of it you’ll find a Cornishman searching for metal’ 1 Ireland is not the first country that springs to
mind when one thinks of copper mining and the Cornish.
However, this summer my husband Frank and I visited Allihies, at the tip
of the beautiful mountainous Beara Peninsula in South-west Ireland, as guests of
the Mining Heritage Committee2, and discovered a fascinating Cornish
connection with the copper mines there, stretching from 1812 to 1884.
The history of the Berehaven (or Bearhaven)
mines is bound inextricably with the Puxley family, of English origin.
John Lavallin Puxley formed the Allihies Mining Company in 1812.3
The
first Mine Captain was a Cornishman, Edward NETTLE, and he commenced work at
Dooneen, where a quartz vein extends into the sea.
Even today, this vein is visibly stained green from the copper within. In 1813, another mine, the Mountain (or North)
Mine, was opened. This appeared at
first to have been worked as an open cast mine. Captain NETTLE was dismissed in 1815, and was followed by
Captain Richard MARTIN and Captain John Richards REED.
These two Cornishmen were to spend over 30 years in Allihies. Very little is known of Captain NETTLE. Captain Richard MARTIN was born in 1872, either in Helston or near Penzance. He was married in Helston in 1807 to Grace Caddy BAWDEN. They had eleven children, nine of whom were born in Ireland.3 Captain John RICHARDS REED was born in 1788 at
St. Agnes, the first of ten children born to Nicholas REED and his wife
Elizabeth. His siblings were
Nicholas (1793), Mark (1795), Elizabeth (1798), James (1799), William (1801),
Mary Ann (1803), Martha (1806), Thomas (1808) and Samuel (1812).
Mark, James, Samuel and William were also brought over from Cornwall, as
time passed, to become captains of the copper mines in West Cork. On 25 March 1815, in St. Agnes, John Richards
REED married Maria NANKIVEL The following summer he sailed from St.
Stephens, near St. Austell, via Wales, to Ireland. (He was to remain at the mines until his death in 1852)
Captain Richard MARTIN preceded him, sailing from Portreath. Before leaving, however, Captain MARTIN travelled to Redruth,
to be trained in copper ore assaying from ‘Mr. Jenkins, assay master,
Redruth’ 3
In 1818, the Dooneen mine appeared to be
failing. Work began at another
site, that of Caminches, to the east of Allihies village. Apparently two engine houses, one of which
contained a whim engine, stood here, but there is very little to be seen today.
In 1821 Captain Mark REED arrived from Cornwall.
He had married his wife Agnes in
St. Agnes in 1817, and had three children – Thomas (1815), John Richards
(1817) and Mark (1821). They had
six more children in Ireland – James (1824), Mary Ann, Elizabeth, William,
Samuel Joseph and Agnes. In 1822, Captains John REED and Richard MARTIN
recommended that John Puxley buy a
steam engine for the Dooneen mine. The
engine was built by in Cornwall by Harvey and Co, Hayle, and had a 36 inch
diameter cylinder. In the summer of
1823 the ‘Sophia’ left Hayle under her master William BERRYMAN, and landed
the eagerly awaited engine at Ballydonegan Beach, near Allihies, at the
beginning of September. 3
By 1826, William REED had arrived from St.
Agnes, and was working as the officer in charge of the underground timbering. By
1834 he is listed as a Captain. Two
other Cornish mine captains were brought over from Cornwall in 1835
- Samuel REED and William TAMBLYN. Samuel
evidently did not find things to his liking, for he left quite quickly, and
emigrated to America. He is known
to have worked at the galena mines in Illinois, and ended up as a farmer in
Iowa. 3
There was a substantial house built at the foot
of the Mountain mine in 1834 for John Richards REED. The site was pointed out to
me, but nothing remains. Not long
after, a school-cum-chapel was built for the Cornish children.
In addition, the Cornish captains and tradesmen were also housed by the
Mining Company, in a separate cluster of houses close to the Mountain Mine.
This cluster is known as the ‘Cornish Village’, and is now on private
land. Griffith’s Land Valuation
of 1852, for the parish of Kilnamanagh lists 11 people as living there, in 14
dwellings, most having a garden. They are listed as: James Mayne
(Office) John Moffat
William Carter
Mary Paul Richard Puxley Benjamin Jago (Dispensary) John Mark Reed Richard Martin John Hain James Mayne Benjamin Jago Mining Company (Offices) John Nicholson Richard Pepper In the same valuation, William REED has
‘gardens’ in the townland of Cahermeelebae,
and land of almost 15 acres
leased from the Earl of Bantry John
REED senior appears in the townland of Cloan (Allihies) with house, office and
garden ( and again in the same townland with a ‘garden’ and with ‘office
and land’), as does William REED and
William ‘TAMBLING’. Richard
MARTIN appears with ‘land’ and ‘garden’. The valuation (which I obtained
from the National Archives, in Dublin) 4 is handwritten, and quite difficult
to read in parts. The Cornish Village is still there, although the
houses are roofless and ivy covered and in a derelict state.
The remains of a track that led from the houses to the Mountain Mine is still visible. In 1838 the Dooneen mine ceased production, and
the Captain, Mark REED, was let go. He
returned to Wheal Vor mine (near Helston) in Cornwall 5.
In 1850, his daughter Elizabeth married Henry PASCOE in Crowan. (She was
to return to Allihies when her husband was appointed a captain there.) Two years
later, Mark’s nephew John Richards REED junior (son of John Richards Reed, the
senior mine captain) was appointed a mine captain. In 1845 a small single storey Protestant chapel
was built in Allihies village. It
has now been re-roofed, thanks to the efforts of the local Mining Heritage
committee, who have great plans to turn it into a Mining Museum.
The committee are making strenuous efforts to locate anything connected
with the mines. Local historian Mr. Con Murphy 7 recently visited Cornwall,
including the King Edward Mining Museum in Troon, and some of the historical
mining sites. The years of the potato famine in Ireland (1845
– 1849) took a terrible toll. The
miners and their families were starving, and the Company began purchasing food
such as Indian corn for them. When
I was in the National Archives, I discovered a letter written by John Richards
REED senior to the Relief Commission in Dublin, dated 21st March 1846. He
required about two hundredweight of Indian corn for his ‘1000 to 1100
workpeople with their families’. The
request was forwarded to the Relief Commission with a positive recommendation Mine captain Henry PASCOE, his wife Elizabeth
and their son Peter H. were in West Cork by 1855. A son, Henry Albert was born in the Big House, Urhan,
Eyeries, in that year. 7 Four more children followed – Joseph (1857), John
Richards Reed (1861), Samuel W. (1867) and Elizabeth (1869)
In 1862, a new pumping-engine house at Mountain mine was built, and a steam-engine powering a man-engine was installed. (A man-engine was a series of small platforms carried on a rod that moved up and down – the miners stepped on and off the platforms.) The remains of this engine house are the most impressive of any of the mining remains around Allihies. Unusually, most of the stone boiler house remains. In 1864-65 Henry PASCOE dealt with a strike at
the mines (harshly by all accounts)3 and was made head captain.
John Richards REED junior, who had been born at the mines 43 years
previously, left with his wife Pricilla and his children William Bowles, Maria
Louisa, John Richards and Langer Walter. In 1868 Puxley sold his interest in the mines. The new mine manager was now Captain James W. CRASE. Dooneen mine was re-opened (1870) and finally abandoned (1878), and Coom mine was reopened. A new mine was opened – Tragh na Mban - but still the mines were losing money. Heavy losses mounted at the mines – Captain Crase was dismissed – but a Captain TREVELLIAN was named as working there at the time. (Captain Crase might have returned to South Providence Mine in Cornwall from 1877-78)3 In 1875 the manager was Robert Richard
NANCARROW, with Captains John CHIGWIN and Joseph CHYNOWETH. 3 The latter’s
daughter, 19 year old Elizabeth Emrina, became the second wife of Robert
Nancarrow.7
The mines struggled on, but the closure of the
Mountain Mine in 1881 signalled the end. The company was wound up in 1884. It is known that many of the Irish miners
emigrated to the copper mines at Butte Montana. The Cornish are generally believed to have returned to
Cornwall. The following research shows what became of some
of them:
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John
Richards Reed Junior -