Windmill Hill Mill is a

grade II* listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

post mill The post mill is the earliest type of European windmill. Its defining feature is that the whole body of the mill that houses the machinery is mounted on a single vertical post, around which it can be turned to bring the sails into the wind. All p ...

Herstmonceux Herstmonceux ( , ; ) is a village and civil parish in the Wealden District of East Sussex, England, which includes Herstmonceux Castle. The Herstmonceux Medieval Festival is held annually in August. History The name comes from Anglo-Saxon ...

Sussex Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

which has been restored and now operates as a working mill. The mill is open to the public on most Sundays from Easter until October.

History

Windmill Hill Mill was built c. 1814 by William Medhurst, the

Lewes Lewes () is the county town of East Sussex, England. It is the police and judicial centre for all of Sussex and is home to Sussex Police, East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service, Lewes Crown Court and HMP Lewes. The civil parish is the centre of ...

millwright A millwright is a craftsperson or skilled tradesperson who installs, dismantles, maintains, repairs, reassembles, and moves machinery in factories, power plants, and construction sites. The term ''millwright'' (also known as ''industrial mecha ...

. It was working by wind until 1893, when it was stopped owing to a weak weatherbeam. It is the largest post mill in Sussex, and is unique in that it is fitted with Hammond's Patent Sweep Governor, a feature previously fitted to Jack Mill, Clayton. After work by wind had ceased, milling was continued by means of a steam-powered mill set up in the roundhouse. Neve, the

Warbleton Warbleton is a village and civil parish in the Wealden district of East Sussex, England. Within its bounds are three other settlements. It is located south-east of Heathfield on the slopes of the Weald. Etymology The place-name Warbleton, deri ...

millwright was responsible for the fitting-out of the roundhouse as a power mill. The mill stood derelict for many years with major structural faults, including both side girts being broken.

Restoration

In 1994, a supporting steel framework was placed around the mill, and the remaining iron sheeting that clad the breast and sides of the mill removed. The tail of the mill was clad in plywood to keep the weather out. A trust was set up in 1995, aiming to prevent further deterioration in the condition of the mill, and to assess options for restoration. The

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

agreed in principle to support the restoration work.

English Heritage English Heritage (officially the English Heritage Trust) is a charity that manages over 400 historic monuments, buildings and places. These include prehistoric sites, medieval castles, Roman forts and country houses. The charity states that i ...

funded the study to produce an application for lottery funds to restore the mill. A detailed study of the mill was made in the summer of 2000. IJP Millwrights of

Binfield Heath Binfield Heath is a village and civil parish in South Oxfordshire, England, south-southwest of Henley-on-Thames and northeast of Reading on a southern knoll of the Chiltern Hills. The 2011 Census recorded the parish population as 709. The vil ...

were contracted to restore the mill. A grant of £570,000 towards a total restoration cost of £770,000 was made in December 2001, this being the biggest single Lottery grant to an individual windmill. The mill was dismantled during November and December 2003, and taken in sections to IJP's workshops. Modern millwrighting techniques, including

CAD Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve co ...

were used in the assessment of the structure of the mill in preparation for the rebuild. It was found that one of the quarterbars in the

trestle ATLAS-I (Air Force Weapons Lab Transmission-Line Aircraft Simulator), better known as Trestle, was a unique electromagnetic pulse (EMP) generation and testing apparatus built between 1972 and 1980 during the Cold War at Sandia National Laborato ...

would need to be replaced due to damage done by

Death Watch Beetle The deathwatch beetle (''Xestobium rufovillosum'') is a species of woodboring beetle that sometimes infests the structural timbers of old buildings. The adult beetle is brown and measures on average long. Eggs are laid in dark crevices in old w ...

s. The rebuilt frame of the mill was lifted back onto the main post on 7 September 2004. The sails were fitted to the mill between 24 November and 3 December 2005. On 19 November 2014 the Heritage Lottery Fund announced the grant of £80,800 for restoration of machinery and sweeps to grind flour. On 5 November 2015, the full patent sweeps turned again for the first time in 120 years.

Description

''Windmill Hill Mill'' is a post mill on a two-storey roundhouse. She has four

patent sails Windmills are powered by their sails. Sails are found in different designs, from primitive common sails to the advanced patent sails. Jib sails The jib sail is found in Mediterranean countries and consists of a simple triangle of cloth wound rou ...

carried on a

cast-iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...

windshaft and was winded by a tailpole. Winding is now

computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...

-controlled, with an automatic turning device installed that receives information about the wind direction from sensors mounted on the mill. The wooden brake-wheel is of clasp-arm construction, with

oak An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...

arms and an

elm Elms are deciduous and semi-deciduous trees comprising the flowering plant genus ''Ulmus'' in the plant family Ulmaceae. They are distributed over most of the Northern Hemisphere, inhabiting the temperate and tropical-montane regions of North ...

rim. It has 104 cogs and drives a stone nut with twelve cogs. The tail wheel is of cast iron, with 130 cogs. The mill drove two pairs of

millstone Millstones or mill stones are stones used in gristmills, for grinding wheat or other grains. They are sometimes referred to as grindstones or grinding stones. Millstones come in pairs: a convex stationary base known as the ''bedstone'' and ...

s, arranged head and tail. The headstones are Peak stones and the tailstones are French Burrs. The body of the mill is long and wide, the largest surviving post mill by floor plan in the United Kingdom. It is high to the roof, the second tallest post mill in England.The Windmill at Windmill Hill - The Guide (Booklet published by Windmill Hill Windmill Trust). The roundhouse is in diameter and has a single-storey lean-to extension of part of its circumference. When originally built, the mill had a single-storey roundhouse which was raised in the 1850s. The Hammond's Sweep Governor was fitted in the 1870s.

Millers

*Beeney 1845 - 1877 *Charles Edwin Hammond 1878 - 1887 *Henry Harmer 1887 - 1913 References for above:-

References

External links