Wheal Busy
last night I had another excursion on my mountain bike
I've not been to wheal busy for a while. in the centre of the area used by of roaders ,there is a very small fenced of area, where there seems to be a level ,rather than an old shaft. anyone know anything about it. Looks interesting. Ill try to get
a picture
Also like to know what the concrete square shaft by the cycle trail at twelve heads is about.
Any meets in my area "Carharrack" that I might be interested in.
Ta in Advance Brian Wildman

a). Sounds like a very shallow level which goes about N to a collapse. It's very shallow and looking at the gradient, was designed to be a flower-outer. It seems odd to have a level so shallow, if it was a feed for dressing floors, surely, they would have used a bit of a longer pipe and a launder from the engine shaft. It seems unlikely that it was a footway, or access. It had a tyre in it, last time I looked. It heads towards another fenced off square, which appears to be a shaft.

b). There are a number of candidates for your second querie, you'll have to be more precise.

Weirdy Beardies aka Cornwall Mine Explorer's Club meets the first thursday of the month, aka this thursday at The Coppice in lanner. 7:30ish. There are lots of people to chat to about hoels in the ground and where they go and what they were for.

The Concrete shaft /square hole is about 50 mtrs into the cycle trail from wheal andrew end . Its where another short trail at the other side of the stream meets the main cycle trail

http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=50.235056&lon=-5.139403&z=20&r=21&src=msl 

If it's that one, it's "Thin Shaft" of Nangiles Mine which is next to Bread and Cheese Shaft with the fence around it. It was formerly an access point to that part of the adit and is plugged at adit level about 20ft down.

This is the shaft Drillbilly is talking about and it matches the description.

http://www.aditnow.co.uk/photo/BREAD-CHEESE-Mine-User-Album-Image-64650/ 

There was a small hole put through the plate to check if there was any water - it is dry (i.e. the dip tape gets to the top of the plug/fill which is dry)

You can hear the water running in the Bread & Cheese shaft

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I always referred to this shaft as Bread & Cheese footway shaft, with Bread & Cheese Engine shaft being the one with the Barbed wire and concrete collar, just a few yards away.
Whether that is indeed the case is open to conjecture.
Wheal Jane were responsible for mucking them both out and doing the concrete work. This work was done in the early days of Wh Jane when Consolidated Goldfields ran the show.
There is also a 'Little Bread & Cheese Shaft' (capped) further away to the East and somewhat lost in the undergrowth.

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[photo]Personal-Album-14777-Image-95202[/photo]

I think Jane had it down as Bread and Cheese Footway.

Their key offence was referring to the whole of Consols and United as "Wheal Maid". It is on the 80's 1:10000 maps as such. Bit of an insult to Cornwall's magnum opus.

Does not bread & cheese refer to a pagan ritual to determine the guilt of a thief? Does the mine have pagan links?

There isn't very much written about Nangiles. Or the origins of many shaft names.

Ale and Cakes mine is up the road, perhaps it's some sort of "poor man's version".

It's more likely to be due to the proximity of a particularly memorable hawthorn tree (Bread and Cheese Tree)

Does not bread & cheese refer to a pagan ritual to determine the guilt of a thief? Does the mine have pagan links?

Weem all be pagans down ere. :lol:

But I believe Drillbilly to be right about the Hawthorne, and his statement about the engine shaft et Footway shaft, also agrees with what I was told in the early 70's; I believe it was Hamilton Jenks told me.

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Oh goody! Glad to be in good pagan company. Very very interesting to hear about the hawthorn tree link maybe.

On the subject of the origins of places names, any clue to nangiles?

Oh goody! Glad to be in good pagan company. Very very interesting to hear about the hawthorn tree link maybe.

On the subject of the origins of places names, any clue to nangiles?

Nan = valley.

Giles ? Take your pick.

Lozz.

Oh goody! Glad to be in good pagan company. Very very interesting to hear about the hawthorn tree link maybe.

On the subject of the origins of places names, any clue to nangiles?

Nan = valley.

Giles ? Take your pick.

Lozz.

Maybe "Gill (Ghyll)"- small stream, although Norse in origin. 'Don't know how much Viking placename influence there is down there.

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Old Jane's main shaft is Giles' Shaft. I think Sperries had a Giles' shaft as well....not sure if it was their main one....may have been a prior engine shaft.


I reckon Lozz is on the money.

Bread and Cheese shaft it is then, thanks for resolving that

Nangiles is also spelled Nanjiles on ancient documents. There's good reason to believe that Nangiles was at work around 1680 and possibly earlier. The opencast pits or Coffins - corrupted from the Cornish Coghan, can be dated back to Elizabeth 1st, with traceable remnants from Tomperrow to Nangiles and a little beyond Mount Wellington; all on the same lode.
There's a cove in the west of the county called Nanjisel Cove.
A great deal of the native language was 'Anglicised' and spellings followed the same slippery route. Some OS maps are guilty of this too.
Back to the Hawthorne tree topic, Certain types of trees were planted deliberately on lodes to depict the content of the lode. This too was an ancient ritual with probable pagan roots.
As for Giles' shaft, I believe it was named after one of the directors. I'll try to dig out my paperwork on Falmouth Consolidated for his full name.

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