Long Grass Quarry

Overview

A small slate quarry cut into the sea cliff between Tintagel and Trebarwith Strand, reached by flights of wooden ladders down the rock face, and the last of the north Cornish coastal slate quarries to be abandoned.

History

Slate was taken from the cliffs between Tintagel church and Trebarwith Strand from perhaps the fifteenth century, and Long Grass Quarry, also called Cliff Quarry, was the last of them at work. It is on the 1884 Ordnance Survey map, and was expanded considerably between 1907 and 1937, the later working destroying many of the earlier buildings. Quarrymen went down to the faces by flights of wooden ladders on the sheer cliff, to the left of a small box cave tunnelled at its foot, where the best slate on the site was found; iron handrails, chains and stanchions were driven into the rock to help them. It was dangerous work above the sea. In 1886 three men drilling the face were carried into the water when the rock they stood on snapped off, and a quarryman named Reuben Tinney died here in 1936, the year before the quarry closed. Slate went out by sea: boats moored below the cliffs at Tintagel Cove were loaded by a derrick perched on the edge, and at Penhallic Point the cliff was cut back to a hundred-foot vertical face so that ships could lie against it in deep water and take slate lowered by crane.

Geology

Upper Devonian and Lower Carboniferous slates of a greyish-green colour, used mostly for roofing; the slate inside the box cave at the foot of the cliff was of exceptional quality.

Workings

The workings run about 70 m along the cliff and reach 59 m in height. Access was by flights of wooden ladders down the face, with iron handrails, chains and stanchions fixed into the rock, and a box cave tunnelled at the foot of the cliff.

Closure

Work ended in 1937, the last of the coastal slate quarries between Tintagel and Trebarwith to be abandoned. By then the quarry was doing little but extracting and dressing stone.

What remains

Disused. The quarry faces stand open to the sea, and the fixings for the ladders remain in the rock.

A strip of ten small buildings, probably slate-dressing sheds, survives, with possible ruins of splitting sheds at the southern end destroyed as the quarry expanded after 1907, and the remains of iron handrails, chains and stanchions in the cliff face. A Cornwall Archaeological Unit survey in 1990 recorded traces of splitting huts, a tramway and a small twentieth-century concrete structure.

Related mines

• Bagalow Quarry — Another of the coastal slate quarries on the same stretch between Tintagel and Trebarwith.
• Lambshouse and Gull Point Quarry — The next quarry north along the coast; the youth hostel building between them served Lambshouse.
• Lanterdan Quarry — Another of the coastal quarries on the same stretch; Long Grass was the last of them at work.
• Prince of Wales Quarry — A neighbouring Tintagel slate quarry.
• Tintagel Slate Quarries — Long Grass is one of the coastal slate quarries covered by the Tintagel record.

Nearby mines

• Lambshouse and Gull Point Quarry — 0.2 km S
• Gillow Slate Quarry — 0.5 km NE
• Lanterdan Quarry — 1.2 km S
• Tintagel Slate Quarries — 1.2 km S
• Bowithick Quarry — 1.3 km S

Straight-line distance, within 15 km. Show on the map.

Recorded claims

Individual factual claims, each attached to the source(s) that support it below. Where sources disagree, both are kept.

• Long Grass Quarry appears on the 1884 Ordnance Survey map, was expanded considerably between 1907 and 1937, and closed in 1937 as the last of the Tintagel coastal slate quarries at work. ^1,2
• Men reached the faces by flights of wooden ladders down the sheer cliff, to the left of a box cave tunnelled at its foot. ^1,2
• The quarry worked greyish-green Upper Devonian and Lower Carboniferous slate for roofing, the best of it from inside the box cave. ²
• Three men were killed in 1886 when the rock they were drilling fell into the sea, and the quarryman Reuben Tinney died in 1936. ^1,2
• Slate was loaded into boats moored below the cliffs at Tintagel Cove by a derrick on the cliff edge, and at Penhallic Point from a wharf where the cliff was cut back to a hundred-foot face. ¹
• The workings extend about 70 m in length and reach 59 m in height. ²

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (secondary) Tintagel Slate Quarries, Cornwall — Cornwall Calling
2. (secondary) Long Grass Quarry — Wikipedia

Record created: 23 September 2026 · Last researched: 24 September 2026