Harvey's Foundry

In 1779, John Harvey, a blacksmith from Carnhell Green, Gwinear set up a small foundry by the Penpol River in Hayle. He had spotted a gap in the market in providing tools and iron pumps for the tin and copper mines of the district. The business flourished and by 1800 employed more than 50 people and it went from strength to strength through both professional and family partnerships with a series of great engineers and entrepreneurs including Richard Trevithick, William West and Arthur Woolf gave the firm a level of expertise unmatched in Cornwall.

Harvey's quickly became what we would describe today as an integrated business and had many different facets. The range of goods produced and the services provided are as impressive as any modern multi-national company.   The bread and butter trade of producing hand tools and providing haulage and general merchant services was never neglected.   In 1790 John Harvey undertook to cast a 9cwt tenor bell for Stithians Church, which is still in use today.

Harvey's Foundry Barn in restoration

In 1772 Harvey's built their first steam powered pumping engine based on a Newcomen design. Following the marriage of John Harvey's daughter to Richard Trevithick in 1797, in 1801 parts for Trevithick's Steam Road Vehicle were made by Harvey's. In 1802 the first steam powered rock drill was designed produced by Harvey's of Hayle.   In 1803, the founder, John Harvey died but the business went on to even greater heights under the management of his son Henry and the growing reputation of Harvey's engineers. It was Richard Trevithick who developed the use of high pressure steam making engines much more powerful and efficient. In 1812

The drawing office used by Richard Trevithick amongst others at the rear of Harvey's Offices. The clock was restored in 2000.

The first engine to incorporate both a high pressure and low pressure cylinder was installed at Wheal Prosper, Gwithian near Hayle and was made by Harvey & Co.

The Foundry consumed large quantities of Coal and iron, all of which had to be brought in by ship, most of it coming from South Wales. Some materials were however much closer to hand. The casting of from required a fine sand which could hold its shape. Into the sand highly polished wooden patterns would be pressed and carefully removed leaving an impression into which molten metal could be poured. The local beach sand was tried but was not suitable. Fortunately the perfect sand was to be had less than two miles inland at St Erth. The St. Erth Sand Pits, became a  bustling centre of activity from which clay and molding sand was extracted to supply both Harvey's and the Cornish Copper Company. It became known as Vicarage Sand since the pits were on land beside to old vicarage at St Erth. Harvey's eventually bought the St Erth sand pits in 1899. Today the pits remain and are a nature and geological reserve managed by Cornwall Wildlife Trust.

Recent excavation at Harvey's Foundry site uncovered a number previously unknown adits driven into the hill behind Harvey's works under the plantation. Tools found in them confirmed that they had been dug and worked during the foundry's hay-day. but it seems that they were concealed. The purpose of the tunnels is something of a mystery since there are no tin or copper bearing rocks in the vicinity, a fact well known even to the Harvey's, It has been speculated that the purpose of the tunnels may have been to extract magnesium which was added to the Iron in order to improve its quality and this 'secret recipe' was the reason for the apparent concealment of the tunnels.

The Millpond, constructed by Harveys in the 1790s to power the Grist and Hammer Mills and to provide water for the Foundry

While Harvey's were developing their business in the South of Hayle, at Copperhouse in the North the Cornish Copper Company were also expanding their business interests. The two inevitably became rivals. The growing hostility between the two firms became violent and battles erupted between the two sets of employees. Harvey's and the Copper Company sought to develop and improve their respective sections of the harbour, hostility between the rival concerns reached new heights of bitterness, involving boundary, disputes, physical confrontation and legal action.

At Copperhouse a dam with sluice gates was built by The Cornish Copper Company across the eastern arm o the harbour to keep back the water at high tide and release it. The effect being to sweep silt and sand from the channel and kept the river clear for ../navigation.

Unlike their rivals The Cornish Copper Company, Harvey's had only a small area of land and so the opportunity to provide housing for the workers was mush less, however, the decision to increase the stabling and have a large number of draught horses on site resulted in the decision, in 1819, to build a terrace of houses on Drovers Row (now called Foundry Hill) to house the drovers who needed to the near the horses.   After a long legal battle, work on the quay at Penpol began in 1830 and a sluicing reservoir to keep the channel clear was provided by the construction of Carnsew Pool. At about the same time. Mr R Millet, a director of the Cornish Copper Company died. Mr Millet had owned Penpol Manor and the land below the millpond and had restricted the growth of Harvey's. A boundary stone denoting the boundary of the Penpol Estate can still be seen in the wall by Philps Bakery in Foundry. With Mr Millett out of the way Harvey's were able to buy the land and began construction or Mill Row (now Tremeadow Terrace) and Penpol Road.   It has been suggested that during daylight hours when the tide was out, workers were set to work on constructing the quays, when the tide was in workers would transfer to build the houses.

Tremeadow Terrace (formerly Mill Row) as seen through an arch into the Millpond Gardens where the Grist Mill once stood   Penpol Creek today

While impressive Cornish Beam Engines were the most visible and high profile element of the Harvey Business Empire, much of Harvey & Co's profit actually arose from the import and selling of coal, timber and building materials through Hayle. With  merchant trade well established, Harvey's set about establishing a coastal packet service to carry goods and passengers between Hayle and Bristol. Not content with just shipping goods Harvey & Co elected to actually build ships and a shipbuilding yard was constructed on site where Jewson's now stands.

They built barques and brigantines, paddle wheel and screw steamers. At first, in the years following 1795, they produced wooden sailing vessels for their own use, with frames built of local oak and planking from pine, imported from Norway and Canada. Later they began to build composite ships with iron frames and wooden planking. Harvey's first outside commission came in 1846 with the building of steam-driven iron tugs for the Rhine. Harvey’s expanded its shipyard into one of the principal elements of its business. Ships such as the packet steamer Herald and Lady of the Isles were built and provided a packet (cargo and good) service to Bristol and the Isles of Scilly respectively.  By 1832 the Cornwall joined the Herald on the regular service joining from Hayle to Bristol.

Such facilities as had been provided by Harvey's at Foundry were very much for the benefit of the company and not the employees.  Hotels to entertain their business visitors, a school for their workers, shops and emporiums (company stores), for the employees run by the firm itself independent shops were not permitted.   When this policy was finally brought to an end an number of shops quickly established. These so called 'Garden Shops' were literally built in the front gardens of existing buildings and are still evident in modern Hayle.

'Garden Shops' in Hayle

Between 1843 and 1849 Harvey's built the largest Cornish Beam Engines ever made. They used the compound high/low pressure engine but unusually had the high pressure 213cm diameter cylinder contained within the low pressure 366cm cylinder.

Rather than the single beam of traditional Cornish Engines this engine actually drove 11 beams arranged in a circle around the engine itself. The combined effect o these beams and pumps was the ability to raise over 120 tons of water on each 10 foot stroke. Three such engines were build and exported to the Netherlands where they were used to drain Haarlemmer. These engines continued working until the 1930s when they were eventually  replaced my modern pumps. One of the engines, the Cruquius engine actually remained as a back-up until the 1960s when it was finally decommissioned. It was then retired and has recently been restored as a working museum.

The restored Cruquius Engine at Haarlemmer built by Harvey's of Hayle

Following the death of Henry Harvey in 1850 Nicholas Harvey took over the management of the company not only expanding the shipbuilding industry but also diversifying Harvey's interests by expanding onto the south coast at Portleven where the a harbour was built. Hayle Foundry was now produced an ever growing range of goods, not only steam engines of all sizes, and mining equipment ranging from pumps to picks and shovels but also a range of domestic ware such as cooking ranges, cast iron window frames, and ornamental ironware. The company also stated to produce catalogues of its products and was one of the pioneers of the mail-order trade The name Harvey was synonymous with quality. Such was the reputation of Harvey's of Hayle that they were invited to mount a display at the Great Exhibition of 1851.

The steam packed business from Hayle to Bristol was doing well, so well that it was decided that a new ship be built to ply the route. It was in 1858 one of Harvey's most famous ships the Cornubia was built. However the opening up of the Great Western Railway into Cornwall led to the swift decline of the service and the Cornubia was sold off to the American Confederacy within three years. 

The shipbuilding yard was expanded again in 1888 with new slipways, boilerworks and machine shops, intended to compete on a national level with other yards, building in 1891 the SS Ramleh, at 4000 tons the largest ship ever built in Cornwall. The shipyard, closely followed by the quay-based trades, became the main employer in Hayle, in effect compensating for the foundry business was declining in the late 1800's. By the time that the shipyard closed in 1893 some 80 ships had been built.   In the 1850s the grist mill (sited in what is now the Millpond Gardens), and Harvey's drapery and emporium were sold off to JH Trevithick, son of Richard Trevithick and Jane Harvey. As the Cornish mining Industry declined so did the fortunes of Harveys Foundry.

White's Carpet Warehouse was originally Harvey's Emporium before being sold to JH Trevithick

Harvey's finally acquired its rival the Cornish Copper Company in 1875, but by then the both companies were in serious decline. Overseas markets for engines and equipment became vital and Harvey's steam engines and other equipment was exported to Mexico, south America, South Africa and Australia and preserved Harvey's engines can be found worldwide. It is also important to appreciate the many non-mining uses for which engines were built and famous preserved engines can be seen at Crofton where they pumped water for the canal system and a Kew, where they provided the water supply for London.

The last great undertaking by Harvey's Foundry was construction of a series of engines to pump water from Brunel's Severn Tunnel in. Between 1879 and 1883 and they continued in use well into the 1960s before eventually being replaced by more modern pumping units. At least two of the engines themselves were dismantled and taken to Cardiff for storage with the expectation that it might be displayed at some time in the future at the now closed Cardiff Industrial Museum.

Harvey's Foundry closed in 1903 and the shipbuilding yard had become a ship breakers in 1893 and continued as such for some considerable time.

After the closure of Harvey's various attempts were made to resuscitate the shipbuilding industry. During the First World War, Admiralty representatives visited Hayle to review the possibility of once again building ships on Harvey's premises. In the 1920s, machinery for barge and ship construction was installed but it was not until the Second World War that shipbuilding recommenced at Hayle with the building of D-day landing craft and defence vessels.

Harvey & Co survived  as a general and builders merchants until 1969 when it was merged with UBM to become Harvey-UBM.