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| Cornish Family History Research |
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Page 1 of 4 The name’s the same…the story of Thomas Merritt. Thomas Merritt is a name that Cornish folk all over the world associate with Christmas. He was a great composer of Cornish hymn tunes and other music, and remembered for his carols. Recently in Truro Cathedral a fine concert was held to commemorate the centenary of his death in 1908. Thomas Merritt was born in Illogan in1863, the son of Thomas and Mary Jane. The census of 1871 shows the family living at Illogan Highway. The father of the family, like many men of the area, was a miner. Thomas (junior) was baptised in Broad Lane Primitive Methodist Chapel, Illogan, and received some education at a school in nearby Pool. His father died when Thomas was just 11 years old. He had to give up his schooling and begin working. He began mining at the Carn Brea Mine and later at the Tolvaddon Tin Streams, where tin particles washed down from the mines were collected from the alluvial mud of the river. These streams fed into Red River, made a muddy red colour by deposits. The river meets the tide at Gwithian on the north coast and often had to be pushed out to sea. There is evidence of tin streaming here since the Bronze Age when Cornish tin was much prized. In later centuries the land became owned by the Basset family of Tehidy. Records show that in the period from 1720 to 1735 as much a eight tons of ‘black tin’, concentrate, were recovered from the alluvial deposits washed out of the mines. The recovery of alluvial tin continued long after the closing of most of Cornwall’s mines. The last records of work are as recent as the 1960s. |
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