In order to widen the search of potential case studies and to find earlier references to copper roofing in buildings I conducted a search of Victoria County History on-line. A number of volumes have been digitised and are available through the website www.british-history.ac.uk . I carried out a word search through each of the volumes for 'copper'. The results include references to manufacture, mining and small items of copper. In total 55 built reference were found. Considering the extent of buildings covered by Victoria County History searched this can be considered a small sample. The majority of reference were to religious buildings, which reflects the bias towards these building in the History.
The earliest reference was to a house in North Bradley in Whiltshire built around the 17th century, later demolished about 1800. The description stated 'All that is known of it is that it was remarkable for the number and size of its windows and that it was roofed with copper.
The chart below shows that date, were discernible, of the construction of the buildings or the re-roofing in copper. Even with the small number of samples there is a noticable increase around the 1880's and in the 1950's and 60's.
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