Quay Foot Quarry

Overview

Quay Foot is a disused green slate quarry in Borrowdale, on the road from Keswick towards Honister and about a mile south of Grange, close to the Bowder Stone. Its slate went into the nineteenth-century building of Keswick and the villages around. It belonged to the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries, whose 1930 return gives it two men underground and one at surface — and it had gone from the company's list by 1935.

History

Borrowdale slate and stone was extracted at several places in the valley — Honister, Yew Crag, Dubs, Rigghead, Quay Foot and other smaller sites — and has provided a livelihood for people in Borrowdale for over three hundred and fifty years. The stone from Quay Foot is green slate, used extensively in the nineteenth-century development of Keswick and most likely of the nearby villages too. The quarry was photographed in 1857 by John Wheeley Gough Gutch, and that photograph is now in the J. Paul Getty Museum's collection — an unusually early image of a working Lakeland quarry, and evidence that Quay Foot was of some consequence by the middle of the century. By 1930 it belonged to the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries Ltd. of Keswick, whose return for that year lists it among the company's six workings with two men underground and one at surface, out of a hundred employed across the firm. It is the smallest working on that list apart from the two that were not working at all. When the company returned again in 1935 only Honister, Lords and Yew Craggs remained on it: Quay Foot had gone.

Geology

Borrowdale green slate is a volcanic rock rather than a true slate — the fine ash and tuff of the Borrowdale Volcanic Group, laid down by Ordovician eruptions and later compressed, as the Borrowdale account puts it, by tremendous forces and heat, until it splits along a cleavage. That is where the green comes from, and why the workable bands are called veins rather than beds. The same veins run through the valley from Honister across to Yew Crag and down to the smaller workings like this one.

Geological setting: Slate and Regional Metamorphism (well documented example)

Workings

A small quarry beside the Borrowdale road, worked both underground and at surface — the 1930 return distinguishes two men below ground from one above. The trade's sequence was the same here as everywhere in the valley: roofing slate blasted out as clogs, large lumps; the clogs docked down in size, once by chisel and mallet and later by diamond saw; then riven, split along the grain by chisel; and the thin pieces dressed to shape. What came off the fell went down by sled, one man running in front of the load to hold it back.

Closure

Quay Foot appears in the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries' return for 1930 and not in the company's returns for 1935 or 1950, so it had stopped between those dates. No source read here gives a closure date or a reason, but a working of three men in a company of a hundred is the kind that goes first.

What remains

Abandoned, beside the road. The quarry lies on the left of the B5289 as it climbs gently past the Bowder Stone about a mile south of Grange, and the site is now used as a parking area for visitors to the stone.

The quarry floor and faces beside the Borrowdale road. Nothing read for this record describes a surviving quarry structure.

Related mines

• Honister Slate Mine — Both were worked by the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries Ltd. and both took the green slate of the Borrowdale Volcanic Group; Honister was the company's principal mine, employing eighty-eight of its hundred people in 1930 against this quarry's three.
• Yew Craggs Quarry — Two of the six workings the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries returned in 1930, both getting the same Borrowdale green slate from the same set of veins — Quay Foot with three people on the road below the Bowder Stone, Yew Craggs on the fell above Honister Pass. Quay Foot had gone from the company's list by 1935; Yew Craggs outlasted every other mine it held.

Nearby mines

• Yew Craggs Quarry — 4.1 km SW
• Brandelhow Mine — 4.2 km N
• Goldscope Mine — 4.3 km N
• Seathwaite Wad Mine — 4.3 km S
• Honister Slate Mine — 4.7 km SW

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.

• The 1930 List of Mines records Quay Foot in Borrowdale under the Buttermere Green Slate Quarries Ltd. of Station Buildings, Keswick, with Com. Hoare as agent, working slate. ¹
• The Buttermere Green Slate Quarries' 1930 return lists Quay Foot in Borrowdale with 2 employed underground and 1 above ground, among six workings employing 100 in all; the company's 1935 return lists only Honister, Lords and Yew Craggs. ²
• Borrowdale slate and stone was extracted at several places in the valley including Honister, Yew Crag, Dubs, Rigghead and Quay Foot, and has provided a livelihood for people in Borrowdale for over 350 years. ³

Photographs & further reading

Sources

1. (primary) 1930 List of Mines under the Metalliferous Mines Act: Cumberland — Durham Mining Museum
2. (primary) Buttermere Green Slate Quarries Ltd. — Durham Mining Museum
3. (secondary) Mining and Quarrying in Borrowdale — The Borrowdale Story

Record created: 5 September 2026 · Last researched: 5 September 2026