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Summary

Worked for silver, lead and zinc ores, this mine was already old when working in the mid-19th century; records indicate it having been worked 200 years earlier. In 1857, 60 people were employed and the mine was reasonably successful but 1861 it had closed. Ruined building remains and the ivy-covered pumping-engine house with its separate stack were still standing in 1967.

Location

Protected Status: none recorded

Other References/Statuses

• National Monuments Record: SX77NE103
• National Record of the Historic Environment: 1433449
• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX77NE/25

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• ENGINE HOUSE (Constructed, XVIII to XIX - 1701 AD (Between) to 1861 AD (Between))
• MINE (Constructed, XVIII to XIX - 1701 AD (Between) to 1861 AD (Between))
• ADIT (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• DRESSING FLOOR (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• HORSE WHIM (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• LEAD MINE (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• MINE BUILDING (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• SHAFT (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• SILVER MINE (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• SPOIL HEAP (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• TIN MINE (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))
• ZINC MINE (Constructed, XIX - 1831 AD (Between) to 1866 AD (Between))

Full description

Ordnance Survey, 1880-1899, First Edition Ordnance Survey 25 inch map (Cartographic). SDV336179.

'Silverbrook Mine (Silverlead, disused)' is depicted on the late 19th century historic map.

Hamilton Jenkin, Dr. A. K., 1967, Silver Brook Mine, Ilsington (Photograph). SDV299604.

Site of Silver Brook Mine. A photograph from 1967 shows the overgrown site with a disintegrating stack.

Harris, H., 1968, Industrial Archaeology of Dartmoor, 36 (plate), 65-7, Plan (Monograph). SDV149229.

Silverbrook Mine, half a mile from Ilsington village has interesting remains and is said to be 200 years old when working in the mid-19th century (see plate). Produced silver, lead and zinc ores. Silverbrook employed 60 people in 1857 but was closed by 1861. considerable dumps still remain at the mine, as well as the remains of some buildings and a stack. Section of mine buildings shown.

Hamilton Jenkin, Dr. A. K., 1981, Mines of Devon: North and East of Dartmoor (Monograph). SDV364319.

Silverbrook mine. A silver mine (sic) which operated intermittently between the mid-18th to mid-19th centuries. The site has been badly disturbed but a ruined engine house with a separate, almost intact chimney stack and various other buildings remain, all heavily covered by vegetation.

Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England, 1985, Aerial Photograph Project (Dartmoor) - Dartmoor Pre-NMP (Cartographic). SDV319854.

Not visible on Royal Air Force 1946 aerial photographs.

Cranstone, D., 1993, Monuments Protection Programme: The Zinc Industry. Step 1 Report, Devon 1 (Report - non-specific). SDV355889.

Listed. Probably originally a tine mine, between 1854-6 1474 tons of zinc ore were extracted, 93 tons of 6% lead ore, and 80 ounces of silver. Closed in 1861.

Nance, R. W. + Nance, R. D., 1996, A Survey of Engine Houses on the Mines of South Devon, 114, figure 9 (Article in Serial). SDV241746.

Silver Brook Mine plan (from an unscaled field sketch) included. Brief description of the standing remains.

Nance, R. D., 1996, Project Design for a Survey of Engine Houses on the Mines of South Devon (Report - Assessment). SDV222663.

Nance, R. W. + Nance, R. D., 1996, Wheal Druid and the Engine Houses of Dartmoor, 4-6, (August 1996) (Article in Serial). SDV340907.

Ruins that housed the 20-inch cylinder pumping engine and 10-inch cylinder whim and crusher. Of the pumping engine house, only north-west and boiler house walls remain standing above level of cylinder loadings. Site of hot well clearly evident. Stack, separate and standing behind pumping engine house, survives and was fed by a flue visible in rear wall of boiler house. Of the house of the 10-inch whim that wound from the same (engine) shaft and also drove a crusher, only crankshaft loadings, winding drum pit and footings of crusher house remain. A field now covers the site of the whim house.

Hamilton Jenkin, Dr. A. K., 2005, Mines of Devon, 124-5 (Monograph). SDV282410.

Silver Brook Mine was located half a mile south-east of Ilsington Church and worked two lead-zinc lodes trending north-east. The lodes at surface lay 35 yards apart and were developed by an adit 2000 feet long and by two shafts.
Engine Shaft, about 550 yards west-north-west of Lenda Farm, was vertical for the first 16 fathoms and thence followed the hanging-wall of the lode to a depth of just over 80 fathoms from surface. From it levels were driven on the lode at 11, 22, 33, 44, 55, and 66 fathoms below adit. The other shaft, 120 yards south-west of Engine Shaft, lay on higher ground and was sunk to about 11 fathoms under adit (here 16 fathoms from surface).
The mine is an old one. In the middle of the last century deeds were in existence to show that work had been carried out here and in nearby Silver Wood, at least 200 years earlier. Operations were resumed about 1757 the lodes on that occasion being exploited to a depth of 15.5 fathoms below adit, with a ‘sink’ in one place extending 7 fathoms deeper. Apparently this working was abandoned in a hurry. In 1852 an old man living in the district had heard his grandfather say that the miners left behind them all their tools (which he enumerated) and that these would be found if the mine was ever worked again. He added that in the bottom of the sink there was a course of lead ore as ‘big as a hogshead’.
The most recent working started about 1851 and continued for seven years. In November 1852 a 20 inch cylinder pumping engine was installed being the ‘first steam engine ever erected in the Ashburton area’. On forking (draining) the mine, the tools were found exactly where the old man had predicted. Clearing the ‘sink’ also brought to light two sets of wooden hand-pumps, accurately bored and with their leather valves almost as hard as the oak from which the pump columns were constructed. During 1853 the lode was cut through in several places, 80 fathoms south of Woodley’s Engine Shaft, where it was reported to be 2 feet to 8 feet wide. Similar widths were recorded in the adit level north of the shaft. (Records of the ores produced and how the shafts were developed included).
In October 1859 the 20 inch pumping engine and 10 inch rotary for hoisting and crushing were still standing on the mine but the pitwork had been drawn up and the rest of the plant sold.
In 1967 the ivy-covered pumping-engine house with its separate stack still remained intact but the whim house had been largely demolished. Below these lay the dressing floors adjoining the stream, and nearby some fairly extensive tailings dumps containing lode material. Two interesting water-colours of the mine were formerly in the possession of the late Sir Arthur Russell. Said to have been painted by the purser of the company shortly before the mine was stopped, the whereabouts of these pictures is now unknown.

Newman, P., 2006, Measured Survey Hidden Dartmoor: Peripheral Mines (Phase 1 Pilot) (Report - Survey). SDV351461.

(30/03/2006) This silver-lead mine is moderately well documented for its main period of operation in the 1850s, but could have origins in the 17th century followed by another short episode commencing in 1757. A prospectus for the Silverbrook Mine was issued in 1851 and work commenced shortly afterwards. The mine produced lead and zinc as well as 80oz of silver before closure in 1858.
This mine is located to the south-east of Ilsington village near the head of a valley formed by the Silverbrook. Field remains from the 1850s activity consists of the building complex near the engine shaft, including the two engine houses(SX 7890 7585), dressing floors (SX 7893 7580), a massive spoil heap and a shaft with whim plat on the south hillside at (SX 7885 7576).
Evidence for the earlier periods of activity are also present. There is a small, blocked shaft with spoil collar on the south side of the brook and another near the later hillside shaft, just outside the wood to the west side of a field wall. An adit with spoil dump just downslope and to the north of the hillside shaft is not included on the 1850s drawing and is also likely to be earlier. The adit portal is now blocked but its position at the head of a short gully is clear. The flat-topped linear spoil heap has a bulbous plan and extends north terminating near the stream.
The hillside shaft, which has been capped but reached a depth of 32fthms, consists of an elliptical hollow with a large conical, flat-topped spoil dump on the downslope side. Just upslope of the shaft is a whim plat for a horse whim. This comprises a level platform, circular in plan with a diameter of 6 to 7m, and a scarp on the upslope side.
The engine shaft has been capped, but its location at SX 7890 7585 may be deduced from the position of the pumping engine house. Two engine houses, one for pumping and one for hoisting and crushing, are set in close proximity and probably shared a single Cornish boiler positioned between the two buildings.
All the buildings are heavily disguised by undergrowth and ivy and surviving walls are in a fragile and dangerous state. The crusher house and whim engine house have both been demolished or have collapsed and only low stumps of walls survive, filled with rubble. The drum pit is visible between the whim and crusher house with some timbers still in place. The walls of the pumping engine house survive to several metres in places and the stub walls of the hotwell are present on the eastern end. The elongated boiler house is visible as a rubble-filled outline but the free-standing chimney stack on the west end still stands almost to its original height. It is however now completely covered by ivy. To the west of the chimney stack the range of buildings depicted on the documentary sources, including the single-storey blacksmith's shop and the two-storey count house. These are ruined but low wall remains are visible. They are completely covered by impenetrable undergrowth.
An ore dressing area, including at least one circular buddle powered by a small water wheel, is located on the south side of the brook where hollows which roughly correspond to rectangular buddles. There is also a levelled floor cut into the base of the hillslope with revetment on three sides which is the site of round buddles. This area measures 13.5m by 8m by 1.5m deep.
The area between the engines shaft and the dressing floors (SX 7893 7581) is covered by a very large spoil heap of just under 100m long and covering 2400 square metres (based on measurements from OS 1905 2nd edition).

Bodman, M., 2015, Mills on the Teign. A gazetteer of water-powered sites on the Teign and Bovey and their tributaries, 115 (Monograph). SDV360401.

Silver Brook Mine, Ilsington may have existed in the 17th century as a tin mine (Newman, 2005). More exploration took place in the 18th century and in the mid-19th century, there were two steam engines (one for pumping, one for winding). Lead and zinc were produced, along with a little silver. In 1857, the working came to a halt and the plant was sold off. Two derelict engine houses remain on site.

Ordnance Survey, 2017, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV359962.

Modern map shows 'Silverbrook Mine (disused)', with remains of buildings indicated.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• EDV8574 - Hidden Dartmoor: Peripheral Mine (Phase 1 Pilot)

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