News: BTA AGM 2026 and Display
14/06/2026 @ 4:34pm
The 2026 Annual General Meeting was held on 13th June. Before the formal business we were treated to a display by Barbara Borlase-Hendry on “Copper and Tin Mining in Cornwall”, a wide-ranging look at some of the many mines which powered the Cornish economy until the 20th century.
Working from West to East the display, 25 years in the making, told the story of these mines using a huge range of material including postal history, postcards, photographs, tokens, share certificates and cheques. Various mines were shown, including those of the Bassett family, involved in the business from 1789 to 1920, including the Dolcoath Copper and Tin Mine, the deepest and most productive mine in the county.
Clearly a lot of research had gone into every page of the display, but for those of us who don’t know much about the subject we were advised by Barbara to “think Poldark”: anyone reading the books or seeing either of the television series would get a flavour of the subject. Indeed, as she said, the mines produced stories of banking interests, scandals and bankruptcies. Definitely all very Poldark, and also very close to home since the Borlase family (antecedents of her husband) were major mine-owning families through several generations. Barbara herself, she assured us, had no such connections; instead, her background was Cornish smuggling. I’m sure many of us would envy such exotic lineage!
The legacy of the mines has not entirely disappeared: a few of the mines are now industrial museums, and there is talk of reopening the South Crofty Mine for commercial mining.
This was a fascinating display on an important part of Cornwall’s history, showing everything from the technology, the working conditions, and the economic pressures of the trade through to the social history of the families involved.
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