South West Coast Path at Botallack - geograph

The Botallack Mine () is a former mine in

Botallack Botallack (, meaning "Talek's dwelling") is a village in west Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It lies along the B3306 road which connects St Ives in the east to the A30 road, near Land's End. The village is included in the St Just in Pe ...

in the west of

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, ...

, UK. Since 2006 it has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site – Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape. The mine is within the Aire Point to Carrick Du

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

(SSSI) and the

South West Coast Path The South West Coast Path is England's longest waymarked Long-distance footpaths in the UK, long-distance footpath and a National Trail. It stretches for , running from Minehead in Somerset, along the coasts of Devon and Cornwall, to Poole Harb ...

passes along the cliff.

Location

The village of Botallack is on the B3306 road, in a former tin and copper mining area between the town of

St Just in Penwith St Just (), also known as St Just in Penwith, is a town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Penwith district of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It lies along the B3306 road which connects St Ives, Cornwall, St Ives to the A3 ...

and the village of

Pendeen Pendeen (from meaning "headland fort", previously known as , meaning "Caswal's high dwelling") is a village and ecclesiastical parish on the Penwith peninsula in Cornwall, England. It is north-northeast of St Just and west of Penzance. I ...

History

Botallack was a submarine mine with tunnels extending under the sea, in places for half a mile. Over its recorded lifetime the mine produced around 14,500 tonnes of

tin Tin is a chemical element; it has symbol Sn () and atomic number 50. A silvery-colored metal, tin is soft enough to be cut with little force, and a bar of tin can be bent by hand with little effort. When bent, a bar of tin makes a sound, the ...

, 20,000 tonnes of

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

, and 1,500 tonnes of

arsenic Arsenic is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol As and atomic number 33. It is a metalloid and one of the pnictogens, and therefore shares many properties with its group 15 neighbors phosphorus and antimony. Arsenic is not ...

. An estimated 1.5 million tonnes of

waste Waste are unwanted or unusable materials. Waste is any substance discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. A by-product, by contrast is a joint product of relatively minor Value (economics), economic value. A wast ...

would have been dug up with the minerals. It is unclear how far back mining activity goes in this location. Early records date from the 1500s. Some archaeological evidence points to mining here in the

Roman era In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

or even as far back as the

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

. Henry Boynes was captain of the mine in the early 18th-century and opened a "deep adit level", which was driven to the Corpus Christi lode in the higher mine. The first steam-engine was put to work at Carnyorth Moor (later part of the Botallack

sett A sett or set is a badger's den. It usually consists of a network of tunnels and numerous entrances. The largest setts are spacious enough to accommodate 15 or more animals with up to of tunnels and as many as 40 openings. Such elaborate setts ...

) in either 1795 or about 1810, depending on the source. In the first half of the 19th-century, the average price of Botallack tin was £64 4s a ton. The abolition of tin duty of 4s per 120 lbs to the

Duke of Cornwall Duke of Cornwall () is a title in the Peerage of England, traditionally held by the eldest son of the reigning Monarchy of the United Kingdom, British monarch, previously the English monarch. The Duchy of Cornwall was the first duchy created i ...

in 1838 helped to keep the mine operating despite a decline in the price of tin to £45 per ton. In the 1860s a new diagonal shaft was dug. A visit by the

Prince A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. The ...

and

Princess of Wales Princess of Wales (; ) is a title used since the 14th century by the wife of the Prince of Wales. The Princess is the apparent future queen consort, as "Prince of Wales" is a title reserved by custom for the heir apparent to the Monarchy of the ...

in 1865, when they descended the shaft, created a mini-boom in tourism, causing the mine operators to charge visitors a guinea per person. An increasing supply of tin – initially from

Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...

Banka Island Bangka is an island lying east of Sumatra, Indonesia. It is administered under the province of the Bangka Belitung Islands, being one of its namesakes alongside the smaller island of Belitung across the Gaspar Strait. The 9th largest island in ...

, and

Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of islands by area, sixth-largest island in the world at 482,286.55 km2 (182,812 mi. ...

, and in the 1870s onwards from Australia – along with a fall in demand for tinplate in the American market, caused the price of tin to fall, causing many Cornish mines to close. The managers decided in January 1883 to stop the Botallack and Crowns engines, because the number of men employed below ground was not sufficient to meet the costs of keeping the engines going. On 2 October 1883 the recently renewed setts, which extended over – comprising Wheal Cock, the Crowns, Carnyorth and Higher Mine – were put up for auction as a "going concern". It included four pumping and three winding engines, two steam stamps, plus other appliances. At the auction it was stated that the mine ″... only needs from £20,000 to £25,000 to be put in good working order, ...″ There were no bids for the mine. The following shafts were working in 1884, * Botallack engine-shaft, deep and worked with a cylinder * Crowns engine-shaft, deep and worked with a cylinder * Wheal Cock engine-shaft, deep and worked with a cylinder * Carnyorth engine-shaft, deep and worked with a cylinder * Wheal Cock skip-shaft, deep * Botallack skip-shaft, deep * Carnyorth skip-shaft, deep * Wheal Hazzard skip-shaft, deep * Chy Cornish skip-shaft, deep * Pearce's skip-shaft, deep * Bullion skip-shaft, deep * Durloe skip-shaft, deep * Rodd's skip-shaft, deep * Boscawen diagonal-shaft, about long, perpendicular depth and under the sea * Approximately 10 other shafts varying in depth from a few fathoms to deep. Other engines, * Botallack stamping-engine, cylinder * Carnyorth stamping-engine, cylinder * Carn whim, cylinder * Davy's whim (Botallack), cylinder * Carnyorth, cylinder * saw-mill, cylinder * air-compressor, cylinder. A total of 265 workers were employed and the wage was approximately £800 per month. The average monthly yield of the mine was about 19 tons of tin, 3 tons of copper and 4 tons of

. The mine closed in 1895 as a result of falling tin and copper prices. The mining developments around Botallack form part of the St Just mining district's successful inclusion in the Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape

World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

, which was inscribed in July 2006.

Description

The engine houses in the Crowns section of Botallack Mine are set low down the cliffs north of Botallack. There are two engine houses and the remains of another pair on the cliff slopes above; the mine extends for about 400 metres out under the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the Age of Discovery, it was known for se ...

ocean; the deepest shaft is 250 fathoms (about 500 metres) below sea level. The workings of Botallack Mine extend inland as far as the St Just to St Ives road, and at times included Wheal Cock further to the north-east. The mine buildings on Botallack Cliffs are protected by the

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

. There are two arsenic works opposite the Botallack Mine count house. At the top of the cliffs there is also the remains of one of the mine's arsenic-refining works. The mineral Botallackite has its type locality here.

Popular culture

The mine is the setting for R. M. Ballantyne's ''Deep Down''. The 1970s

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

television series '' Poldark'' was filmed partly in Botallack, using Manor Farm as Nampara. More recently, filming for the new ''Poldark'' series also took place here.

Mineral statistics

From Robert Hunt's ''Mineral Statistics of the United Kingdom''''.''

Gallery

File:Crown Mines from the air 2.jpg File:Crown Mines from the air 3.jpg File:Crown Mines from the air.jpg File:Crown Mines arty 4.png

References

External links

* {{Commons category-inline Arsenic mines in Cornwall Copper mines in Cornwall Geological type localities Grade II listed buildings in Cornwall Grade II listed industrial buildings Industrial archaeological sites in Cornwall National Trust properties in Cornwall St Just in Penwith Tin mines in Cornwall Scheduled monuments in Cornwall