Newquay Harbour sits below the old town on Cornwall’s north coast. Its sheltered basin and quays belong to the working history behind the resort: fishing boats, cargo vessels and the handling of goods all helped shape the town around it.
In the nineteenth century, Joseph Thomas Treffry connected the harbour to inland mineral traffic by tramway. The system linked the coast with workings including East Wheal Rose, making the harbour part of a much larger industrial arrangement. Bringing heavy ore to the water was one job; finding a market across the sea was another.
This is the existing harbour, not Treffry’s unbuilt proposal to create a much larger refuge at Towan Head. Keeping the two apart makes the ambition clearer. One place handled real ships and cargoes; the other lets us examine what its promoters hoped Newquay might become.
Where it is
Newquay Harbour
50.417765, -5.086809 · Position source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Newquay_Harbour_-_geograph.org.uk_-_7893719.jpg
Harbour orientation: Geograph subject coordinate, not boat navigation
Visiting and access
A location reference, not confirmation of public access or a visitor entrance.
Sources
Source: https://www.visitnewquay.org/explore/history-of-newquay
Connected subjects
- The Central Inn, Newquay
- Seine fishing and the tuck net
- The Clemens shipbuilding family
- Towan Beach, Newquay
- Treffry’s harbour of refuge
- Wilkie Collins in Cornwall
- Joseph Thomas Treffry
- The Red Lion, Newquay
- Towan Head
- Tregunnel, schooner built in 1858
- Newquay Harbour tramway and incline
- Shipbuilding at Tregunnel
- Treffry’s Newquay mineral tramway
- Newquay
Read on
- Joseph Thomas Treffry: The Man Who Joined Cornwall’s Businesses Together
Most of us, faced with an awkward delivery, complain about the delivery company. Joseph Thomas Treffry’s approach was rather more expensive. He became involved in mines, harbours, waterways and tramways.
- When Ships Sailed Up the Gannel
The families who built ships, the merchant who fought the mud, and a working river with very little interest in anyone's timetable.
- The Mine Beneath Mount Wise: Putting Newquay’s Lead and Silver Back on the Map
A mine beneath a familiar view, children whose wages went straight home, and a hillside that kept finding new jobs after the digging stopped.
- There Was a Railway Running Out of Newquay Harbour
A load of ore could reach Newquay and still have a cliff to get down. Follow the horses, miners and winding machinery that completed the journey.
- I Went Looking for Cornwall's Smugglers' Tunnels
I remembered a smugglers’ tunnel under a Cornish pub. The records confirmed the building, not the smuggling—and that became the more interesting story.