Charles Roe, who was engaged in the manufacture of silk in Macclesfield turned his attention to mineralogy and discovered a copper mine in Anglesey and it is recorded that he first engaged with it during an excursion to that area, located south of the town of Amlwch in north east Anglesey. Parys Mountain has been confirmed as a site of prehistoric mining, has some indications of Roman activity and became probably the world's largest copper mine in the 1780s. Until 1800 most mining was by open cast but from 1810 Cornishmen opened up significant underground workings. By 1900 all significant mining activity had ceased.