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Coprolite was also in Orwell, Cambridgeshire

note the spelling...google Coprolite+Cambridgeshire or Orwell and you will find a pdf on coprolite mining in Cambridgeshire ( The origins)

Diane,

From Wiki:

Coprolite mining
In 1842 the Rev John Henslow, a professor of Botany at St John's College, Cambridge discovered coprolites just outside Felixtowe in Suffolk in the villages of Trimley, [7] Falkenham and Kirton[8] and investigated their composition. Realising their potential as a source of available phosphate once they had been treated with Sulphuric acid, he patented an extraction process and set about finding new sources [9]. Very soon, coprolites were being mined on an industrial scale for use as fertiliser due to their high phosphate content. The major area of extraction occurred over the east of England, centred around Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely [10][11] with its refining being carried out in Ipswich by the Fison Company.[11] Today, there is a Coprolite Street near Ipswich Docks where the Fisons works once stood.[12] The industry declined in the 1880s [11][13] but was revived briefly during the First World War to provide phosphates for munitions.[10] A renewed interest in coprolite mining in the first world war extended the area of interest into parts of Buckinghamshire as far west as Woburn[

Interesting!

Elisabeth

My great grandfather was a coprolite digger in the cambridgeshire area I had never heard of this before and I wondered if anyone else had any ancestors with unusual occupations. Diane