WHEN young Cornishman Francis Oats left school in the early 1860s, he became a miner, as did many of his classmates in west Cornwall. Yet, with an eye on a bigger prize, he would walk the seven miles from his home in St Just across the fields to Penzance, in order to attend evening classes in mining engineering. His efforts paid off. After excelling in exams, he was offered free tuition at the London School of Mines and was made a local mining captain at the age of 20.
Moving to South Africa, he became chairman of De Beers and a close ally of Cecil Rhodes, accruing a significant fortune in the diamond mines and gold fields along the
