Abstract
Railways have contributed to the complex mosaic of Cornish identity in three ways. First, as a holiday destination promoted from late Victorian times until the Second World War by companies such as the Great Western Railway, London and South Western Railway and Southern. Initially marketing its mild climate and health benefits as an alternative to holidaying abroad evolved, from the 1920s, into an enduring tourist gaze of romantic landscapes, myth and legend. Second, structural changes in the Cornish economy in association with a decline in metal mining precipitated large-scale emigration which continued until the start of the First World War. Railways represented the initial phase of the emigrant journey and the volume of migration was such that their role has become part of a cultural text signifying both loss and opportunity. Lastly, their physical presence and contribution to the landscape adds a further layer of social and cultural significance to Cornish identity.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.Paul Atterbury and Roger Furness , Speed to the West: A Nostalgic Journey (Carmarthen: Poster Publishing, 2016 ).
2.Stephen Austin , The Cornish Rivera Express: A View from the Past (Shepperton: Ian Allan, 2000 ).
3.Dudley Bains , Migration in a Mature Economy: Emigration and Internal Migration in England and Wales 1861–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985 ).
4.Alan Bennett , The Great Western Railway in East, Mid, and West Cornwall, three volumes (Cheltenham: Runpast Publishing, 1990 –1992).
5.Alan Bennett , Southern Holiday Lines in North Cornwall and West Devon (Cheltenham: Runpast Publishing, 1995 ).
6.Claude Berry , Portrait of Cornwall (London: Robert Hale, 1971 ).
7.John Betjeman , “Padstow”, in Stephen Games (ed.), Trains and Buttered Toast (London: John Murray, 2006 ), 293–301.
8.John Betjeman , Summoned by Bells (London: John Murray, 1960 ).
9.John Binding , Brunel’s Cornish Viaducts (Penryn: Atlantic, 1993 ).
10.John Binding , Brunel’s Royal Albert Bridge (Truro: Twelveheads Press, 1997 ).
11.A.M. Broadley , The Cornish Rivera (Paddington: GWR, 1905 , reprint Kessinger Publishing, no date).
12.Rob Burton , “A Passion to Exist: Cultural Hegemony and the Roots of Cornish Identity”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Five (Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1997 ), 151–63.
13.Jamie Dallen , “The Challenges of Diverse Visitor Perceptions: Rail Policy and Sustainable Transport at the Resort Destination”, Journal of Transport Geography 15 (2007 ), 104–15.
14.Bernard Deacon , “‘And Shall Trelawney Die?’ The Cornish Identity”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornwall Since the War (Redruth: Truran, 1993 ), 200–223.
15.Bernard Deacon , “‘The Hollow Jarring of the Distant Steam Engines’: Images of Cornwall Between West Barbary and Delectable Duchy”, in Ella Westland (ed.), Cornwall: The Cultural Construction of Place (Penzance: Patten Press, 1997 ), 7–24.
16.Bernard Deacon , “A Forgotten Migration Stream: The Cornish Movement to England and Wales in the Nineteenth Century”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Six (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1998 ), 96–117.
17.Bernard Deacon , “Imagining the Fishing: Artists and Fishermen in the Late Nineteenth Century”, Rural History 12:2 (2001 ), 159–78.
18.Bernard Deacon , A Concise History of Cornwall (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2007 ).
19.Bernard Deacon and Philip Payton , “Re-inventing Cornwall: Culture Change on the European Periphery”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies One (Exeter: Exeter University Press, 1993 ), 62–79.
20.C. Dendy Marshall , History of the Southern Railway (London: Ian Allen, second edition, 1982 ).
21.A. Fairclough , The Story of Cornwall’s Railways (Truro: Tor Mark Press, 1970 ).
22.Katherine H. Grenier , Tourism and Identity in Scotland 1770–1914 (London: Routledge, 2005 ).
23.GWR , Through the Window : The Great Western Railway from Paddington to Penzance (Paddington: Burrow & Co, 1927 ).
24.Hugh Howes , The Struggle for the Cornwall Railway (Truro: Twelveheads Press, 2012 ).
25.Kerryn Husk and Malcolm Williams , “The Legitimation of Ethnicity: The Case of the Cornish”, Studies in Ethnicity and Nationalism 12:2 (2012 ), 249–67.
26.Stanley C. Jenkins and Roger C. Langley , The West Cornwall Railway: Truro to Penzance (Usk: Orchard Press, 2002 ).
27.Steve Jones , Antonio Gramsci (London: Routledge, 2006 ).
28.Alan Kent , The Festivals of Cornwall, Ritual, Revival, Re-invention (Bristol: Radcliff Press, 2018 ).
29.Scott Lash and John Urry , Economies of Signs and Space (London: SAGE, 2002 ).
30.E. MacDermot , History of the Great Western Railway , Volumes 1 and 2 (Paddington: GWR, 1931 ).
31.S.P.B. Mais , The Cornish Riviera (Paddington: GWR, 1927 ).
32.S.P.B. Mais , My Finest Holiday (Waterloo: Southern Railway, 1927 ).
33.Alexander Medcalf , “‘We are Always Learning’, Marketing the Great Western Railway 1921–39”, The Journal of Transport History 33:2 (2012 ), 186–211.
34.Peter Mitchell , “The Demographic Revolution”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornwall Since the War (Redruth: Truran, 1993 ), 135–56.
35.Nigel Morgan and Annette Pritchard , Tourism, Promotion and Power (Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, 1998 ).
36.Nigel Morgan and Annette Pritchard , Power and Politics at the Seaside (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1999 ).
37.O.S. Nock , The Limited: The Storey of the Cornish Riviera Express (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1979 ).
38.O.S. Nock , History of the Great Western Railway, 1923–1947 , vol. 3 (London: Ian Allen, 1989 ).
39.Anssi Paasi , “The Institutionalization of Regions: A Theoretical Framework for Understanding the Emergence of Regions and the Construction of Regional Identity”, Fennia 164:1 (1986 ), 106–46.
40.Anssi Paasi , “Region and Place: Regional Identity in Question”, Progress in Human Geography 27:4 (2003 ), 475–85.
41.Philip Payton , The Cornish Overseas (Fowey: Alexander Associates, 1999 ).
42.Philip Payton , Cornwall: A History (Fowey: Cornwall Editions Ltd, 2004 ).
43.Philip Payton , John Betjeman and Cornwall (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2010 ).
44.Philip Payton and Paul Thornton , “The Great Western Railway and the Cornish-Celtic Revival”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Three (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1995 ), 83–103.
45.Ronald Perry , “Cornwall Circa 1950”, in Philip Payton (ed.) Cornwall Since the War (Redruth: Truran, 1993 ), 22–46.
46.Ronald Perry , “Celtic Revivalism and Economic Development in Edwardian Cornwall”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Five (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1997 ), 112–24.
47.Ronald Perry , “The Changing Face of Celtic Tourism in Cornwall, 1875–1975”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Seven (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1999 ), 94–106.
48.Ronald Perry , “The Making of Modern Cornwall, 1800–2000, A Geo-economic Perspective”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Ten (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2002 ), 166–89.
49.Payton Philip , The Making of Modern Cornwall (Redruth: Truran, 1992 ).
50.Arthur T. Quiller-Couch (ed.), “How to Develop Cornwall as a Holiday Resort: Opinions of Eminent Cornishmen”, The Cornish Magazine Vol. 1 (Truro: J. Pollard, 1898 ).
51.T.W.E. Roche , The Withered Arm. Reminiscences of the Southern Lines West of Exeter (Teddington: Branch Line and West Country Handbooks, 1967 ).
52.A.L. Rowse , A Cornish Childhood (London: Jonathan Cape, 1942 ).
53.A.L. Rowse , Poems Chiefly Cornish (London: Faber & Faber, 1945 ).
54.Sharon Schwartz , “Cornish Migration Studies: An Epistemological and Paradigmatic Critique”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies Ten (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 2002 ), 136–65.
55.Rob Shields , Places on the Margin (London: Routledge, 1991 ).
56.Hiroki Shin , “Marketing Strategy in Britain’s Mainline Railways, 1923–38”, Journal of Historical Research in Marketing 9:4 (2017 ), 425–50.
57.Jack Simmons , “The Railway in Cornwall”, Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall (1982 ), 11–29.
58.Richard C. Stedman , “Is it Really Just a Social Construction? The Contribution of the Physical Environment to Sense of Place”, Society and Natural Resources 16 (2003 ), 671–85.
59.David St John Thomas , A Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain: Volume 1 – The West Country (Newton Abbot: David and Charles, 1988 ).
60.Chris Thomas , “See Your Own Country First: The Geography of a Railway Landscape”, in Ella Westland (ed.), Cornwall: The Cultural Construction of Place (Penzance: Pattern Press, 1997 ), 107–28.
61.Paul Thornton , “Cornwall and Changes in the ‘Tourist Gaze’”, in Philip Payton (ed.), Cornish Studies One (Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1993 ), 80–96.
62.David A. Turner , “‘Delectable North Wales’ and Stakeholders: The London and North Western Railway’s Marketing of North Wales, c.1904–1914”, Enterprise and Society 19:4 (2018 ), 864–902.
63.John Urry , The Tourist Gaze; Leisure and Travel in Contemporary Societies (London: SAGE, 1990 ).
64.John Urry , Consuming Places (London: Routledge, 1995 ).
65.John Vaughan , An Illustrated History of the Cornish Main Line (Hersham: OPC, 2009 ).
66.James Vernon , ‘Border Crossings: Cornwall and the English (imagi)ation’, in G. Cubitt (ed.), Imagining Nations (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998 ), 153–72.
67.Stephan V. Ward , Selling Places: The Marketing and Promotion of Towns and Cities (London: Routledge, 1998 ).
68.Ella Westland (ed.), Cornwall: The Cultural Construction of Place (Penzance: Pattern Place, 1997 ).
69.Roger Burdett Wilson , Go Great Western: A History of GWR Publicity (Newton Abbot: David and Charles, 1986 ).
70.R.J. Woodfin , The Centenary of the Cornwall Railway (Ely: Jefferson & Sons, 1960 ).
71.David Wroe , The North Cornwall Railway (Gwynedd: Irwell Press, 1994 ).
72.Bernard Deacon , “Peggy Combellack’s Conundrum: Locating the Cornish Identity”, unpublished paper, Institute of Cornish Studies, Exeter University, 2006 .
73.Richard J.P. Harris , “Locating Identity and Ethnicity in Cornish Civil Society: Penzance, a Case Study”, unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Exeter, 2017 .
74.Josef E.M. Thompson , “‘A Master Whose Heart is in the Land’: Picturing the Tourist Utopia of the Great Western Railway, 1897–1947”, unpublished PhD dissertation, University of York, 2011 .
75.
www.gov.uk/government/news/cornish-granted-minority-status-within-the-uk (accessed 21 July 2015).
76.
www.gwr.com/adventuresstsathere (accessed 17 July 2019).
77.
www.ons.gov.uk, population estimates by total persons England and Wales 1838–2014 (accessed July 24 2019).
78.
www.visitbritain.org, GB Tourism Survey Annual Report, Table 2.7 (accessed 26 February 2019).
79.
https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10036/19712/PopulationchangeinCornwallsince1801 (accessed 24 July 2019).