Lady Bertha Mine, Buckland Monachorum, West Devon, Devon, England, UKi

Regional Level Types
Lady Bertha Mine	Mine (Abandoned)
Buckland Monachorum	Civil Parish
West Devon	Borough
Devon	County
England	Constituent Country
UK	Country

Tin and arsenic, dumps reworked in 1915-6.
Ref: Richardson P.H.G. (1991) Mines of Dartmoor & the Taymar Valley after 1913, Devon Books, Tiverton.
The original output of arsenic ores was taken to Tavy Consols for calcining, with some of the sand returned for tin stamping.
Ref: Dines H.G. 1956.

The site is quite compact, sandwiched between the river and the raised ground behind. 3 wheelpits and some building foundations survive as do 5 of the 6 buddles. The rock dumps are heavily overgrown but small mineral samples are obtainable from the red sand dumps with better samples to be found on the river bank where the tips have washed out. (Site description Oct 2004, revised March 2023.)

On the morning before I visited in 2023 I had been on the dumps at Virtuous Lady and spoken with a man who had grown up locally. He recalled that in his early teens he and his friends would play at Lady Bertha riding in one of the ore skips that was still on the rails. He also recounted going underground, which he said was quite extensive, and taking great care not to tread on the planks that must have covered winzes. He recalled that the metal scrap was stripped soon after and at a guess that would have been the early 1970s.
In the annotated photo an ore truck is pictured on an incline to the left of the image. Clearly this must have been drawn by a hawser. A large quantity of hawser is still at the site (2023) though a short distance down stream in an area that appears to have seen more quarrying than mining. It might not have been associated with the mine or it may have been moved but left when the other metals were stripped.
There are several places in the rock face at the back of the mine site where here may have been entrances to levels. However large amounts of rubbish and soil have been tipped in from the field above covering the shaft by the wheelpit (marked on the map) and covering over any entrances. There is no obvious source of outflow of mine water to indicate entrances.

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