From Belfast to Buitrón

I left Belfast in 1989 on my z750 Kawasaki with the intention of travelling and working my way around Europe. When I got to Huelva I was blown away by the landscapes, beaches, gastronomy and way of life, and decided to stay for a whole year, and then another, and I’m still here today.

But I wasn’t the first forastero in these far-flung lands. Just over 150 years before me, there was an influx of British mining companies that came in search of mineral wealth—mainly copper and sulphur—to feed the voracious demand of the industrial revolution. The Huelva Gazette is the story of that time, the crucible of cultures that resulted and the legacy they left behind.

The Huelva Gazette

In the The Huelva Chronicles section you will find my research: an extensive collection of original 19th-century newspaper articles and documents that help place events in context and illuminate the mindsets of the period. This is primary source material, published as it was in its day — unfiltered by modern opinion or reinterpretation, and reflecting precisely what was available to people at the time.

Perspectives contains my own analysis of those events. Please bear in mind that the Huelva Gazette is a personal project, and an openly partial one — shaped by who I am: a Northern Ireland Presbyterian, which makes me both British and Irish simultaneously, and someone who, after 35 years of immersion in and love for Huelva, feels deeply Spanish as well. If you cut me, my blood would run in three colours.

19th Century Huelva Today is where I indulge my passion for photography and exploration, documenting the vestiges of that era that can still be found today.