Brendon Hills Iron Ore Company

Formed in 1853 and controlled by the proprietors of the Ebbw Vale ironworks, it worked the Brendon Hills iron field in west Somerset and built the West Somerset Mineral Railway to get the ore to Watchet. It never made the field pay — ore cost around £1.25 a ton to raise against a selling price of 75p — and had lost some £762,000 by the time mining stopped in 1883.