The importance of copper mining in the south west, particularly in the first half of the 19th century, and the huge industry to smelt the ore that flourished in south Wales has been well documented. Although one or two recent papers have shed some more light on the latter. But without the ‘Welsh Fleet’ this part of mining history could not have taken place and I feel the story of this has to a certain extent been ignored.

The waters around the south west and south Wales are notoriously hazardous, even in summer, remember the 1979 Fastnet Race. The skill and bravery of the men who sailed these small sailing vessels carrying the coal from Wales and the ore from the south west cannot be overestimated. Not only did they have to brave the oceans but many of the ports were small and docking sailing ships (particularly the north coast ports) would have been a nightmare and very often impossible. In fact in winter there were long periods when trade came to standstill. To a certain extent this explained the emergence of Devoran as a port although of course the close proximity of the major copper mines had much to do with it. Even so the ships still had to navigate the treacherous waters around the Lizard and Lands End.

There is an interesting paper on the subject by Peter H. Stanier, The Copper Ore Trade of South West England in the Nineteenth Century. I can’t upload it for © reasons but I don’t think there is a problem with producing an extract. As Cornish Pixie mentioned in another thread sometime ago many of these interesting papers pop up in obscure journals. I came across this in The Journal of Transport History.

“It would appear that a regular mining trade was already established by the early eighteenth century, for in 1720 at least 40 sail of ships were said to be engaged carrying copper are from the South West to Bristol and South Wales. In 1799, John Vivian estimated that some 8,000-10,000 tons of shipping was constantly involved in this trade. Thus the trade was responsible for creation of a large volume of shipping, and vessels engaged on this trade became known collectively as the 'Welsh Fleet'. As a measure of the importance attached to these ships, it had long been felt that one advantage was that 'a constant uniform nursery for seamen is easily and cheaply preserved, as our quota of additional support of the trade, navigation and security of these kingdoms'. In 1824, 109 vessels (9,407 tons) with perhaps 500 seamen, were said to be employed regularly on the copper ore and coal trade with Swansea, the principal smelting port. Thirty years later, Symons estimated this trade 'must require upwards of I 50 vessels of from 80 to 150 tons burthen and find employment for from 600 to 800 seamen'. This represented 17,250 tons of shipping, on average, and in 1858, some 20,000 tons of shipping (c.1,200 men) were said to be engaged from Swansea. This was at a time when the copper are trade was at its peak, but both the above figures were estimates for Swansea alone, and unfortunately none of these accounted for the whole of the trade.”

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How right you are, Carnkie. The North Cornwall coast can be very treacherous and unpredictable hence the lack of good ports. Trying to gain entry into Portreath, situated in a lee, is hopeless in stormy weather as my late grandfather, a native of Portreath, would attest!

In fact the original, C18th harbour, built and owned by the Bassets, was washed away by storms before the mid-C18th. That of St Agnes suffered the same fate in the C19th. The foundations of the original Portreath harbour were exposed in 1983 and investigated by archaeologist, Prof. Charles Thomas and local historian, Michael Tangye.

In 1760 Portreath became a viable port when the current pier was constructed which gave sheltered space for a number of small sailing vessels to take on copper ore. Portreath harbour was leased in 1769 by the Bassets to two of the most powerful industrial dynasties in Cornwall at that time: the Foxes of Falmouth and the Williams' of Scorrier.

As the demand for coal to steam pumping engines inland grew during the expansive and explosive phase of Cornish industrialisation, it was necessary to enlarge the harbour and extend the pier. The outer basin was excavated in 1801 providing space for 25 vessels. In the 1820s the outer pier was added to facilitate the huge rise in trade stimulated by the opening of the Portreath Tramroad.

The importance of the maritime and commercial links between Cornwall and South Wales have most certainly been underestimated. In the late-C18th- early-C19th many prominent Cornish industrialists transferred their business capital to smelting in Swansea, including the Vivians, Williams', Foxes, Tregonings, and Baths, forming dense trade and commercial networks across the Bristol Channel that persisted into the mid-C20th.

The business interests of the Foxes in particular presented an admirable example of vertical business integration. This family shipped coal and pig iron from their own Welsh foundry and collieries to Cornwall, largely in their own vessels. This was imported through the Port of Portreath and transported over a mineral tramway, both enterprises that they had helped to initiate. They were also leading adventurers in many Cornish copper mines, the produce of which was sent back along the transportation route described above to the Fox-controlled smelters of Swansea.

Portreath, Cornwall's premier industrial port, undoubtedly lay at the heart of a maritime network of trade and commerce that stretched from Cornwall to South Wales across the Irish sea to Ireland and on across the Atlantic to the Caribbean and the northern shores of the South American continent. Hundreds of contracted Cornish mineworkers began their journey to the copper mines of Cuba from the Port of Portreath in the 1830s and 40s. This human story has been totally overlooked and is as tragic as it is epic (I am writing this up in my forthcoming book).

Later in the nineteenth century the Bain family came to the fore in Portreath shipping. David Wise Bain was one of the most well-known and successful ship owners in the west of Britain, having built up a fleet of coastal sailing vessels involved in the Welsh coal trade. These were gradually replaced by steam ships between 1887 and 1900. It think it was on one of Bain's ships that my paternal grandfather, Bob Kessell, worked. His family had been coal merchants in Portreath since the C19th.

It's easy to overlook this exciting and challenging period of Cornish history when you visit Portreath today, ruined to a large extent by the horrid housing that was allowed to be built on the harbour in the 1970s. Can't say I'm too captivated by the prettification of the place that was evident last time I was home.

All this has made me a bit homesick 😞 Nothing like Portreath for a stroll, providing you're walking in the opposite direction to the prevailing wind on a hot summers day when the tide is out of course!!! :lol:

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Must have been worse when the Fish Palace was in full swing. :lol:

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Doesn't bear thinking about 😮

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I guess it was just down to Economics that the Copper smelting operation at Copperhouse lost out to the Welsh operations in the early 19th Century. (If I read my History books correctly).

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Copper ores from Cornish mines were smelted in Bristol and South Wales in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Attempts to smelt copper ores such as at St Ives and Polrudden in the C17th resulted in failure. Later attempts at Penpol and at St Agnes enjoyed some success, but the cost of fuel and the competition of the Bristol and Welsh smelters eventually put paid to both enterprises.

In the C18th copper smelting was started at Carn Entral near Camborne which then relocated to Copperhouse, Hayle, to lessen the cost of importing the coal inland from the coast. This was run by the Cornwall Copper Company (1758-1819).

However, the older smelting firms did their level best to ruin this competitor by forcing up the price of copper ore and that of refined copper down. But it was the cost of importing coal that eventually did for this company. Local residents too, were unhappy about the amount of pollution created by the Copperhouse works.

So the cost of fuel was the main deterrent in establishing a copper smelting industry in Cornwall and this was allied closely to the cost of transportation.

Cornish industrialists like the Vivians, Grenfells, Daniells and Williams' simply shifted their capital to South Wales where they established copper smelting enterprises that smelted Cornish ores from mines and companies in which they had an interest, as well as those from mines in Wales and Ireland and further overseas such as Gran Colombia, Cuba and Chili with which they were concerned: the Morfa Copper Smelting Works (Williams) the Copper Bank Works (Grenfell) Llanelli Copper Works (Daniells) and Hafod (Vivians).

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As I understand it the residents of Swansea weren't very impressed by the pollution either. The copper kings naturally built their estates to the west in Gwyr. The largest of these, Singleton Park, belonged to John Henry Vivian, co-owner (as you mention) with his brother, Sir Richard Hussey Vivian, of the Haford works.

The pollution issue led to the great copper trials in 19th century Wales.

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I don't think the shipping companies who went to Cornwall from Wales with coal are particularly heroic IMHO, they were doing a difficult job in the name of commerce as were the thousands of sailors that worked all around the coast of Britain from Barry to Mallaig to Whitby, from Sunderland to Whitehaven etc especially in the era of sail..... my family included on the East Coast of England!
The crews were skilled, brave and courageous men in the main who chose that way of life to put food on the table for their families and for that they deserve our respect and to be remembered. The companies and sailors involved did not undertake these hazardous voyages as part of some noble heroic cause.
There is a tendency to romanticise so many elements of our industrial past but at the end of the day it was all done in the name of making money and deemed worth the risk, it involved masters & sailors living and dying to achieve that end for paymasters who I doubt regarded the crews as anything other than a means to an end. Certainly I have heard it said in my family that the loss of the load being carried was more lamented than the loss of the Crew in those days... life was cheap.

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Thanks for info CP.
As I live close to Carn Entral, I do wonder where the copper works would have been. There is very little sign of anything there now, but I guess there are not many remains From mid 18th Century left in Cornwall from mining as any operations may have been superceded by 19th Century structures.

The lady who lives on the top of Carn Entral sold me some pet rabbits, who seem particulary robust, must be all that copper left in the soil.

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ICLOK has covered the real point - over-romanticisation of a hard trade by people with little or no first-hand experience of it - very well in his recent post in this thread. The 1970s Portreath housing probably isn't very photogenic, but it is or was, contemporary housing built to the same criteria as the older stone structures so idolised by the 'heritage' enthusiasts - ie housing at a price, to current standards, using the methods of the time.

I recently visited a caving mate ( can I say that here? given the anti-caving rants you get on ME at times ) who lives in a 'historic lead miners' cottage' in the Peaks. As he rightly points out, it may have been built originally as contract housing for lead miners, but that was a very long time ago and it hasn't filled that function for about 150 years.

I don't really see the difference between contract housing built in 1830 and used by lead miners ( who probably were only casually employed in that industry and spent much of their lives labouring or working small-holdings ) for a few years, and spec housing occupied for some years by mining students.. anyone?

it isn't generally known that the well-known Hovis ad, for all it's cod-' ee, grim oop North' tone, was actually filmed in Buckler's Hard....

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I don't think that Carnkie or I have over-romanticised the shipping industry in the above thread one little bit. No, we don't have any first hand experience of it, but then neither do others posting on this thread. I agree with IKLOK that such men were only doing a job as were thousands of others in Britain. What Carnkie was pointing out, and I agreed with him, is that this part of maritime history has been overlooked to some degree.

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I didn't say you were... I am just saying there is a tendency to and to put the notion of a hero into context, my family worked the East Coast out of Boston and on the East Coast people certainly don't regard these brave guys as heroes but as participents of a very hard industry. At least the fisherman had a choice whether to go out, according to the stories handed down to me, some gaffers sent freight boats out regardless rather than risk losing the shipping contract.
By all accounts the tenders for regular shipping were cut throat and the terms often very hard, firstly because the customer would play the various shippers off against each other and the shippers themselves would fight for the work, it was probably as vicious as todays tender processes. The sailors I am told would then be asked to tender their services for the lowest price and contracted accordingly for so many voyages... if you were good and skilled you would probably get a good rate, but a standard grunt got what he could by all accounts.

(PS Hovis advert filmed at Gold Hill in Shaftesbury, Dorset)

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I agree with you about the danger of over-romanticising the past. In fact I made a similar point in another thread not long ago. The point really was the one that CP made in her last post.

With hindsight I should have given more thought to the title of the thread and the ambiguities would have been avoided. Probably. 🙂

Might pop down to the Basset Arms, Portreath for a lunchtime pint. No, no, who wants to look at those horrible buildings across the road. :angel:

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Well if you do pop into the Basset Arms, Carnkie, have a pint for me too!!! 😉

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