Morwellham Quay Devon
Morwellham Quay on the Tamar River in Devon is the most completely preserved and most comprehensively interpreted nineteenth-century copper mining port in Britain. The combination of the restored quayside buildings, the tramway tunnels, the working mine accessible by tram and the open-air museum of Victorian working life creates one of the most immersive industrial heritage experiences in the southwest. At the height of the Victorian copper boom in the 1840s and 1850s, Morwellham was the busiest copper port in the world.
The ore extracted from the great Tamar Valley mines was loaded onto sailing vessels here for export to the Swansea smelters and the world copper market. The subsequent rapid decline left the quay derelict and preserved in its Victorian condition beneath woodland growth, cleared by the restoration project of the 1970s to reveal the extraordinary industrial heritage beneath.
The volunteer costumed interpreters working in the blacksmith's forge, the assay office and the various industrial buildings in period costume provide one of the most engaging forms of heritage interpretation available at any industrial museum in England.