Penzance, as represented to potential visitors and well-heeled locals in the early 19th century, might as well have been surrounded by a force field. A range of texts waxed lyrical about the surrounding area, and in particular the charms of the Bay and the minor stately homes that overlooked it. Within the imperfect circle that formed the 1614 Borough boundary, the docks might be smelly, the streets rowdy and the markets noisy – but outside that charmed one mile diameter, all was delight. Here was Rosehill, where – according to a poem of 1829 - a “golden wand” had transformed a wilderness: “the glorious work of fairy hands.” Here were the trees and waters of Trereife. And here was Treneere, with its “fleecy flocks” and “murmuring stream.”

But what else lurked just outside the Borough in the early 19th century – apart, that is, from livestock and pleasant paths to the north, and rather a lot of water to the south?

Adjoining the western boundary stone, as yet, lay very little but sandhills. But to the east there already lay an interesting industrial area. The very name 'Chyandour' means 'house of the water.' This is probably a reference to the Chyandour stream, eastern equivalent to the Lariggan, and similarly put to good industrial use as a source of free - and regularly renewed - energy.

1831 view by J S prout, looking towards the smelting works (marked by a tall chimney in the distance)

(Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance)

There had been a smelting works at Chyandour since Penzance became a coinage town in 1663, or slightly earlier. And later, once steam power nthracite was brought in through the tunnels, using a beach outside the Borough boundary to avoid harbor dues. The Bolitho family bought the freehold in 1850, and within 50 years the works was the largest in Cornwall. Although it closed in 1911, the work done there – and the profit turned - began over a century of profitable banking for the Bolitho family. Nearby, the smelly process of tanning animal hides to produce leather continued until 1882, generating a formidable boot-making industry in Penzance. Other trades conducted at Chyandour included blacksmithing and carpentry, and from 1852 until Long Rock was developed in the early 20th century all the business of a railway terminus – turntables, signals and points, marshalling and loading – were carried on there.

The smelting works, Chyandour, with other industrial buildings in front: on the left a barkmill used for grinding Peruvian bark for the tanning process. To the right was a carpenter’s shop and a blacksmith’s

(Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance)

In 1846, Prince Albert paid a visit, escorted by Mayor Edward Bolitho. He “watched with much interest the whole process of smelting… expressed much pleasure at what he saw, and was given several specimens of ore” before being conveyed past eager cheering crowds to peruse the RCGS museum. There he admired four serpentine vases that had been placed invitingly before him – and thus begins the story of the settlement at the western edge of the Borough, Wherrytown.

H Gastineau, view of Penzance from the Newlyn end of Wherrytown

(Image courtesy Penlee House Gallery & Museum, Penzance)

Here, too, the name provides a clue as to the origins: this was the landing place for wherries, or ferries. It seems likely that serpentine from the Lizard was brought ashore here, conveniently close to the workshops. Other traffic may also have come ashore in small boats unwilling to pay harbor dues for a depth of water beyond their needs. But there is another theory about the name: that it derives from the Wherry Mine, so called because of its position, 70 fathoms or about 130 metres offshore.

Whole books have been written about the story of this famous enterprise, and most readers will be familiar with its main character: the “poor miner of Breage,” Thomas Curtis, who (according to his legend) toiled under the sea to make an honest profit until his fabulous structure was destroyed by an American ship loaded with raisins. In fact, the truth is rather more interesting and complicated than the legend. Was there only one Thomas Curtis, or have two men, probably father and son, been conflated? Why was Davies Gilbert so keen to talk up the mine's prospects in 1792? Why in the same year did James Watt write to his agent about the Wherry Mine adventurers: “stick to their ribs and give them no advice… you may have it in your power to piss on them in your turn.”. And where does the story of the American ship – as represented by Ballantyne in his 1869 novel Deep Down – originate, given that it appears in no contemporary press reports or insurance records, and indeed not in any surviving records at all until a visitor's passing remark 20 years after the event is supposed to have taken place?

The Wherry Mine ‘New Shaft:’ dug in 1796 abandoned  in 1798, re-opened in 1836, abandoned again by 1840  - and its remains photographed in 2019

(Image copyright Kevin Camidge)

More detail on the Wherry Mine will have to wait for another occasion. But what is less well known, is that the eastern side of Penzance also had its seafront mine. Over at Long Rock, admittedly a fair step east of Chyandour, the Wheal Mexico was to be found, and present day adventurers may still be able to find, at low tide, rock bases designed to support a superstructure. This was probably a walkway similar to the well-documented Wherrytown example.

The commercial potential of serpentine is reputed to have been first noted by a Mr Drew, as he worked on building the Lizard lighthouse in 1828. By 1840 the old Wherry Mine buildings on the sandhills had been taken over by the Serpentine Marble Company, and Wherrytown was becoming a settlement. Prince Albert's admiration guaranteed space at the Great Exhibition of 1851, where 2,000's worth of artefacts made from the stone were displayed, and gave rise to commissions for Osborne House.

Although the serpentine boom was over by the 1880s, with commissions for giant urns, fonts and obelisks fast drying up, the mineral was still popular for small souvenir items. Along the cottage fronts of Wherrytown, these continued to be sold from porches until the mid-20th century

The paperweights of Penzance: a typical example of the 20^th century serpentine souvenir

In the meantime, Wherrytown had become an entire industrial quarter. There was a flour mill, and a steam saw mill - the forerunner of UBM and later Jewsons. At one stage in the late 19th the industrial zone included a ground-breaking (but short-lived) fish processing plant, the Co-op dairy was sited there for many years, and later in the 20th century GWR road transport and Western National buses made Wherrytown their home.

In the fashion of mediaeval city gatehouses, the two Penzance 'frontier posts also had military functions. The eastern beach was – in rather cavalier fashion - used for target practice by volunteers stationed on Chyandour cliff. A little further along to the east was the barracks. Here, WW1 PoWs were housed, and the public sternly warned that these interesting foreigners should not be regarded as a “cheap show for the vulgar and inquisitive; this point being made “especially, to the young women and girls.”

Chyandour barracks today

After the barracks fell out of use, the County police remained, perched on the cliff fractionally outside the town boundary. Until the 1940s, Penzance Borough had its own police force and chief constable, but wrongdoers and suspects from out of town would have to either pass through or around the town on their way into custody. The building survives to this day, although no longer serving as a police station.

Over at Wherrytown, too, there was a military presence. The old serpentine works became the drill hall, and during the Newlyn Riots of 1896 the Berkshire regiment, summoned to maintain order and to keep the men of Lowestoft, Newlyn and Penzance apart, spent a dull week quartered there. Dull, at least, for the men, who caught colds in their damp lodgings. The officers lived it up, running up huge bills at the Queen's Hotel, and leaving the town and the regiment to argue it out as to who should pay.

But why should the military men have all the fun? There was also a fair bit of 'living it up' on the beaches beside the Lariggan and the Chyandour streams. But for part two of this Penwith Paper - the story of community and recreation in and around Wherrytown and Chyandour – please come back and visit the site in May.

General sources and references:

'The Industries of Penzance' Peter Laws 1978, pp 12-15, 20-21, 31, 32, 36; Laws' refs to 'Crofts' are to editions of the Cornishman

'Cornishman' and 'Cornish Telegraph' - see individual reference links for details

For more on the Penzance boundary stones themselves, see the Penwith Papers published in August and September 2017.

Because it was based on a brief presentation looking at the parallels between these two 'border zones,' this Penwith Paper has had to take a 'broad brush' approach. The author is always happy to provide more detail and precise references to support the points above – please use the contact form.