St Mewan, Cornwall

Historical Description

Mewan, St, a village and a parish in Cornwall. The village stands 1½ mile SW by W of St Austell and half a mile from Burngullow station on the G.W.R., and is a considerable but primitive place. Post town, St Austell. The parish contains also the hamlet of Trewoon. Acreage, 2653; population, 1092. St Mewan's Beacon is a hill of greenstone rock, rising 385 feet above sea-level. Copper and tin are found, and there are traces of silver and gold. The living is a rectory in the diocese of Truro; value, £230 with residence. The church has lost the uppermost stage of its tower. There are a Methodist chapel and a reading-room.

Administration

The following is a list of the administrative units in which this place was either wholly or partly included.

Any dates in this table should be used as a guide only.

Church Records

The register dates from the year 1693.

Churches

Church of England

St. Mewan (parish church)

The church of St. Mewan is an ancient building of granite, supposed to date from the 13th century, and consists of chancel, nave of five bays, north aisle of three bays, south aisle, south porch and a western tower of two stages with low pyramidal roof and containing 6 bells, all re-cast in 1738 and again in 1894, and rehung in 1904: the east windows are memorials to the late F. Stephens esq. of Hembal, and the Bennetts family; ten other windows are also stained, and there are various modern tablets and monuments to the families of Hocker, Oliver, Crews, Borlase, and others: the church was thoroughly restored in 1854 and enlarged in 1890-91, at a cost of £706, when the south side was extended, two stained windows erected and an oak screen placed in the tower arch: in 1900 further improvements were made at a cost of £625: in 1909 an organ was presented to the church by Miss Mary Coode, of St. Austell: in 1911 new carved oak choir stalls, two carved oak screens and a carved oak pulpit were presented, and in the same year the sanctuary floor was relaid in white Italian marble, and a new carved oak font cover given. There are now 230 sittings.

Directories & Gazetteers

We have transcribed the entry for St Mewan from the following:

• Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858. (Mewan, St.)

Maps

Online maps of St Mewan are available from a number of sites:

• Bing (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• Google Streetview.
• National Library of Scotland. (Old maps)
• OpenStreetMap.
• old-maps.co.uk (Old Ordnance Survey maps to buy).
• Streetmap.co.uk (Current Ordnance Survey maps).
• A Vision of Britain through Time. (Old maps)

Newspapers and Periodicals

The British Newspaper Archive have fully searchable digitised copies of the following Cornwall papers online:

• Royal Cornwall Gazette
• Cornishman
• West Briton and Cornwall Advertiser
• Lake's Falmouth Packet and Cornwall Advertiser

Visitations Heraldic

We have a copy of The Visitations of Cornwall, by Lieut.-Col. J.L. Vivian online.