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Local Information for St. Austell

St Austell is a town in Cornwall, UK. It has the largest population of any single town in Cornwall, and is generally believed to have a population larger than the city of Truro, which is the county's capital city.

The first detailed record of the town's existence comes from an account of a visit to the county by the then reigning King Henry the VIII, who despite mentioning it as being a town, described St Austell as at the time being little more than a small village surrounding a central church, whose only other notable feature was a small granite bridge (clearly far older than the other buildings) spanning the river (later to be known locally as "white river" due to the drainage of micaceous waste water from the local clay industry). The bridge is still extant, and is believed to be either the oldest or one of the oldest standing structures in the town.

Not long after William Cookworthy discovered china clay in Tregonning, the same mineral was found (in greater quan...More