Trelill () is a hamlet in North

Cornwall Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...

, United Kingdom. Trelill Tunnel carries the disused railway line to

Wadebridge Wadebridge (; ) is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in north Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The town straddles the River Camel upstream from Padstow.Ordnance Survey: Landranger map sheet 200 ''Newquay & Bodmin'' The pe ...

and Trelill Wood is in the valley of the River Allen.

History

Trelill was part of the larger

St Kew St Kew ()Place-names in the Standard Written Form (SWF)

parish. It was part of the estate of

Plympton Priory Plympton Priory was a priory in Devon, England. Its history is recorded in the Annales Plymptonienses. History The site of an Anglo-Saxon minster, Plympton Priory was re-founded as an Augustinian house by Bishop William Warelwast in 1121. The ...

and later the

Bishop of Exeter The Bishop of Exeter is the Ordinary (officer), ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Exeter in the Province of Canterbury. The current bishop is Mike Harrison (bishop), Mike Harrison, since 2024. From the first bishop until the sixteent ...

, before the dissolution of the monasteries. For many years, the manor was held by the

Molesworth family Molesworth may refer to: Places * Molesworth, Cambridgeshire, a village in Huntingdonshire, Cambridgeshire, England * Molesworth (crater), a crater on Mars *Molesworth Station, New Zealand's largest farm * Molesworth Street, Dublin, Ireland *Moles ...

. Cornwall was an area where

Methodism Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

had a significant impact, and by the early 19th century there were 19 Methodist members in Trelill, so that a chapel to seat 130 was built in 1812. In 1854 the chapel was in use by the United Free Methodists and a small burial ground was added in 1914. The chapel closed in 1990 and has been converted into a private dwelling although the burial ground remained in use. It is a Grade II listed building.

Industry

To the west of Trelill village is the abandoned Trelill Quarry.

Tetrahedrite Tetrahedrite is a copper antimony sulfosalt mineral with formula: . It is the antimony endmember of the continuous solid solution series with arsenic-bearing tennantite. Pure endmembers of the series are seldom if ever seen in nature. Of the two, ...

has been found here, along with

chert Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a prec ...

and

tuff Tuff is a type of rock made of volcanic ash ejected from a vent during a volcanic eruption. Following ejection and deposition, the ash is lithified into a solid rock. Rock that contains greater than 75% ash is considered tuff, while rock co ...

. Also nearby is the disused Trewethen Mine which had five shafts following a lode of lead-zinc for up to . A second level of Antimony was also pursued here.

Trelill railway tunnel

Trelill Tunnel is a railway tunnel on the now-closed

North Cornwall Railway The North Cornwall Railway (NCR) also known as the North Cornwall Line, was a standard gauge railway line running from Halwill in Devon, to Padstow in Cornwall, at a distance of via Launceston, Camelford and Wadebridge. The line was opened ...

, which ran the

Atlantic Coast Express The ''Atlantic Coast Express'' (''ACE'') is an express passenger train in England that has operated at various times between London and seaside resorts in the South West England. It is currently operated as a summer only service by Great Wes ...

to London, between Wadebridge and

Camelford Camelford () is a town and civil parish in north Cornwall, England, United Kingdom, situated in the River Camel valley northwest of Bodmin Moor. The town is approximately north of Bodmin and is governed by Camelford Town Council. The ward pop ...

and passes directly under Trelill village. Construction of the tunnel, the only tunnel on the North Cornwall RailwayInside Trelill tunnel July 2003
Tintagel Web commenced in 1893 and by January 1894 over 100 yards had been tunnelled into the hill. The breakthrough took place around the end of June that year and by the end of August about one third of the length had been opened out to the full size. The tunnel, which is built on a curve and a falling gradient towards

St Kew Highway St Kew ()Place-names in the Standard Written Form (SWF)

, is single-bore, but part of the agreement allowed the size to be increased to accommodate double-track although this was never required as traffic was always light. During the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

the tunnel was guarded by the

Home Guard Home guard is a title given to various military organizations at various times, with the implication of an emergency or reserve force raised for local defense. The term "home guard" was first officially used in the American Civil War, starting ...

although the only event of any note was when a single German aircraft dropped some bombs which fell in a nearby field. The line closed on 3 October 1966 as part of

Dr Beeching Richard Beeching, Baron Beeching (21 April 1913 – 23 March 1985), commonly known as Dr Beeching, was a physicist and engineer who for a short but very notable time was chairman of British Railways. He became a household name in Britain in the e ...

's railway cuts and the track removed soon after, although the tunnel was still in existence in 2020.

Tunnel location

* North portal: * South portal:

References

* *

Citations

{{coord, 50.5674955, -4.76395, format=dms, display=title Hamlets in Cornwall