I can help with all resources marked , copyright permitting.

See also Glossary

Almost all of the links on this page are external to my site and somewhat beyond my control. If you discover one that is broken, please let me know and I will fix/remove it as soon as possible.

Would you like to link to this site?

Other sites I have found that have an interest in the same area. Sites relating to particular parishes will be found on the relevant parish page.

Genealogical

• Archive CD Books is a non-profit organisation making rare books of genealogical interest available on CDROM using the most up to date techniques.
• Nick Berryman’s Cornwall Index pages (Link Broken 9 Apr 2007) have a lot of history, travel, maps and town descriptions for Penwith, especially St. Buryan, Towednack and Zennor.
• The Bodmin Moor Site has similar objectives to this one and is growing to cover all parishes on the moor.
• The CORNISH-L Library hosted by Rootsweb offers a lookup service.
• The Cornwall GenWeb has been revived by Sue Seibert and is growing.
• Similarly the Cornwall Lookup Exchange may be able to help with certain resources.
• The Cornwall Exchange (which has a confusingly similar name) provides a surname research contact list.
• Phil Ellery has a great site which includes details of the Paynters of Boskenna in St. Buryan and an ongoing project to transcribe Daniell’s History of Cornwall.
• The Familia—Cornwall (family history resources in public libraries) site has more information about the CSL.
• Family Trees Online is a new site to try and bring together all sorts of free and low cost genealogy websites in one place.
• FreeBMD is a project which is (slowly) putting the GRO indexes of Births, Marriages and Deaths online.
• For someone just starting out in Genealogy, I can reccomend genealogy-guide.org.uk which is a very easy to follow guide to starting up and not making time wasting mistakes; and it is ad-free too!
• GenealogyLinks.net has some very useful links for Cornish Genealogy.
• Brian Jelbert’s Cornwall web page which includes a nice scan of John Norden’s map of Penwith c1597 and the accompanying description.
• The Cornish Association of Victoria Inc., Australia St. Just District Research Group which spreads wide enough to cover all of these parishes.
• The Cornwall Online Parish Clerks now have their own web site.
• John Rees’ site has many useful sources including a master list of the MI transcriptions done by Suezan James, however this site is very old and has not been updated recently.
• “Richard’s Church Albums” is a very useful site for pictures by Richard A. Derrick, including pictures of Halsetown, St. Just in Penwith, Ludgvan, Morvah, Newlyn St. Peter, Pendeen, Penzance St. Mary, Sennen and Zennor churches.
• Jim Thompson’s “Kernow’s West Penwith Genealogy” site is no longer online but he still has Cornish Extended Family and a site about Cornish Surnames.
• There is a magnificent accumulation of Cornish will abstracts, many in West Penwith, on Kathie Weigel’s Cornish Database page.

General

• Amicus Trencrom is a guide to South West Cornwall—Particularly good for walking information.
• BBC Radio Cornwall have a site devoted to Cornwall with an up-to-date what’s-on and a live (and archived) Cornwall Connected program every Sunday afternoon 15:00–18:00 UK time.
• Beyond St. Ives—the attractions of the Coast Road from St. Ives to Land’s End (and a bit beyond).
• The British Library is very useful for finding books.
• Carn Metals have an interesting page about the St. Just Mining District by Geoff Treseder. They are a company still exporting tin and tin products from Cornwall. This site includes the St. Just Mines Research Group.
• The British Mining Database is accumulating a lot of general and localised information about mining.
• Chapels and Churches of Cornwall. Steve Beazley has a huge collection of photographs. These are slowly moving to the combined Cornish Churches website. If you need one and it is not there then drop him a line, he likes a challenge.
• Heather Coleman in Exeter has a wonderfully zany site but (but beware the brain behind the fluff). It was useful for a wealth of detail about the mines and minerals of the South West but this is now published on a CDROM.
• Cornwall and Scilly Urban Survey. This series of studies by the Cornwall Archaelogical Unit, part of Cornwall County Council, is a very detailed study of the towns in Cornwall. It does wonders for my ego to discover that they have cited this web site as one of the sources for the Penzance chapter. There are also chapters on Newlyn and St. Ives.
• The Digital Museum of Cornish Ceramics is documenting the industry in great detail including identification marks and styles. Many of these potteries were in the St. Ives and surround areas.
• Cornish ConneXions, despite being a holiday accomodation web site has some interesting articles on the Culture and History of Cornwall.
• Cornish Light is “A Travel and Tourist Guide with nice Pictures” to quote their own description. They have pages on St. Ives, Land’s End and Mousehole.
• Cornish Mining is the site of the World Heritage Site bid.
• Cornwall CAM is a photograph site run by Charles Winpenny.
• Cornwall Clicks is a photograph site run by Stuart Lindsay.
• Cornwall Coast have some walks and pictures along the Coast Path. The site complements the one by the South West Coast Path Association below. There is also a very good guide to part of this path with photgraphs by a Frenchman, Pierre Lavaurs.
• Cornwall County Council have a smart and useful web presence which keeps changing(!) You will find information about the Library Service, Record Office, Registration Service (Services of the Council), Family History, Museums (Recreation and Leisure), Facts & Figures (Your Council), History and Archaeology (Environment) and lots more.
• The Cornwall Guide is a new site (2005) that doesn't have much yet but shows promise.
• The Cornwall Heritage Trust own Sancreed Beacon and Tregiffian Barrow and have pages about them.
• The Cornwall Wildlife Trust have a large site with information about conservation etc.
• The Cornwall Online Internet Magazine have a lot of useful stuff, both locally and via links. Much of it is referenced directly from my pages but more can be accessed via the front page.
• If it’s in Cornwall and it’s online then it is probably on the eCornwall portal site.
• The Countryside Agency has a document about West Penwith.
• David Nash Ford’s Early British Kingdoms does a good job of separating the fact from the mythology and covers all the Celtic dynasties including those of St. Just, St. Piran, St. Levan Uther Pendragon, Tristram, King Arthur etc.
• Discovering West Penwith is quite a good tourist information site with sections on History and Places.
• English Heritage have three or four ancient sites in the area (see the Ancient Sites page on this site) but they have also launched the Images of England project which, even in prototype, has 52 photographs around Zennor (the Cornish Grid Stiles) and Ludgvan.
• The Federation of Old Cornwall Societies is a long established organisation devoted to researching and recording the customs and traditions of Cornwall.
• A study of the myths and legends of Cornwall has been created by Bill Rowe on his site Gandolf dot Com.
• The Geevor Mine is now managed by Pendeen Community Heritage.
• For local politics I can suggest Andrew George, Liberal Democrat M.P. for St. Ives
• Mark Hattam has an extensive gallery of photographs taken around St. Buryan, St. Just, St. Levan, Madron, Morvah, Sancreed and Sennen including some Monumental Inscriptions by image.
• An Index to the Historical Place Names of Cornwall is an ongoing long term project by Chris Bond
• The St. Ives Trust Archive Study Centre, often overlooked, is another major archive worth remembering.
• The St. Just Heritage Area site was set up by the St Just regeneration project to try and bring business to the area.
• St. Just in Penwith Town Council.
• The St. Just Methodist Circuit (Link broken Sep 2005) has a simple site with a page devoted to each of the 9 churches in the circuit and other information.
• Krows Kernewek is the site of jeweller Alex Everitt of Mousehole. He specialises in silver reproductions of the Celtic crosses of South West Cornwall and this site tells their story.
• Land’s End Coastguard is an unofficial organ for the Polgigga station who watch the coast from Lamorna to Aire Point.
• Levant Mine is home to Cornwall’s oldest working beam engine and is owned by the National Trust but run and managed by local volunteers.
• Meyn Mamvro is a magazine about the stones and pre-historic sites of Cornwall published three times a year.
• Mining History of Devon & Cornwall was created by Lynette Costello at Exeter University. It hasn't been updated for a while. Link broken Aug 2005
• The Mining History Network is a site at Exeter University run by the eminent Professor Roger Burt. It contains an excellent bibliography.
• Penlee House Gallery and Museum is West Cornwall’s centre for art and heritage.
• There is a useful Penwith site which provides links for many local activities, so long as you excuse the occasional strong language.
• Penwith District Council have a site which will tell you about some local facilities.
• Friends of Penzance Promenade are campaigning to get a regeneration package for the old Prom.
• PZNOW is an excellent site with information about Penzance and all the surrounding district.
• The SOSKernow site (friends of Cornwall) has some interesting historical pages with some church histories (including St. Buryan, Gulval, St. Ives, St. Just in Penwith, St. Levan, Madron, Morvah, Paul, Sancreed and Sennen, Towednack & Zennor), Levant mine, the Prayerbook Rebellion, Stannery Parliament etc.
• SOURCE—The Holy Wells Journal is a magazine edited by Richard L. Pederick with an archaelogical view of these old sites, many in our area.
• The South West Coast Path Association have a Photo Tour of the West Penwith path which includes some very fine pictures.
• The Tate Gallery in St. Ives is a world class art gallery.
• There is a lot about Lighthouses on the Trinity House site.
• The Trevithick Trust was responsible for the management of Pendeen Lighthouse, Geevor, the Levant beam engine and Porthcurno Submarine Cable Museum but its future is uncertain. These sites are now being managed by other groups.
• The Truro Diocese site has links to other parish church pages.
• The Truro Diocesan Association of Bell Ringers have some nice little sketches of Churches (and information about their bells of course).
• The Wayside Folk Museum in Zennor is a masterpiece in rural museums.
• West Cornwall Tourism will be useful if you are planning a visit.
• The workhouse project has a page about the Penzance Union Workhouse.
• The Youth Hostel Association have two hostels in the area; Castle Horneck, Alverton, Penzance (map ref. 457302) and Letcha Vean, St. Just (map ref. 364305).

And if there is nothing here then you can search the whole web.

Link to this site

I welcome anyone who would like to link to this site from their own to do so without hesitation. There is a small logo you can use if it is convenient and suitable HTML code would be
<a href="http://west-penwith.org.uk/">
<img src="WPRs.gif" width="92" height="49"
alt="West Penwith Resources"></a>