Lymington's life of brine (From Bournemouth Echo)

Lymington's life of brine

7:30pm Monday 26th July 2010 in

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A TEAM of archaeologists is literally digging into the past in a bid to uncover the long-lost secrets of Lymington’s once-lucrative sea salt industry.

So far 100 volunteers have signed up to undertake the two-week dig in five trenches on Pennington Marshes adjoining the country’s last remaining sea salt boiling houses at Lower Woodside.

Salt was a vital trade for the area for centuries and only ceased as the Cheshire salt mines came fully on-stream in the 1800s.

The Lower Woodside boiling houses were the last to operate in Britain, shutting in 1865.

New Forest National Park Authority is organising the dig to find out the extend of a typical salt works and to discover how long it was in existence as part of the Festival of British Archaeology.

National Park archaeologist Frank Green said: “The salt industry once dominated the New Forest coast and has shaped the natural and economic landscape which residents, visitors and nature-lovers know today.”

Salt was created by drawing sea water into clay-lined pans, where some of the water evaporated.

The brine was pumped by windmills to tanks and then boiled in coal-fired containers. As the water boiled, salt was skimmed off to be dried and tranported by barge to waiting ships.

In 1730 there were 163 salt pans in the Lymington area. Between 1724 and 1766 the town exported 4,612 tons of salt in 64 ships to destinations including Newfoundland, America, Norway, Ireland and the Channel Islands.

Mr Green said the tithe map of 1840 shows one of the buildings was larger than it is now.

After the excavations have been carried out, the Grade II Listed buildings will be converted for office and storage use.

l Tours of the excavations are available this week until Thursday but booking is essential. Contact James Brown on 01590 646695 for more information.