One of the most prominent landmarks in the St Ives district stands on Worvas Hill, to the south of the town. It is a pyramidal mausoleum known as Knill’s Steeple. It was erected by John Knill, who was Mayor of the town in the year 1767. He was a lawyer and a collector of customs for twenty years from 1762. He attended church regularly and had drawn up a scheme to suppress wrecking. However, there were those who openly contended that Knill had worked with the local gentry as an encourager of smuggling.

John Knill was born at Callington, east Cornwall on 1^st January 1733, and died in London at the age of 77. He was sent to Jamaica in 1773 to examine the ports there and make a report to the Government. Four years later he was appointed private Secretary to the Duke of Buckingham, and a relative alleged that Knill drew up the Income Tax Act for Pitt. His motto was ‘Nil Desperandum’.

Knill erected the mausoleum in 1782, intending that his remains should be buried there, but long before his death he had, in consequence of difficulties which stood in the way of consecration, completely abandoned the idea, and chose to be buried at St Andrew’s Holborn in London. His original reason for building the mausoleum was included in his will, which read in part: ‘It is natural to love those whom you have had opportunities of serving, and I confess I have real affection for St Ives and its inhabitants, in whose memory I have an ardent desire to continue a little longer than the usual time those do of whom there is no ostensible memorial. To that end, my vanity prompted me to erect a mausoleum, and to institute certain periodical returns of a ceremony which will be found in a deed…and now remains in a strong oaken box placed in the Custom House at St Ives’.

From: ‘A Wanderer in the West County’ and ‘Official Biography of John Knill’, St Ives Times, 29^th July 1911