The harbour village of Charlestown was a Georgian ‘new town’, a port development planned by local landowner Charles Rashleigh (after whom it was named) and built between 1790 and 1810 for the export of copper and china clay.
Throughout the nineteenth century the little dock was packed with ships and the harbourside sheds and warehouses thronged with complementary businesses: boatbuilding, ropemaking, brickworks, lime burning, net houses, bark houses and pilchard curing.
Charlestown has survived as a working port and a small amount of china clay is still exported in an average of 30-40 ships a year, and this saves the place from becoming a cosy caricature of itself with plenty of ‘heritage appeal’ but no real life.
Charlestown has largely escaped ‘development’ and remains one of the finest and most fascinating places on the Cornish coast.