Whats in a landscape?

You may see here a typical Dartmoor Landscape, look a little deeper and you will see the remains of what is in fact, an open cast tin mine. Tin mining was first recorded on Dartmoor around 1100. It would first have been found in the rivers, where it had been washed from the hillside. Tin being the heavier ore would have sunk to the bed of the river. This was called "streaming".

The tinners would then have traced where the tin had originated and locate the seam. Having not as yet, mastered the art of sinking shafts they would dig down along the seam to recover the ore. Here you see these workings from were the miners had recovered the tin, all done with pick and shovels, often having to remove the top covering of rock to access the tin ore.

At the bottom of these channels you will see the piles of grey rocks which are the spoil heaps of left over rocks after the tin had been removed. The tin ore would have been broken down to a sand like constituency and washed to remove impurities. The remainder would have been mixed with charcoal and smelted to release the tin which would then have been pored into a mould.

All around this area you can find the remains of the industry that went on here and in the next valley, where the remains of the industry at the end of its life on Dartmoor in around the 1930's can be found.

At the bottom of the picture you will see the roofs of Headland Warren, now one of the new industries of tourism and holiday cottages once the place where rabbits were bread to feed the miners.

Far from being the peaceful tranquility we prize today, this would have been a place of noise and industry.