Early Years
The new railway was operated by gravity and horse traction; Murray's handbook said in 1856:
Towards evening the produce of the mines and quarries is brought down to Moorswater in detached trucks, which follow one another in succession, under the control of breaksmen, and are drawn back the next day by horses.
Because of this tidal flow arrangement, frequent passing loops were not necessary. Contrary to what was contemplated before the Act, the Company was its own carrier, with the possible exception of the granite traffic from Cheesewring.
The track was T-section rail in chairs fixed to stone blocks. It was laid to standard gauge (4ft 8½in, 1435 mm). Speed was limited to 12 mph (19 km/h), half that over level crossings. It was graded at about 1 in 60 (1.7%) for most of its length.
The Company was immediately successful, with considerable and increasing tonnages conveyed: 10,000 tons were carried in 1849, and net profit was £364. About 70% of the carrying was metal ore downwards, with nearly 30% being coal uphill to fuel the mine engines; the remainder was granite – although this did not realise the volumes originally contemplated – timber, sand, lime, iron and sundries.
The route of the railway was from close to the dressing floors of the South Caradon Mine, south and then westwards on the slope of the valley below Darite, crossing under the road at Polwrath Bridge, and the south-west, turning back eastwards across the northern margin of St Cleer. Passing south of Venland Cross, the course then turned west again to Tremabe. It was here that the line terminated in 1844; it is likely that there was no depot here, but simply that the individual wagons were stopped alongside the road and the ores trans-shipped there.
At the same time, a branch from near the Cheesewring Quarry – the owner, John Trethewey had internal sidings – ran broadly south, crossing through what became Minions village, and then descending by the incline at Gonamena, passing South Caradon further up the hillside, and running parallel to the main line, descending and joining it at Polwrath Bridge.
When the line was extended in 1846 from Tremabe to Moorswater, it ran west at first, soon turning back on a curve of 3 chains radius (66 yards, 60 m) at Old Treworgy, then turning south and then west, finally descending with the East Looe River all the way to Moorswater, where there were sidings adjacent to the Canal basin.
Read more about this topic: Liskeard And Caradon Railway
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