For most of the nineteenth century Swansea smelted virtually all of Britain’s copper and much of the worlds.
The hard glistening coals in the picturesque hillsides around Swansea and Neath, were ideal for copper smelting, and the copper ores of Cornwall, just a short sea journey away.
Refining the copper needed a lot of coal, and the Welsh coal fields lay midway between the ore fields of Cornwall and the metal hungry factories of the English Midlands.
By 1823 there were nine copper works in the lower Tawe valley, just outside the town.
