Llŷn Tramway & Soch Valley Railway
Mining & Quarrying
Transport
Soch Valley Railway
Map of Llanengan and the Main Load
The Warren |
[Rhiw] |
The Llŷn Tramway can be seen as a standard gauge version of the
Glyn
Valley Tramway
or a Welsh version of the
Wantage Tramway.
The Soch Valley
Railway
connects
the
mines at
Rhiw to the
Llŷn Tramway at Pont Abersoch.
Mining & Quarrying
The Llŷn’s mineral wealth was extracted by quarries, mines
and levels at: -
Bont Newydd, five
iron mines.
‘Main Lode’ from
Llanengan to Penrhyn Du worked by eight mines with three
outliers.
Working began in the 1630s the main period of working was in the latter part of
the 19th century, with all of the mines closed by 1900. At their peak 240 miners
dug lead, copper, & zinc ores. Tan-y-Bwlch Mine was the richest with an output
of [tons of ores] 8,722 lead, 450 zinc and 4,652 copper 1873-86 [average 3½
tons/day].
Rhiw
manganese mining at Rhiw
was a major project in its day, with over 195,000 tons mined between 1840 and
1945, with peak production in 1943 when 100 miners raised 20,333 tons. The mines
started as quarries and became mines when it was cheaper to tunnel. There were
six mines in all but only three of them were a viable operation and production
stopped completely several times between 1840 and 1945.
The granite [Mynydd Tir-y-cwmwd Porphyritic Granophyric
Microgranite] of the Llanbedrog headland was worked by three coastal quarries
from the second half of the nineteenth century to 1949 when the last quarry
closed. Quarrymen came from Nefyn and Penmaenmawr and lived in the small
clusters of cottages around the neck of the headland. Output was setts, cut
stone, for walling, structural, engineering, & decorative purposes.
Pen y gaer |
Port Nigel/Porth-neigwl |
Gweithfa |
Rhiw
Crown |
Bryn gwynt |
Daugoch |
Ysgubor wen |
Benallt |
Brongaer |
Pantgwyn 1896 suspended Alfred Evans [manager] |
Old Tanrallt
|
Tyddyn
Meirion |
Bwlch |
Tan-y-Bwlch |
|
Ty Canol |
Bron y gaer |
West Assheton |
|
Nant |
|
Pared |
|
Ty'n Llan |
|
Bwlch tocyn (active to 1809 &1869-1892) |
||
|
Penrhyn |
|
|
Bont Newydd and ‘Main
Lode’
A major problem was moving ore, pit props, coal (to power the
mines) granite
and other materials the options were horrendously expensive pack mules or the
dangerous and undependable beaching small ships in local bays. There was a four
mile long forty-two inch gauge horse tramway between Pwllheli and Llanbedrog
1896-1927. Proposals were made to extend it 5 miles via Pont Abersoch (6¾ mile
from the manganese mines at Rhiw and ¾ mile from the Bont Newydd iron mines) to
Machroes (‘Main Lode’) with tourism as a bonus. Steep grades would have been
needed to cross the granite Llanbedrog Headland precluding horse working
and the cost of rebuilding the tramway for steam operation and the extension
doomed the proposals.
When mining started at
Rhiw donkeys
were used to carry the ore to Porth Cadlan where it was loaded onto small
sailing vessels for export to Ellesmere Port, Cheshire. When production
increased two jetties were constructed, one at Hells Mouth and the other in a
cove off Hells Mouth called Porth Ysgo. As the name suggests both jetties were
dangerous to use and ceased operation in 1927. The mines were connected to Porth
Ysgo by a cable way. There were repeated unheeded
calls for a railway from Rhiw to Pwilheli 13 miles away.
Thankfully model railway ‘economics’ are much easier than the
real world’s and I’ve assumed a steam tramway was built from Pwilheli to
Machroes enabling the ‘Main Load’ mines to survive past 1900.
Given construction of the
Llŷn
Tramway the
Soch Valley Railway would have linked Pont Soch to
Porth Ysgo with a cable way to the mines This
would have made the narrow gauge Soch Valley Railway a much more practical 5½
miles long with the advantage of crossing easy terrain. The terminus station
would have been called Rhiw but would have been 1½ miles from the small village [population of about 400]
The layout
Rhiw represents
the terminus near the Hells Mouth Jetty. The station comprises a loop and siding
to a loading dock and goods shed meeting all the needed for the small village of
Rhiw. Behind the station a spur goes off to the terminus of the aerial cable way
linking the railway to Benallt Quarry/Mine. In the centre is the worked out Nant
Quarry and at the far end the Ty'n Llan Quarry.