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The mineral wealth of the mountains of Breadalbane has been recognised for hundreds of years. Enough gold was found in the Earl of Breadalbane’s mines in the mid – nineteenth century to make his lady wife’s wedding ring – though this is not exactly what one might call a gold-strike. In 1730 Sir Robert Clifton took a mining lease on the Breadalbane estates and opened the mine at Tyndrum for the extraction of lead ore. The biggest drawback to the working of the mine at that time was the problem of getting coal to Tyndrum with no roads on which to transport it. Due to this ore had to be carried by pack ponies more than twelve miles to the head of Loch Lomond for smelting where coal could be easily transported by boat. Between 1741 and 1745, 1697 tons of ore were carried in this way to the smelter. |
