Redruth and Chasewater Railway
| Locale | England, UK |
|---|---|
| Dates of operation | 1824–1915 |
| Track gauge | 4 ft (1,219 mm) |
| Length | 9 miles (14 km) |
| Headquarters | Devoran |
The Redruth and Chasewater Railway, (otherwise called the Redruth and Chacewater Railway using modern spelling), was an early mineral railway line in Cornwall, England, UK. It opened in 1825 and was built to convey the output from copper mines in the Gwennap area to wharves on Restronguet Creek (off the Fal Estuary) around Devoran, and to bring in coal to fuel mine engines; later it carried timber for pit props and also house coal.
A little over 9 miles (14 km) long, it was built to a 4 ft (1,219 mm) narrow gauge and used horse traction at first, later using steam locomotives. Solely dependent on the economy of the mines it served, it prospered when they did, and when they declined, the railway declined too; it finally closed in 1915. It never carried passengers.
Much of its route can still be traced, and part of it forms the course of the Redruth and Chasewater Railway Trail, an outdoor leisure facility.
Prior to the nineteenth century, much mineral extraction had taken place in the Cornish peninsula, but this had been limited by the non-existence of industrial methods; thus the depth to which shafts could be sunk, and at which water inundation overwhelmed the workings, and the cost of transporting extracted minerals to market, all proved limiting factors, and many mines were abandoned as exhausted using available methods. (Transport of minerals was chiefly done on the backs of mules.)
As the industrial revolution gathered pace, steam engine power became available to overcome these limitations, and new seams were developed at greater depths, and in some cases abandoned mines were re-opened. Moreover copper began to supersede tin as the dominant mineral for exploitation. Because the process of smelting copper required large quantities of coal — in the proportion of 18 to 1 — the copper ore was transported by sea to South Wales, where Swansea was dominant.
The focus, then, was on transporting copper and tin ore to a sea port for onward movement, and to bring in coal to fuel the increasing number of steam engines operating at the mines. In 1809 a privately owned tramway was constructed to connect the harbour at Portreath on the north coast, with mines around St Day and Scorrier; at first called the Portreath Tramway, with later extensions it became known as the Poldice Tramway. It was a horse-worked plateway and it was an immediate success financially. However it was in private ownership, as was the harbour at Portreath, and was not made available to the proprietors of competing mines.
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