Coulsontown Cottages Historic District

Four stone cottages on a slate ridge about three quarters of a mile east of Delta, York County, were built between 1845 and 1865 for Welsh slate workers. Each is two stories with a rectangular plan, gable roof, and end chimneys. Their walls are rough, unfinished blocks laid in random courses, with the gaps filled by rubble, and the cottages nearly duplicate quarrymen's houses from Snowdonia in northwest Wales. The first cottage, on parcel six, is regarded as the prototype; the later three use brick chimneys and slightly more elaborate woodwork. The district is significant for its link to the Peach Bottom slate industry, which expanded in the 1840s when Welsh slaters settled the area. Quarrying in the region drew wide notice, including a prize at London's Crystal Palace Exposition in 1850. The cottages are the county's only architectural record of this Welsh community and of the lower-paid pit workers who lived in such housing.