Country diary: sunk in the bones of the moor

Chaw Gully, Postbridge, Dartmoor: Walking down the shallow valley, you reach a network of forked ravines gouged into the earth by centuries of tin miningFor all its apparent wildness, the landscape around Headland Warren was once a heavily worked industrial site - and one of the most lawless places on Dartmoor.There were four tin mines, the last of which only closed in 1930. Tin mining was a hard and dangerous occupation and the workers were often unruly. In 1793, men from Vitifer, enraged by the arrest of some of their gang for smashing pub windows, stormed nearby Chagford, vowing to level it to the ground. Townsfolk raised the alarm by ringing the church bells and, after an 11-mile chase, all but one of the tinners were caught and press-ganged into the navy. Continue reading...