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THE TREVITHICK SOCIETY

 

FOR THE PRESERVATION AND STUDY OF CORNWALL'S INDUSTRIAL HERITAGE

 

Established 1935

Industrial gazetteer: mines

Botallack Mine Archaeology

 

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Having spent a lot of time wandering over Botallack Mine and recording it I thought I could justify a separate section on the industrial archaeology.  The sett is very large so I have subdivided this section to try to rationalise it.

 

20th century remains
Surface plan of BotallackThe mill built in 1907-8 lies nearly opposite the count house, itself renovated at that time.  The mill can be divided into four main parts, battery house, table floor, vanner floor and tin floor.  The battery house comprises the base of the tramway from Allen's Shaft and Botallack Engine Shaft and the huge cast concrete loadings for the Californian stamps battery.  Below this lies the section which held the Buss shaking tables and possibly some crushing equipment.  All table loadings are present.  Below this, where cars park, is the section which held Frue vanning tables.  There is also a small tramway which leads to the Brunton calciner.  Concentrate from the vanners was roasted then went throughDate inscribed in machine mounting further concentration on the tin floor, which contains the remains of concave and convex buddles, shaking tables, a round frame and kieve marks.  Only part of the rear wall is finished, possibly because the tin floor was constantly being modified through its life. 

 

The Brunton calciner and its associated flues arePlan of the new mill grade II* listed structures, but all have been vandalised at some point.  Some of the drive loadings exist, but those inside the house were demolished and thrown out to turn the drive tunnel into an informal 'summer house'.  The principle features of the calciner can still be seen: arc for the calciner plate, parts of the two furnaces and the hot flue.  The Botallack's new mill in the distancecondensing chambers are in a variable condition, the worst part being the cross-over flue linking the two banks where the two concrete caps which covered the inlet and outlet sections have been allowed to collapse.  Some stone robbing has taken place, but the worst part has been repaired.

 

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Plan of the arsenic calciner and labyrinthWork at Wheal Cock during the 20th century involved removing the old pumping engine house and creating a flat area around Wheal Cock Engine Shaft, which was stabilised and re-collared.  A wall was built up along the seaward side of this 'plat'.  The lode here was extensively stoped and had to be back-filled; it is now beginning to collapse and should be visited with care.  The shaft was grilled in recent years, as was Wheal Cock Skip Shaft above it, but it is not possible to check the stability of the shaft itself.

 

Labyrinth, cross-over flue and stack

Very little now remains of the complex built around Allen's Shaft as most of this was demolished and built over when Geevor Tin Mines decided to re-open the shaft.  Part of the engine house remains, as does all of the stack.  Most of the buildings here are of breeze block-type construction and date from about 1985.  The shaft itself is visible at surface but is grilled to prevent access.  The head-frame, apparently acquired from an unknown coal mine, is also not accessible.

 

19th century remains
The count houseTowards the end of the 1850s the quality of the tin ore at Botallack went into a decline, balanced by an increase in quantity.  It was decided in about 1859 to expand the dressing floors and to erect a new stamps engine.  These dressing floors lie opposite the count house.  Originally the area was bounded to the north by a tramway which led from the Botallack section to the stamps and on to Wheal Cock.  Parts of the massive loadings can be seen outside the 'Bunnys' (more below).  The stamps engine was 30 inches in diameter, erected in 1860; eventually 64 heads of Cornish stamps were attached to it.  The foundations of the engine hStamps beater or mortar stoneouse can be seen, as well as the fly wheel loadings on the north side.  Part of the boiler house lie to one side, at an angle to the engine house.  This was probably rebuilt in the 1860s following a fire.  The stack was also built in 1860 but reused in 1908; the original flue, now bricked up, can be seen facing the boiler house.

 

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The old dressing floors at BotallackThe dressing floors to the south of the stamps engine mostly comprise buddles, of great variety.  While most probably date from the 1860s the sett to the east are from the 1890s.  In 1888 a Brunton calciner was used to augment arsenic production; the chambers lie at the eastern side of the floors.  The stack formerly stood near the road at the eastern side of the new mill but this was demolished in about 1907.  Early arsenic production came from a shaftBuddle yard calciner erected in 1875.  This lies just seaward of the coastal path, below the 1908 power house, where a small section of flue (actually a manifold) can be seen.  To the south of this lies another buddle yard, badly damaged by Luftwaffe activity in 1940.

 

The Crowns engine houses

The two engine houses at the Crowns are probably the most famous vista in this part of Cornwall.  The lower house held a 30-inch pumping engine, built in 1835 to replace a smaller engine at the same location.  Having been built on the bare rock there are no foundations, the rocks being bolted and mortared in place. I estimate this building weighs on the order of 1200 tons, all brought down the cliff.  In addition the metal work weight about 100 tons.  Above this is the winder for the Boscawen Diagonal Shaft, built in about 1860.  The boiler was brought from a boiler house on the cliff to the north.  The two engine houses here were stabilised in 1985-86 by a team led by the Carn Brea Mines Society.

 

Above these engine houses are the remains of two others, the Wheal Hazard whim to the south and the Carn whim directly over the Crowns.  The former wound from Wheal Hazard Shaft, to the south of the Crowns.  The latter raised ore from the surface of the Crowns section and also drove rollers for crushing copper ore.  The stack and engine bed-stone still remain here.


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Chasm at Wheal CockTo the north of this is a reservoir and further north is Wheal Cock.  The building just north east of the OS trig. point is a dry, which I have been informed was never used.  The two concrete loadings hereFlue from old beam winding engine at Wheal Cock were built in the 1880s when work concentrated on this section.  They formerly supported a winding engine (unusual in that it came from a Welsh coal mine) which worked from Wheal Cock Skip Shaft.  After Botallack closed in 1895 the engine was sold to Dolcoath Mine at Camborne, where two nearly identical loadings were built to hold it.

 

18th century dressing floors
18th century stamps at Wheal CockA map of Roscommon Cliff was made in the late 18th century and several of the mining features on that map can still be found; these include stamps and a burning house.  A reservoir near the engine shaft may be the origins of the plat on which the engine house was built.  On the slopes below the plat is a section of wooden launder, of unknown age and the site of a stamping mill.

 

 

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