I noticed something interesting the other day. Bassett's Cove, aka Spratting Cove which is on North Cliffs, just around the corner from Portreath (the real Bassett's Cove) has a weird shaft like incline running up the side of it. You can just about make it out if you squint.

If you stand at the bottom and look up, you will see about 70% of a shaft format. It is clearly man made and I'm wondering what it's all about.

Hamilton Jenkin doesn't mention it, although there were mine workings in the area. There was fishing activity there, but surely, they would have landed at Portreath. I haven't looked for any whim plat.

I'm wondering if anyone else has noticed it and if so, are they able to say what it is.

🔗Personal-Album-205-Image-75909[linkphoto]Personal-Album-205-Image-75909[/linkphoto][/link]

Could it be outfall of a sewer or land drainage?

Lack of scale makes it difficult to judge, but it could be a borehole, it looks like something similar a few yards to the right

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It's most certainly a more ancient than modern phenomena.

If it was drilled and blasted, the marks are very discreet.

It's clearly some sort of haulage way, but considering the alternatives for such, as well as the position, it's quite an odd thing.

There are no indications of stoping or levels anywhere nearby.

Hamilton Jenkin doesn't mention it, although there were mine workings in the area. There was fishing activity there, but surely, they would have landed at Portreath. I haven't looked for any whim plat.

I would have said the fish would certainly have been landed at Portreath, the original Basset's Cove, as that's where the fish palace was. I have some photos of the cliffs but they are at what is now known as Basset Cove adjacent to the entrance to Tehidy Country Park.

You know better than me but weren't most of the small mine workings in the area to the north of the village along Nancekuke Downs? Wheals Pedlar, Hope, Stirran, West, East, Tye, Fox, Vincent, Sparrow, Virgin, Towan Goath.
Of course that doesn't preclude some workings in the other direction.

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Is there much difference between the north cliffs line in 1880's and now? might give some indication and how fast this section is eroding away and how far "inland" the shaft was if it is not modern industrial (ie last 150 years).
I'll try and check the county archeological reports later if someone else doesn't beat me to it.

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It has been a very long time since I walked that bit of coast from Portreath. If I remember rightly, the rock offshore (in the background of the pic) has holes in it, which look like workings.

I think between Bassets Cove and Ralph's Locker (the cove in from that rock) there is a bit of quickly eroding cliff which I recall having some man made holes in it.

The shafty thing is similar to a manway/small whim shaft in size and format. Probably 6x4ft ish. I wondered if used to be a full shaft and the cliff dropped and this is probably a more likely explanation. However, there is a cave at the bottom with no adit and there are no signs of mineralisation or drives which I can see.

I've looked along the whole stretch of coast for workings and the only thing significant I found was that at Fishing Cove.

Above the cliff path, and slightly below where the photo was taken is a flat piece of ground which I am pretty certain was something mine related. I'm thinking Horse Whim and capped shaft. Although it isn't on any of the maps. There is a concrete slab above it.

I'll make an effort to have a poke around down there and get a couple of photos.

The cove adjacent to the tehidy entrance, now on the OS as Basset's Cove used to be called Spratting Cove.

Talking of works north of Portreath, there is a shaft which appears on the 1909 map and is not on the 1888, not mentioned by Ham Jenks and is clearly a whopper of an engine shaft....think double skip road, ladderway and pumps which is here:-

http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=50.268194&lon=-5.283355&z=17.7&r=0&src=msa 

It has the most bombproof grille I have ever seen on any shaft. It's made of huge bars placed at 2" intervals. Obviously any adit is a boat job. Again, the experts I know don't know anything about it either. Which means it was probably something to do with the weapons factory! 😉

is that the one with the big galv brackets on the inside of the wall look a bit like mountings for a winch?

Yep. I think it's not mining related, although there is a crack below it which looks like the top of some stoping. I chucked a rock down and it was about 25ft deep. It might be a crack though.

It's possible, I suppose that there was a horsewhim there and a skid way for hoisting stuff up the cliff, but again, why you would......? Unless Portreath was expensive/spoken for.

A bit further west from your photo. A natural cave?

🔗Personal-Album-272-Image-75923[linkphoto]Personal-Album-272-Image-75923[/linkphoto][/link]

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I gather there is an utterly huge cave which has an adit running through it. I have yet to see it, but will and when I do, I'll take a camera.

Many caves along that area are along crosscourses and were more kindly to driving adits along.

THe 1909 map shows a quarry SW of Mirrose well cove, or very near to this shaft, as well as a nearby spring (Mirrose well) and of course smuggling activity (historical records) here. The modern map puts the a quarry further north-east but I suppose there could have been two.

So the ideas of a "winze" for hauling goods / fish/ contraband / stones down to boat / spring water (from an old well since collapsed into the sea) from older times all seem like possibilities if mining is discounted.

More importantly who is going to dash over there and hang over the edge to get better photos?

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According to one of the local historians (Whose an archivist at the CRO), the Bassetts were quite active in the smuggling trade and apparently they had some "mine workings" dug along North Cliffs to Tehidy that were never mine workings at all.

This may be of interest.

William Burgess, 1776-1862, would not have been so careless. A Farmer cum smuggler, he lived at Trengove a lonely farmhouse situated high above Portreath to the south of the Incline and made it a depot for goods smuggled into Porthscadjack or " Scradjick " (first accessible cove west of Portreath). Here at high tide a vessel could berth and at low tide be unloaded on to the small beach. Barrels were placed in a cave until dark then rolled across the beach to be hoisted up the low cliff by pulley. They were then loaded into farm wagons and taken to Trengove where they were hidden. Some goods were secreted behind piles of gorse in a capacious cupboard at the side of the kitchen fireplace. Others beneath ricks and in a subterranean cavity, found some years ago covered by a round. piece of granite with an iron ring on its surface. The liquor was later taken to Tyacks Hotel at Camborne and the Plume of Feathers at Pool. (" A family record," Enid Smith).

The would not have been so careless refers to a story about the Bassets.

Source: Michael Tangye: Portreath: some chapters in its history.

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