Invitation to the descendants from
South East Ireland

At the centre of the Copper Coast in County Waterford lie the 19th
century mines of Bunmahon-Knockmahon-Tankardstown. These gradually
closed in the 1870s, devastating the area. Most of the mining families
headed into the unknown and were directed to the Copper Country of
Michigan's Keweenaw Peninsula and later to Butte, Montana. Their story
has never been told.

A social history of the Waterford mines has been compiled by local
historian Des Cowman in "The Making and Breaking of a Mining
Community: the Copper Coast, Co. Waterford 1825-1875+". For
more details about the publication, please visit the "Mining Community"
page on this website.

In association with it, as Appendices, there is a database of about 2000
families. The page "Lists of Names" on this website shows the different
listings. Anyone who recognises a possible ancestor is invited to ask for
whatever other details are available:

• by email at info@coppercoastgeopark.com
  
  
• or by mail at:
  
  Copper Coast Geopark Ltd.
  Knockmahon Lodge,
  Bunmahon,
  Co. Waterford,
  Ireland

So many entire family groups left the Bunmahon area that there was
nobody left home to write to and it was part of the disaster of the time.
The Copper Coast communities would wish to commemorate them
locally by name and invite their descendants to be part of that process.