Little Hallingbury Watermill & Windmill ..
We all know the beautiful old watermill at the bottom of Mill Lane built in 1874 and magnificently restored by John and June Wilkinson, but did you know there was also a Windmill ?
HALLINGBURY MILL - 1930's
HALLINGBURY MILL - 1970's
My interest started when I was told there once was a painting hanging in the Church of a Windmill at Gaston Green. This painting is no longer there, so I must now travel along two paths.
1: Where is the painting ?
2:
Where was the Mill ?
So far, I have had no luck with the painting, but details of the
Mill are beginning to come to light. Bill Williams found an entry
in the book "Essex Windmills. Millers and Millwrights"
Vol 4 by Kenneth G. Farries, this states the Mill stood on the
hill which rises steeply above the Stort Valley, in an enclosed
plot shown on the 1838 Tithe Map.
The 1839 Apportionment Records detail the Wind and Watermills as
being owned by George and Peter Pavitt and occupied by Joseph and
Peter Pavitt. The freehold property being advertised for sale in
February 1856 consisting of a Watermill with three pairs of
stones and the Windmill with one pair of fixed stones, but
capable of driving two. These and the dwelling house being rented
annually at ?120.
This is all that is known of the Windmill, which may have been
discarded, when the present Watermill was built in 1874, so
escaping the notice of surveyors of the 1875 maps.
I have asked some of the older residents of the village, but they
cannot remember this Windmill standing. One lady, who was
resident in the village, almost 100 years ago, said she could
remember a Windmill at Gaston Green, but could not remember the
exact spot.
So we most defiantly did have a Windmill in Little Hallingbury.
If anyone can give any more information on this, or any other
topic of our village history, however small (or the whereabouts
of the painting) please let me know ..
Sue Meyer 723814.
Village History Society
UPDATE ....
Little Hallingbury Windmill stood on the hill which rises steeply above the Stort Valley on an enclosed plot which is shown on the Tithe Map of 1833.
The 1839 Apportionment Record indicates the mill was owned by George and Peter Pavitt and occupied by Joseph and Peter Pavitt.
The property was advertised for sale in February 1856, consisting of a watermill with three pairs of stones and the windmill with one pair fixed, but capable of driving two.
These and the dwelling house were rented annually at £120.
Little is known of this Mill, after 1874 when it may have been discarded, with the building of the present Hallingbury Water Mill, as the Windmill to which we refer was not detailed on the map of 1875.
