I've been scouring newspaper archives for anything that will add to the history of Four Lanes. It's mainly genealogical but there some other interesting snippets such as the discovery of a smugglers tunnel whilst widening the road.

Also a short article on restarting working china clay around St. Day and Four Lanes. This is just after the war when the area was very depressed. The fact that the word restarted was used seems to indicate that at one time china clay was worked around Four Lanes. On the other hand it might just mean in a general sense, i.e. West Cornwall.

I don't think anything came of this but I just wondered if anyone can confirm (or not) whether china clay was ever worked around Four Lanes.

I've had to upload the short article as a JPEG as it's awkward to extract.

[photo]Personal-Album-272-Image-75605[/photo]

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I don't know of any china clay workings around Four Lanes (Lets face it - they are rarely inconspicuous!) Hower there is certainly China Clay in Four Lanes, 9 years ago I was site manager on the construction of the new Four Lanes school, where we installed a ground source geothermal heating system, the boreholes were meant to be 70m in depth, we could not get any past 50m. The drilling contractor ended up bringing in another contractor who does a lot of work for Imerys and Imerys to try and find away of getting down to depth (The problem being the holes kept closing in) in the end the array was redesigned with shallower holes.

That ties in with what I know. I believe they actually got as far as identifying the site for the workings but that was as far as it got. Thanks for the info. on the school. Very interesting.

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They also worked china clay at Carharrack on a small scale, and of course Tregonning Hill where it was identified and worked by Thomas Cookworthy in 1746, a while before the
St.Austell bonanza.
It's hard to believe that other places had not been explored on the strength of those early discoveries, and so there are probably record or diaries (Cookworthy's?) gathering dust in some cabinet, that document some of the smaller deposits.

EDIT; In addition, there is a crosscut on Davey's (correct spelling 😉 ) through to Sim's Shaft which has been driven through a decomposing granite intrusion. The Kaolin in this crosscut is superfine stuff and I have seen a small vase made from it a couple of years ago by an expert ceramicist.
Very nice work!

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Most of the clay's found around Carharrack & St Day were of a fire clay type rather than china clay. This type of clay was ideal for brick making and fire-backs etc.
As for Four Lanes, what is not widely known, that it was a source of "Duck", stone. St Andrew's church in Redruth is faced with it.

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The main kaolinisation zones can be found on several websites, but BGS has a wealth of info:

http://bgs.ac.uk/mineralsuk/planning/mineralPlanningFactsheets.html 

Shows no significant kaolinisation in these areas mentioned. So this ties in with what spitfire has said, it is a ball clay type, ie a secondary deposit formed by sedimentation rather the normal primary kaolinisation type deposit found in St.Austell area. But will check my Colin Bristow books tonight to confirm! - There is still a possibility of a small Kaolinisation zone....

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It is most definately kaolinised granite in Four Lanes, its very patchy in the area of the school, as another example up there we ended excavating a very large soakaway due to poor drainage in the kaolinised areas, this pit was 30m long, 3m wide and 4.5m deep, the kaolinised granite was clear to see.

Knocker
did it look like a cross course or was it more substantial?

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It is most definately kaolinised granite in Four Lanes, its very patchy in the area of the school, as another example up there we ended excavating a very large soakaway due to poor drainage in the kaolinised areas, this pit was 30m long, 3m wide and 4.5m deep, the kaolinised granite was clear to see.

As far as I'm aware the area designated to be worked around 1949 was on the other side of the village from the school about 1/2 a mile away.

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It aapeared to widespread to be a crosscourse as we encountered it in several places on the site. From the drilling the kaolinisation was substantial below 10m, with very few instances of the hammer coming on. there was one hole that we had to abandon as we couldn't get any deeper than 35m at the same time as picking up several tonnes of returns at surface.

I worked for Kernow Mining and exploration in the late 1980s, we tried to work the moor on the left hand side of the road up from Redruth just before you get to the village. There is a large kaolinised deposit here full of decomposed granite. We intended to work the sand and gravel deposits here on a very small scale.

This was following the collapse of the tin price back then. Our planning application was refused despite approval from the enviromental people and planning people and local companies who would have benifited from much cheaper materials !!.

Mainly by "local" people who mostly turned out to be local to London etc !!. So that was the end of a small Local Mining company and 5 people unemployed !!!.

I have recently found it amusing with all the renewed interest and publicity in metal mining in Cornwall . Tin and Tungsten deposits no problem , Metal Prices great !!, Jobs desperately needed.

Getting planning permission to do anything... Not a hope in Hell !!!!!. :surrender:

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Words in the right Whitehall ears had to be resorted to to get the accesss road for Hemerdon passed after 18 months sitting on a desk (or under it), accompanied by numerous weak excuses when those concerned asked what was taking so long.
I can see Crofty getting the same run-around when it comes to the crunch. I hope they have factored that one into their time-frame.
This would not happen in Germany, where industry is trusted and encouraged by the planning departments.
In GB however, I believe the reluctance to grant anything is purely down to buck passing and arse covering; bloody litigious society... :curse: :guns: :guns:
End of unexpected rant....!

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Hi Roy,
The last I heard was, that due to its world heritage status as a mining "" landscape"" the planning people dont want it disturbed by any of that, ....... yep you guessed it, nasty mining !!!. :confused:

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Since when has St. Day been in West Cornwall? It starts at Penzance! 😉

Since when has St. Day been in West Cornwall? It starts at Penzance! ;D

I've seen Wheal Jane described as being in West Cornwall! suppose it makes sense if you dont bother about the 'Mid' Cornwall

According to the BBC weathermen, the westcountry / South west begins, and pretty much ends as far as they are concerned, at Bristol !!!!!! :blink: :blink: :blink:

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It aapeared to widespread to be a crosscourse as we encountered it in several places on the site. From the drilling the kaolinisation was substantial below 10m, with very few instances of the hammer coming on. there was one hole that we had to abandon as we couldn't get any deeper than 35m at the same time as picking up several tonnes of returns at surface.

Sounds like the typical kaolinised "Funnel" deposit. Mr Bristow mentions that Kaolinisation can occur in any granite outcrop, but has not mentioned this deposit on the Kaolinisation maps in the book I have. Might see if I can sift through the geological reports in the IMERYS library, but I suspect economic factors and possibly issues with land access and mineral rights being used or not granted by Tin mines nearby may have stopped any development. The only small china clay pits I am aware of in west cornwall (20th century) was the one at "Lower Bostraze?" near St.Just area.

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Yes there were a couple of pits nr. St. Just, the only other one i know is on Tredinney Common approx 1 mile north of Crows-an-wra on the A30 about 5mls west of PZ.

As Lower Bostraze was a recent closure, I guess it has had the full "back to nature" treatment ?

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There was china clay at Dowran, where I lived for a few months. The owners of the campsite said how if you dug, it was bright white clay everywhere.

The gwennap stuff is definately kaolin from rotten feldspars, whereas I thought that "fireclay" was usually obtained from the seat earth of coal seams.