Started by John Easton of Dodbrook, Kingsbridge in 1770, who was looking for copper but found only pyrites.

Hawkins wrote that in 1770 one John Easton, of Dodbrook, attempted to open a mine in a part of the cliffs of Bolberry Down, not far from Ralph’s Hole ‘but it was presently abandoned on submitting the spangled fossil to the test of the assayer, who pronounced it mundick (Cornish miners’ name for pyrites); and the adventurer gained nothing, except the empty honour of leaving the shaft his name.

• Hope Cove, Galmpton and South Huish, The History and Heritage of a Devon Parish