It is difficult to be sure which name should be applied to this mining complex, which is located in the Hyddgen valley. Previous records refer to it as the Hyddgen Mine, and the features shown on the 1891 Ordnance Survey map are annotated as the 'Hyddgen Lead Works'. However, there is strong evidence to suggest that this mine complex was originally opened as the Llechweddmawr Mine, c.1873.

Llechwedd Mawr was operational for a few years from 1873 onwards and had a Mr Williams (possibly Isaac) as its Chief Agent in 1874, who became the mine manager in 1875-76. This could be the same person as the Captain Williams of Dylife who was named by David Bick as the first manager at Hyddgen. By 1876, again according to Bick, a 40ft waterwheel had been installed for crushing and pumping. It is evident therefore that investment was being made in developing the mine, presumably as the management had grounds, based on their own experiences, to hope that the rich lodes exploited at Dylife would appear in the area around Hyddgen.

These hopes were not realised, however. The mine complex appears on the 1891 Ordnance Survey map (surveyed in 1885) as the 'Hyddgen Lead Works Disused', but was clearly disused by that time. It appears that the Llechwedd Mine had changed hands sometime after 1879 and a new venture, for which no documentation has been discovered, attempted to work the site. There is no evidence of any activity at Hyddgen after the 'Hyddgen Lead Works' closed.

When visited during the summer of 2005, the Hyddgen mine complex was examined carefully and, despite difficulties caused by thick vegetation obscuring much of the landscape, some new features were recorded and it was possible to better define some known features.

The mine can be described in two parts. In the area to the west of the Afon Hyddgen, surviving features are apparently only related to ore extraction. At least two water filled shafts survive (NPRNs 285789 & 285790), an infilled level or possible opencut working (PRN 285786) a possible level or drainage adit (NPRN 285792) and a quarry or possible infilled level (NPRN 285794), each with an associated spoil tip, which Bick (1977, 6) noted as having good samples of sulphide ores when visited in 1956. Several prospecting trenches (NPRNs 285795-97 were also identified by AP mapping and confirmed in the field, as well as several more distant trial workings on Llechwedd Mawr hill (e.g. NPRN 285560).

There was no evidence identified in the field, or from AP evidence, of trackways or tramways connecting these western workings to the features that survive on the eastern side of the Hyddgen valley. However, to the east are found structures that interpreted as being related to the crushing and possible processing of ore derived from the workings to the west of the river. These include a ruinous mine building (NPRN 285760), two wheelpits (NPRNs 285753 & 285759), a fragmentary ruin of a building or structure (NPRN 285754) associated with the largest of the wheelpits, probably the crusher house, and an infilled level (NPRN 285770) and one probable shaft site (NPRN 285840), both with associated spoil tips. A former tramway bed (NPRN 285757) runs for approximately one hundred metres southeastwards from the vicinity of the largest wheelpit to a large spoil tip on the valley floor. Clearly there had been hopes of significant returns for the investment in the site, and this long tramline suggests that it had been anticipated that a considerable amount of spoil would need to be disposed. The site has an air of unfulfilled potential about it.

P. Sambrook, Trysor Archaeology, 3rd December, 2005.

AP: Aerial Photography