Topics

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Our growing collection of Topics explores the people, places, events and stories that have shaped St Breward.

Each Topic provides an introduction to its subject, illustrated where possible with photographs and other material, and connects you directly to related records in our Archive. Start with something that catches your interest, then follow the links and see where they take you.

And the story keeps growing. Nearly 4,000 photographs with searchable information have recently been added to the Archive, and 25 years of Parish Magazines will shortly join them. As new material is added, our Topics will become richer too, revealing new connections and sometimes new stories.

Is there a person, place or subject you’d like us to explore? Let us know through our Contact page.

All Topics

Bible Christian Chapel — Providence House

Providence Chapel opened at Row on New Year's Day 1871, replacing the Bible Christians' smaller 1848 chapel nearby — the building later used by St Breward Silver Band. As the congregation grew, a gallery was added, leaving a debt which the community eventually rallied together to clear.

Bolts Quarry

Hidden beside Penvorder Lane is the flooded remains of a small nineteenth-century granite quarry associated with the Bolt family. Once a place of stone-working and heavy labour, the abandoned quarry gradually returned to nature — and its former workings now provide a very different kind of habitat.

Church Lane

Church Lane is one of many footpaths in the parish used as short cuts when going on foot or horseback to work, church or school.

Churchtown

Churchtown is the historic heart of St Breward, clustered around the Parish Church and Old Inn. Today it is a quiet corner of the village, but for generations it was a busy centre of worship, trade, education, markets and celebration — sometimes crowded with cattle, stalls and people from across the district.

Coombe Mill

Beside the River Camel, Coombe Mill once used water power to grind grain for the surrounding community. But corn wasn't the only thing processed here. The mill also had a pound house where apples were crushed for cider — with a donkey providing the power by walking patiently round and round.

Hawken Manor – Higher Penquite

Hawken Manor stands at Higher Penquite, one of St Breward's old hamlets. The property has long associations with the Hawken family, a name which appears repeatedly in the history of the parish. Its fuller story remains to be uncovered.

Historic Dwellings at Row

Among Row's chapels, shops and community buildings are older cottages which recall the people who lived and worked in this once-distinct hamlet. Harley Cottage and neighbouring Laburnum Cottage have associations with the nineteenth-century working village, when mining, farming, trade and transport shaped everyday life.

Mine Hill

The quiet slopes of Mine Hill hide the remains of St Breward's most important venture into underground mining. From the 1840s, miners searched here for copper and other minerals, sinking shafts more than 100 fathoms deep. Traces of this ambitious but ultimately unsuccessful enterprise can still be found in the landscape.

Modlin Lane

Running downhill from Church Lane beside the churchyard, old Modlin Lane passes Glebe Farm and the former Victorian Vicarage before reaching a stream crossed by a wonderfully simple granite bridge — two slabs of granite laid side by side from bank to bank. Together, lane and bridge preserve an older route through Churchtown.

Parish Church of St Breward

Cornwall’s highest parish church, St Breward preserves evidence of many centuries of village history, from the earliest days of Christianity in Cornwall to the present-day community.

Row

Row gradually became the centre of everyday village life as shops and services gathered here from the late nineteenth century. Stores, Post Office, butcher, chapels and Bandroom have all played their part. Many have now become homes, but the Silver Band and new Community Shop continue the story.

Row Mill, Duck Street and Tor Down Stream

A wooden footbridge crosses Tor Down Stream near the remains of a former watermill, Row Mill, which continued grinding animal feed until the Second World War. Cobbled Duck Street — also known as Mill Lane — once led to the mill, whose eighteenth-century owner’s house still stands nearby.

Rylands

Between Churchtown and Row lies Rylands, an open area of common grazing land at the heart of St Breward. Its name is traditionally said to recall poor ground where rye could be grown, while its common grazing rights preserve a much older pattern of land use.

St Breward Community Shop

St Breward's Community Shop is a modern chapter in the village's long history of providing for itself. Owned for the benefit of the community and supported by local volunteers, it provides everyday goods and services from its home at Row — continuing a tradition of village shops stretching back generations. Topic introduction

St Breward Football Club

St Breward Football Club has roots stretching back to the late nineteenth century. Before finding a permanent home at Brake Parc, generations of village footballers played on several different pitches around the parish, including fields at Churchtown and the Lank.

St Breward Silver Bandroom

St Breward Silver Band has been part of village life since 1899. Its modest bandroom at Row has an even older history, having once been a Bible Christian chapel and later a corn store. During the band's long occupation it has been enlarged and adapted — but remains the home of a remarkably enduring village tradition.

St Breward Village Hall

Built in 1852 as St Breward's village school, this granite building educated generations of local children before beginning a new life as the Village Hall. More than 170 years after it was built, it remains a place where the community comes together — although for rather different reasons.

St Breward Village School

St Breward's present village school opened in 1930, replacing the old school at Churchtown. Standing at the lower end of the historic Church Path, it has been part of village life for nearly a century. The History Archive preserves photographs and documents recording generations of school life.

St Breward War Memorial

Standing prominently on Mine Hill, St Breward's War Memorial was unveiled in 2010 — although it was by no means the village's first memorial to those who served and died in war. Made from local De Lank granite, its creation was very much a community effort.

St James' Holy Well

Hidden beside Chapel Farm is a small late-medieval granite well-house dedicated to St James. Nearby once stood a chapel recorded as early as 1422. The chapel has disappeared, but its holy well survives — a modest reminder of a much older religious landscape beneath the later working farm.

Taggart's Platt

Why should a St Breward footpath be called Tiger's Platt? The answer may lie with a Victorian vicar. The Reverend John Tagert served the parish for only a few years, but his name apparently became attached to this path — and over time “Tagert's Platt” evolved into the much more intriguing “Tiger's Platt”.

The AA Road Sign and Early Shop

Fixed to The Gables opposite the church is a rare survivor from the early days of motoring — an AA village sign erected in 1922. But the cottage has an older story too: from the late 1700s it was home to a village shop that grew to supply an extraordinary range of goods and services.

The Ancient Cross and Churchyard

This remarkable granite cross-head may be more than a thousand years old — predating the present church. It now stands amongst generations of St Breward burials, but has had an eventful history of its own, including several decades spent in the village school playground.

The Methodist Chapel at Row

Methodism played an important part in the life of Row. An earlier Sunday School provided religious teaching and a meeting place for local people before its loss during the Second World War. The present building dates from 1957, its foundation stone laid by the distinguished Cornish politician Isaac Foot.

The Old Inn & Parish House

The Old Inn has long been one of St Breward's social landmarks, once hosting auctions and concerts as well as generations of customers. Beside it formerly stood the Parish House, while the open space outside became the scene of village fairs and livestock markets. Together they made Churchtown a busy centre of community life.

The Old Police House & Policing in St Breward

Once home to St Breward's resident policeman, the Old Police House recalls a time when the village had its own local officer. But policing here has an older history: before the creation of the Cornwall Constabulary in 1856, keeping order was the responsibility of locally appointed parish constables.

Tor Down Quarry

Granite was being commercially quarried at Tor Down by the mid-nineteenth century, with stone said to have been supplied for the rebuilding of Bodmin Gaol. The quarry later grew into a substantial industrial operation whose granite travelled far beyond Cornwall. Today its flooded workings have become part of the moorland landscape once again.

Victorian Post Box

A surviving Victorian in-wall letterbox at Churchtown, set into the former village stores opposite St Breward Church.

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