Par Docks is an

Imerys Imerys S.A. is a French multinational company which specialises in the production and processing of industrial minerals. It is headquartered in Paris and is a constituent of the CAC Mid 60 index. Imerys has operations in over 40 countries and ...

-owned

harbour A harbor (American English), harbour (British English; see spelling differences), or haven is a sheltered body of water where ships, boats, and barges can be docked. The term ''harbor'' is often used interchangeably with ''port'', which is a ...

in the village of Par,

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

, United Kingdom, which was used for the export of

china clay Kaolinite ( ) is a clay mineral, with the chemical composition Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4. It is an important industrial mineral. It is a layered silicate mineral, with one tetrahedral sheet of silica () linked through oxygen atoms to one octahedral ...

from the numerous Imerys sites in the clay-rich region of Mid-Cornwall.

History

Joseph Treffry Joseph Austen Treffry (1782 – 29 January 1850) was an engineer, mining adventurer, and industrialist who became a significant landowner in Cornwall, England. Biography Born in Plymouth, Devon as Joseph Thomas Austen, to Joseph Austen (d 1786 ...

(born Joseph Austen in 1782) was the owner of the

Fowey Consols mine Fowey Consols mine is a group of mines in the St Blazey district of Cornwall. They were owned by wealthy Cornishman, Joseph Treffry. The mines were worked by 6 steam engines and 17 waterwheels. The mines were linked to the port at Par by a can ...

and wanted a harbour to export

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...

and import

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

. He started work on a harbour in the small cove of Porth in 1829. The first ships used it in 1833 and it was finished in 1840. The

breakwater Breakwater may refer to: * Breakwater (structure), a structure for protecting a beach or harbour Places * Breakwater, Victoria, a suburb of Geelong, Victoria, Australia * Breakwater Island Breakwater Island () is a small island in the Palme ...

enclosed of harbour and was capable of taking up to about 50 vessels of 200 tons each. The port is tidal so the vessels would sit on the bottom at low tide. Cornish

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

was exported from Par in the early days for such famous landmarks as

Waterloo Bridge Waterloo Bridge () is a road and foot traffic bridge crossing the River Thames in London, between Blackfriars Bridge and Hungerford Bridge and Golden Jubilee Bridges. Its name commemorates the victory of the British, Dutch and Prussians at the ...

in London,

Chatham Docks Medway Ports, incorporating the Port of Sheerness and Chatham Docks is part of Peel Ports, the second largest port group in the United Kingdom. The Ports authority is also responsible for the harbour, pilotage and conservancy matters for of ...

, Gibraltar Docks & Glasgow Docks. As the china clay industry grew in the area during the 19th century this became the main export through the docks. According to the Imerys Blueprint For Cornwall published in 2003: 1858 – 15,154 tons of china clay went out through Par 1885 – 86,325 tons 1987 – 700,000 tons 2002 – 313,425 tons + 134,810 tons of aggregates Treffry Estates sold the harbour to English China Clay (ECC) in 1964 having leased it to them since 1946. In the 1950s and 1960s, vast dryers were built on-site. The current Grade Dryer was built in 1996. In 2007 the port and some of the clay dries (those dealing with clay for the paper industry) closed with the loss of 200 jobs. All shipping for clay now goes to

Fowey Fowey ( ; kw, Fowydh, meaning 'Beech Trees') is a port town and civil parish at the mouth of the River Fowey in south Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The town has been in existence since well before the Norman invasion, with the local ch ...

. The port is still the site of a Milling Centre and a Grade Dryer and this continued industrial usage means ECO-BOS's ideas for a marina and residential Eco-village on the dis-used dryer site to the west of the docks is unlikely to come to fruition. The port is used by vessels servicing the St Austell Bay Mussel Farm.

The Stack

The port was famous for its “Stack” – the chimney of a

lead smelter Plants for the production of lead are generally referred to as lead smelters. Primary lead production begins with sintering. Concentrated lead ore is fed into a sintering machine with iron, silica, limestone fluxes, coke, soda ash, pyrite, zinc, ...

that had to be demolished in 1907 after it was hit by lightning – and for its low-roofed engines Alfred & Judy (Bagnall 0-4-0ST), the inspiration for Bill & Ben in Rev W Awdry’s children’s books about

Thomas The Tank Engine Thomas the Tank Engine is an anthropomorphised fictional tank locomotive in the British ''Railway Series'' books by Wilbert Awdry and his son, Christopher, published from 1945. He became the most popular and famous character in the series, a ...

after his visit to the docks in 1966. The port is still served by a rail line from

St Blazey St Blazey ( kw, Lanndreth) is a small town in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. St Blaise is the civil parish in which St Blazey is situated; the name St Blaise is also used by the town council. The village of Biscovey and the settlements of ...

and still has the occasional early morning train. The old St Blazey to Fowey railway closed in 1968 and was turned into a

haul road A haul video is a video recording, posted to the Internet, in which a person discusses items that they recently purchased, sometimes going into detail about their experiences during the purchase and the cost of the items they bought. The posting of ...

for the clay lorries delivering to the port of Fowey. They access this haul road on the Docks site. Par Docks at Low Tide

References

{{Cornwall Ports and harbours of Cornwall Imerys St Blazey