Christmas in Camborne

Camborne, just 13 miles north-west of Falmouth, is regarded as the most impoverished town in Cornwall and one of the poorest in UK. Yet in the mid-19th century it was one of the world's richest towns, the centre of Cornwall's flourishing tin and copper industries. The town and its near neighbour of Redruth were surrounded by hundreds of mines, Cornwall's deepest tin mine, Dolcoath, being situated in the town, as was South Crofty, the last tin mine to close, in 1998.

Echoes of the past on arrival at Camborne train station

On Christmas Eve 1801, the Puffing Devil, the world's first self-propelled steam-powered road locomotive, built by Camborne engineer Richard Trevithick, made its way up Camborne Hill (now Tehidy Road and Fore Street). At the top of the hill, in the town centre, the Camborne School of Mines was based from 1888 to 1975, and a couple of hundred yards away was the meeting place for mining engineers from around the world, the Tyacks Hotel.

Fittingly Tyacks was the venue for two Christmas mining events this month. Last Saturday was the annual CSM Association Christmas lunch, attended by mainly past students and staff of CSM.

Five days later the Christmas Cornish Mining Sundowner was held, as always, at Tyacks, with a good attendance of around 20 regulars.

It was particularly good to talk to Camborne School of Mines Director Pat Foster and Matthew Eyre, Associate Professor in Intelligent Mining. As is now well known Mining Engineering will be reintroduced as an undergraduate degree at CSM from September next year and the School wishes to celebrate this historic development with the establishment of a scholarship programme, which will help convert students onto this exciting learning pathway.

The aim is to establish a £2M endowment fund to support Mining Engineering students for many years to come. Students will either be offered a £15,000 scholarship upon enrolment to the Mining Engineering course for four years, or have the option to select Mining Engineering at the end of the common engineering first year, incentivised by the opportunity for the scholarship.  

The opportunity will be promoted to all students on the University of Exeter’s Engineering course from September 2025, with the first cohort notified of awards in Spring 2026. Each student will receive up to £60,000 over the course of their studies.

Donations are invited to help CSM launch this historic opportunity to Exeter students, in order to drive recruitment to this vitally important industry worldwide.

With Matthew Eyre and Pat Foster

The next Cornish Mining Sundowner will be at the County Arms Hotel, Truro from 5.30 pm on Thursday January 16th.