POLZEATH TIMELINE

• 360 MYA  Polzeath Slate Formation… pale green to purple 

• 3000 BC Daymer Bay forest submerged by rising sea and buried in sand (not discovered/revealed until about 1800)

• 2500 BC Bronze Age people construct Tumuli around Polzeath until about 800 BC

• 352 BC: first mention of Cornish Tin Industry 

• 100 BC: The Cliff Castle at The Rumps probably built

• 55 BC: Romans arrive in Cornwall (until 410 AD) they quarry tin at Mulberry Down (13 miles south of Polzeath)

• Doomsday: Rosminver Manor (renamed St Minver), Trewornan Manor to east by River Amble, Pentire Manor to north, Penmayne Manor (an ancient sub-manor) to south of Polzeath

• 1201: Cornish Stannary Charter granted by King John

• 1260: St Endellion church built. St Minver & St Enodoc likely have earlier sites

• 1350: Half the population of Bodmin killed by Black Death

• 1485: Wadebridge first bridge across River Camel 

• 1490: Slate quarrying starts along the North Cornwall coast around Trebarwith

• 1497: Cornish Rebellion march on London protesting against tax (to raise funds to fight the French)

• 1580s: First recorded mining at Pentire, with discovery of lead ore

• 1590 Shilla Mill (milling corn until 1885)

• 1660: Rabbit warren at Pentire (100 acres). One by Brea Hill too (until 1860).

• 1664: The Barton of Pentire granted a license to mine lead ore

• 1664: Cornwall mostly Royalist in English Civil War. Surrender of most Cornish Royalist forces in 1646 and many, like local Roscarrock family, fined

• 1690: Quaker Burial ground on road between Polzeath and St Minver. High walls partially rebuilt in 1833. Different trees planted on each burial plot. 

• 1743: Charles & John Wesley bring Cornwall Methodism. Andy Cameron (started Wavehunters 2002) is related to them, although Charles, the prolific hymn writer, writes none with a nautical theme 

• 1758: William Borlase mentions mining for antimony at Pentire

• 1791: Trewornan-bridge built to replace a dangerous ford

• 1793: 120 tons of lead ore were sold from Pentire

• 1793 Inventor Goldsworthy Gurney born in Treator, Padstow

• 1807: The great slate road from Delabole to Port Gavern built to ship-out slate

• 1814: Cpt William Bartlett (24) and crew drown off Stepper carrying pipe clay to Liverpool 

• 1815-19: The Pentire Silver and Lead Mine is a major producer of lead ore.

• 1819: A boat carrying lead ore from Pentire sinks, six drown

• 1825-27: Mining for copper takes place at Pentireglaze

• 1827: Doyden Castle built in Port Quin

• 1829: First Padstow lifeboat

• 1830: Daymark at Stepper (cost £27)

• 1830 Polzeath “Beach House” built by the captain of the local mines, it was originally called "The Pleasure House”

• 1841 Polzeath population: 44 

• 1843: Mining at Pentireglaze is restarted on the Costbook principle

• 1845: Mining begins on Tinners Hill, New Polzeath, in the "South Hill Mine"

• 1846: The lease for Pentireglaze mine is revoked due to ineffective management

• 1847: Trevose Light House (flashes every 7.5 seconds) automated 1995

• 1848: A new mining lease is drawn up for Pentireglaze

• 1848: Alfred Lord Tennyson in North Cornwall (May to July) touring with Rev Hawker, among others, to places like Tintagel

• 1850: The Pentire & Pentireglaze United Lead-Silver Mines is formed

• 1853: Pentireglaze mine produces 540 grams silver 

• 1854: Meeting houses and chapels at: Tregenna (for Protestant dissenters), Tredizzick, Stopatide (Methodists) and Rosserow (Bryanites)

• 1855: Polzeath mine opened (closed 1856). Miners path named Tinners Lane

• 1856: Both Pentire and Pentireglaze mines close for good

• 1856: First RNLI lifeboat at Padstow

• 1861: Trebetherick Mine (Trewiston Mine) closed, although reopens turn of century

• 1864: St Enodoc’s north chapel restored

• 1869: Port Isaac’s first lifeboat

• 1879: Stone for Eddystone Lighthouse from De Lank Quarry, Blisland. Shipped on barges, after being cut in Wadebridge, until 1882

• 1879: Until now every local farm kept a flock of sheep and grew mostly wheat, oats and barley. Sheep mostly replaced by North Devon beef cattle

• 1880: Coastguards’ rocket apparatus housed by Trebetherick Store (until 1930)

• 1885: last oxen used on local farms. Horse drawn bus to Wadebridge

• 1886: Wadebridge Town Hall built

• 1890: St Enodoc golf clubhouse first built (rebuilt 1907 and moved in 1937)

• 1892; Dinham freshwater mill stops milling corn twice a week, Dinham saltwater mill stops milling bone (used for manuring root crops)

• 1893: Rock ferry sinks, two drown

• 1895: Rock Hotel built (knocked down 1978 site used for Mariners Pub)

• 1895: Percival Institute St Minver 

• 1898: Metropole Hotel Padstow built, opened 1904

• 1898: Atlantic Terrace, Pentireglaze Estate, built

• 1898: Old Methodist Chapel, “The Tin Tabernacle”, on Chapel Corner (replaced and moved as road widened 1933) also used as Methodist school hall

• 1899: Railway Line to Padstow opened (closed 1967). London and South Western Railway (LSWR) (although the North Cornwall Railway Company initiated)

• 1900: Polzeath Lodge Hotel built (became Pinewood flats in 1950s)

• 1900: James Stevens steam lifeboat capsizes in Hell Bay. 8 of the 11 lifeboat crew drowned. 

• 1902: Rock Hill Methodist Chapel built

• 1903: Atlantic House Hotel opened

• 1906 “Medla” built (used in Doc Martin Christmas Special 2023)

• 1908: “West Ray”  built in Trenant Valley. Postcard series named after house

• 1910: Doyden house built 

• 1911: Foghorn at Trevose (until 1963)

• 1913: Old Accounts office for Polzeath mines becomes Post office (until 1927). In the 1870’s the building was used as the playroom for the Pleasure House next door (now called Polzeath Beach House but built 1830)

• 1914: “For the Fallen” Laurence Binyon pens poem on Pentire cliffs after Battle of Mons

• 1915: SS Armenian sunk by U Boat 24 miles off Trevose with 1,400 mules. Some crew buried St Enodoc

• 1917: Arnold Bax, Tintagel holiday with pianist Harriet Cohen… affair and visit inspires symphonic poem

• 1918: RAF Crugmeer (Padstow airfield) operational until 1919

• 1922: New Polzeath tennis courts open (repurposed a car park in 1938)

• 1922: Maycocks Art shop opens Polzeath (until 1966) now TJ’s

• 1923: Polzeath Seminars given by Carl Jung

• 1925: Two breakwaters built for Port Isaac

• 1927: Trebetherick Telephone Exchange laid in June (the 1957 Exchange building is still on site opposite the St Moritz turning)

• 1927: Piped water from Crowdy reservoir turned on by the King

• 1927: BP petrol sold from new PO stores. Shell petrol sold opposite Couch Garage

• 1928: Greystones Private Hotel built in New Polzeath (70’s renamed Pentire Rocks Hotel but short lived and now private housing complex called Pentire Rocks)

• 1929: Tinners Hill, annex to “Pemberton”, for Lady Wills of Wills Tobacco, Bristol

• 1935: National Trust acquires Pentire and the Rumps (Pentireglaze land acquired later)

• 1934: Polzeath road bridge built, replaces footbridge and ford

• 1935: The Polzeath block of shops built on the site of Couch’s Tea Rooms. Will include Dairy and Stotts Newsagents. Today shops centered on Spar

• 1936: “Penglaze”, the only house on the beach at Pentireglaze Haven, built

• 1937: “Stepper”, first house built on the Greenaway cliffs by Lewis Brown of Wadebridge

• 1937: RNAS St Merryn, HMS Vulture l (closed 1956)

• 1938; Polzeath and Trebetherick get electricity 

• 1939: HMS Vulture ll at Treligga airfield (until 1955)

• 1939: HMS Media wrecked on Greenaway rocks

• 1939 RAF / USAAF St Eval airfield (until 1960’s)

• 1940: RAF St Mawgan airfield (until 2013 RAF)

• 1940: German invasion expected (Dunkirk May 26th - June 4th). Home guard started, mines and barbed wire put into sand dunes around Daymer Bay

• 1941: West Hill Park school evacuated to Atlantic House Hotel (until 1945)

• 1942: Davidstow Airfield (RAF until 1945)

• 1942: Trebetherick Royal Observer Corps operate from Pentireglaze (until 1968)

• 1943: American B-17 Flying Fortress forced to make an emergency landing at Treligga (HMS Vulture II) 

• 1944: Minefield "HW A3", fatal to U-1021, laid by HMS Apollo 3 near Trevose

• 1945: Valley Caravan Park started by William A Taylor. Now owned and run by Martin Taylor

• 1946: St Moritz hotel opens 

• 1946: Polzeath WI moved to Trewint

• 1948: “North Coast Recollections” in John Betjeman's Selected Poems published

• 1950s: Polzeath Lodge Hotel becomes Pinewood flats

• 1948: Lingham Club for ex servicemen and women (later becomes Carters Pub)

• 1949: David Lean and stars film part of “Madelaine” on beach (although film noir set in Glasgow) 

• 1952: Formula 1 on Davidstow airfield track until 1955

• 1960 : Underground Nuclear Bunker built at Pentireglaze for Trebetherick ROC (until 1968)

• 1962: Hawker's Cove lifeboat station decommissioned, new station built at Trevose Head

• 1967: railway to Wadebridge closed

• 1970: Strongbow Explorations Ltd acquires mineral rights in area. Name changed to Cornish Metals Limited in 2020

• 1974 Anne’s Cottage store starts

• 1976: “The Eagle has Landed” filmed in sand dunes between Rock and Daymer Bay

• 1975: Poldark first TV series filmed, Doyden for Dr. Enys' surgery and house until 1977

• 1979: Skopelos Sky (Gk) wrecked off Port Quin. Crew all saved by helicopter

• 1982: Reinforcement of the cliffs below Atlantic Terrace New Polzeath 

• 1983: Mini Series “Jamaica Inn” filmed Polzeath and Port Quin

• 1984: John Betjeman buried St Enodoc

• 1990: Polzeath Surf Life Saving Club (PSLSC) formed

• 1991: UK’s first commercial windfarm at Delabole opened

• 1993: Tom Kay starts Finisterre from back of car sometimes based in Polzeath

• 1995: Wreck of Maria Asumpta at The Rumps. Three crew drowned

• 1995: Fisherman's Friends formed, signed record deal 2010. films: 2019 and 2022

• 1997: “Swept from the Sea”, film cast, including Sir Ian McKellan, stay in Polzeath 

• 2000: “Saving Grace” film released. Doc Martin 2004-2022 (80 episodes)

• 2004: Flooding at Boscastle

• 2006: Tubestation born in Methodist “school hall” at chapel corner

• 2024: Plans to build seaweed farm in Port Quin Bay

Thank you for helping compile this list of dates related to Polzeath's rich history.  

I’m sharing the latest update but realise there’s so much more to add! 

Can you help?

If you have any local knowledge or can make corrections to the list please let me know. 

Bill Bartlett, 1 Polzeath Court, New Polzeath, PL27 6UA 

0748 646 1998

email wnbartlett@gmail.com