Serpentine Works at Laregan

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At Laregan, in the ground by the bowling green, the first serpentine factory, worked by a water wheel, was established by Mr. Murphy. Later a larger factory was built the site now the Bedford Bolitho Gardens, by three Penzance gentlemen, Mr. J. Organ, Mr. J. Bromley, and Mr. R. Millett, and in 1848, they were employing 37 men and boys. They received Royal and other distinguished patronage, and the works were visited by the Queen, Prince Albert, and the Royal children, but notwithstanding this the company never paid, and was closed after a few years’ existence. The building was afterwards used as a drill hall, and about 85 years ago, as a fish preserving factory, later garage for the G.W.R. motors, and it housed the soldiers sent here in the Newlyn riots, before it was demolished to form the gardens. Some the workmen set up on their own account in the little shops at Wherry Town. Basket making died owing the introduction of wooden crates. Factories were carried on by Messrs. Kitt, Stevens (2), Hocking, and Wakefield.
 
This answers a query that I had as to where the serpentine factory was. By the boating pool. A very distant relative came down here from Derbyshire as the Foreman Serpentine worker in about 1857 and in the 1861 census lived in number 1 Wherrytown with his family, the younger ones were born in Penzance, they all moved to Cornwall Terrace and then Coulson Place
 
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