Lower Swansea Valley - History

History

Over a period of about 150 years up until the 1920s, the open valley of the River Tawe became one of the most heavily industrialised areas of the developed world. There were a number of reasons that favoured the great expansion of industry in this particular location. The general exploitation of coal in the South Wales coalfield of the South Wales valleys had revealed seams of steam coal and anthracite close to the surface in the Upper Swansea valley and these were easily exploited by shallow drift mining or open cast mining. Smelting metals required more than three parts of coal to every one part of metal ore, so it was of major economic benefit to have easily available, high quality coal. Swansea also had a good port and safe anchorage. The combination of these two factors meant that it was financially more viable to bring the ore to Swansea's coal than take the coal to the ore. In addition, the very high tidal ranges at Swansea allowed deep draught ships to access the river mouth. This allowed large quantities of raw materials to be brought in (allowing further profit through economies of scale)and, more importantly, the finished products, such as sheet copper, tinplate, alum, porcelain and coal to be exported.

The technologies involved in iron making had already been developed and refined, and skilled craftsmen were readily available to extend the newly developing industry. Swansea was already a town of significant size which could provide the required workforce. The growth of the industry in the Lower Swansea valley itself caused a great expansion in the population of Swansea and nearby Neath. A number of wealthy entrepreneurs, scientists and engineers of considerable ability were drawn to Swansea during this period, which in turn, promoted great innovation in the industrial processes.

Initially, the smelting works concentrated on copper. Coal was brought down to them by waggonways and tramways; copper ore was brought on ships which could sail right up to the works; and the resulting copper was exported out again the same way. Swansea became known as Copperopolis; and the lower Tawe valley became a mass of industry. In the wake of the copper and coal industry followed pottery-making (another industry which requires large amounts of coal, together with clay and flint, which could be shipped in from the West Country); the alum industry (based on pyrites found with coal); and the manufacture of fire-clay, which was used to line furnaces.