Bragg's Mill, William Bragg's Mill, Bartlow Hamlet Mill or Stevington End Mill is a grade II listed post mill

Post mill

The post mill is the earliest type of European windmill. The 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. The earliest post mills in England are thought to have...

 at Ashdon

Ashdon

Ashdon is a village and civil parish in Essex, England. It is located about northeast of Saffron Walden and is northwest from the county town of Chelmsford. The village is in the district of Uttlesford and the parliamentary constituency of Saffron Walden...

, Essex

Essex

Essex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 which has been restored.

History

Bragg's Mill was built in 1757 by William Haylock, a carpenter

Carpentry

A carpenter is a skilled craftsperson who works with timber to construct, install and maintain buildings, furniture, and other objects. The work, known as carpentry, may involve manual labor and work outdoors....

 of Ashdon. In 1813, the mill

Windmill

A windmill is a machine which converts the energy of wind into rotational energy by means of vanes called sails or blades. Originally windmills were developed for milling grain for food production. In the course of history the windmill was adapted to many other industrial uses. An important...

 was advertised for sale, then having two pairs of millstone

Millstone

Millstones or mill stones are used in windmills and watermills, including tide mills, for grinding wheat or other grains.The type of stone most suitable for making millstones is a siliceous rock called burrstone , an open-textured, porous but tough, fine-grained sandstone, or a silicified,...

s. At this time it was still an open trestle mill

Trestle (mill)

The Trestle of a Post mill is the arrangement of the Main post, crosstrees and quarterbars that form the substructure of this type of windmill. It may or may not be surrounded by a roundhouse...

. The mill was extended at the tail c1815. A roundhouse was added circa 1820. The mill was working until c1912. By 1932 the mill was being propped up from beneath, as the side girt

Girt

In architecture or structural engineering, a girt is a horizontal structural member in a framed wall. Girts provide lateral support to the wall panel, primarily, to resist winds loads.May also be known as a sheeting rail....

 on the left side had failed. The mill was renovated in the late 1950s, but was derelict again by 1974, when further repairs were carried out. The sails

Windmill sail

Windmills are powered by their sails. Sails are found in different designs, from primitive common sails to the advanced patent sails.-Jib sails:...

 were removed in the 1990s.

Restoration

A meeting of the villagers in April 1999 agreed that the windmill should be restored and that included the sails being fitted. The Ashdon Windmill Trust Ltd was formed and registered as a charity. Planning permission and listed building permission were obtained. In 2000, the mill was gifted to Ashdon village by the Thurlow Estate, who owned it, with the promise of a £25,000 donation once the Trust had raised £25,000 itself. The Essex Environment Trust gave a grant of £40,000 in 2001. Restoration of the mill started in March 2002. Vincent Pargeter was engaged to do the restoration. The frame of the mill was straightened, and the mill completely reclad in new weatherboards

Weatherboarding

Weatherboarding is the cladding or ‘siding’ of a house consisting of long thin timber boards that overlap one another, either vertically or horizontally on the outside of the wall. They are usually of rectangular section with parallel sides...

. By 2004 the mill was resplendent in a new coat of white paint. In July 2004, a grant of £46,900 was received from the Heritage Lottery Fund

Heritage Lottery Fund

The Heritage Lottery Fund is a fund established in the United Kingdom under the National Lottery etc. Act 1993. The Fund opened for applications in 1994. It uses money raised through the National Lottery to transform and sustain the UK’s heritage...

. New sails were fitted on 5 July 2006.

Description

Bragg's Mill is a post mill with a single storey roundhouse. It has four patent sails carried on a wooden windshaft with a cast iron

Cast iron

Cast iron is derived from pig iron, and while it usually refers to gray iron, it also identifies a large group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic. The color of a fractured surface can be used to identify an alloy. White cast iron is named after its white surface when fractured, due...

 poll end. Two sails are double shuttered and two are single shuttered. Two pairs of millstones are driven, arranged Head and Tail. The mill is winded by tailpole. The mill is 34 ft (10.36 m) high to the roof.

Trestle and roundhouse

Before the recent restoration, the lower crosstree had been clamped at a quarterbar joint. The crosstrees stand within 3 inch of ground level. The brick piers that the crosstrees rest on had been tarred, and the crosstrees themselve painted white, evidence that the mill was built as an open trestle mill. Both crosstrees are of oak

Oak

An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...

, the upper being 24 ft (7.32 m) long and 13 by in section, whilst the lower crosstree is 12 by 11 in (305 by 292 mm) at the ends, thickening to 13+1/2 in at the centre. The post is 17 inch long, and 27 in (69 cm) square at its base.

Body

The body of the mill measures 19 ft 10 in by 11 ft (6.05 by 3.35 m) in plan. At some point, the body of the mill had been extended at the back to provide room for a bolter. It was originally only 16 inch long. The crown tree is 20 in (51 cm) square at the ends, thickening to 20 by at the centre. The side girts are 6 by by in section.

Sails and windshaft

The windshaft is of wood with a cast iron poll end, probably fitted at the same time that the Patent sails were added. The mill would originally have been built with common sails.

Machinery

The clasp arm wooden head wheel was converted from Compass arm construction, it is 7 inch diameter. The wooden tail wheel has also been similarly converted, it is 6 inch diameter. The mill was originally built with a single pair of millstones, the second pair probably being added when the mill was extended at the rear.

Millers

• Josiah Giblin 1809 - 1819
• John Ruse 1830
• John Brown 1848
• Frederick and John Ruse 1850
• John Bragg 1898
• William Bragg 1894 - 1912

References for above:-

Culture

Bragg's Mill in its last working years was described in the book Five Miles from Bunkum.

Public access

The mill is open to the public on the second Sunday of each month, starting in April each year.

External links

• Windmill World webpage on Ashdon mill.
• Ashdon Windmill Trust homepage.