Friday 4th June 2010 - Rosebush

After yesterday's longer than normal walk, we decided to have a quiet day today. In the afternoon we walked to the Pant Mawr cheese farm and bought a selection of cheeses. We were told that they also sell on the Internet and, as it is their 25th year, they are offering a special discount on the 25th of each month.
I decided to do some exploring on my own and headed for the quarries.
Rosebush has an interesting history, only being created in the 1870's. Before this it was a wilderness with just two small slate quarries on the hillside. In 1869 Edward Cropper, a retired merchant banker from Kent, with the assistance of Joseph Macaulay, bought the run-down quarries, improved the quarrying technology and expanded the output. They spent a fortune building a connection to the GWR railway in order to transport the slate and in 1876 it was also opened for passengers. They built cottages for the quarry workers and the village came into existence, named Rosebush after the quarry. Lilly ponds were dug close to the station (now in the grounds of the caravan park) together with Chinese pagodas, rockeries and shrubs to form a pleasure garden. The tourists were attracted to Rosebush by the fresh air, scenery and relaxed atmosphere. Unfortunately, the high price of slate that had encouraged the quarry development, collapsed in 1876. This together with a short tourist season meant that the venture was not viable, output from the quarry fell and the railway closed in 1882. Although the railway reopened in 1895, the quarries produced little more slate. In 1937 the railway was closed to passengers, closing completely for the last time in 1949.
The quarries are now abandoned but are some of the best preserved in South Wales and coming from a quarrying background, I was keen to investigate them. I worked for a company that produced crushed limestone and granite and was used to seeing huge piles of waste that consisted largely of clay. These quarries were very different – all of the faces were solid stone. I was surprised to see neatly demarcated benches, a feature of modern quarries not often seen in old quarries. The reason for this was not health and safety, it allowed workers to win rock from multiple levels at the same time, increasing production efficiency. Although there was no clay in the rock there were absolutely huge waste tips everywhere. They produced slab slate (for doorways, lintels, flooring etc.) and roofing slates of many sizes but slate is very difficult to work and the rejection rate must have been huge.
Above the main Rosebush quarry I found the small flooded workings that Gareth Williams had told me about. The reservoir here was used to power a turbine in the slate finishing shed below and also supplied the drinking water for the village. There were also vestiges of a tramway used to transport waste to the tips and good slate from the faces down to the finishing shed and the railway. As with all stone quarries, transport was a very expensive part of the cost of the final product. Rail provided a much cheaper method of transport than road. Transport by ship was even cheaper and this is why much of the output from the coastal quarries went by ship to Bristol and other South West England ports. Even transporting roofing slate, a relatively expensive value-added product, from Rosebush to the sea could cost as much as the slate was sold for ex-quarry.
I descended to the bottom of the valley having collected a sample of Rosebush slates from the waste tips on the way. On the opposite side of the now non-existent railway line is the old railway engine shed. Gareth had told me a story about this. His father explained that the engine driver had gone in to the Precelly Hotel for a few pints before he returned to take the loco back down the valley. He went into the engine shed and neglected to engage reverse gear – he went straight though the end wall of the shed, leaving a perfect loco-shaped hole in the brickwork. Unfortunately, the wall has long since collapsed but it is a lovely story and it is easy to understand why the current railway companies have a zero tolerance to alcohol for their employees!
Photos: The Rosebush Quarry – imagine quarrymen on each bench splitting slate from the faces; One of the tunnels in Rosebush Quarry used for access to lower levels and also for drainage; The reservoir used not only to power the turbine in the finishing shed but also as the villages water supply; The vast waste tips of the quarries.