London Apprentice

London Apprentice Cornish: Oberden Loundres
OS grid reference	SX006502
Civil parish	Pentewan Valley
Unitary authority	Cornwall
Ceremonial county	Cornwall
Region	South West
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Post town	ST AUSTELL
Postcode district	PL26
Dialling code	01726
Police	Devon and Cornwall
Fire	Cornwall
Ambulance	South Western
UK Parliament	St Austell and Newquay

London Apprentice (Template:Lang-kw) is a village in south Cornwall, England on the banks of the St Austell River in the Pentewan Valley approximately two miles (3 km) south of St Austell.

The village is in the civil parish of Pentewan Valley and the ecclesiastical parish of St Austell and it takes its name from the London Apprentice Inn, which formerly stood on the St Austell to Pentewan road. The inn traded from 1815 to 1871 and probably longer.

Tin-mining

New Mills Primitive Methodist Church

In 1833 a coalyard was constructed on the Pentewan Railway near the inn to supply coal to the tin mines at nearby Polgooth and the settlement may have arisen around this point. According to nineteenth-century census returns, most of the villagers were engaged in tin-mining, either in the stream-works of Wheal Virgin, close to London Apprentice, or in Polgooth. The former closed in 1874, the latter by 1900. The New Mills Primitive Methodist Church was built in the village in 1870, but closed in 1988, though the building still stands.

The village today

Bridge over St Austell River at Kings Wood

Today, the village (which retains a shop and a restaurant) caters mainly for tourists. The route of the narrow gauge railway from St Austell to Pentewan is now a footpath and cycle path, known as the Pentewan Trail. Kings Wood, a remnant of ancient woodland, owned by the Woodland Trust, lies to the south of the village.