Flanchford Mill

TQ 24 NW 902/25/272 31.03.1977

FLANCHFORD ROAD (East, off) Leigh Flanchford Mill

II*

Watermill. Mid-C18 ("1768" etched in wall of pit floor), for James Scawen (Stidder, p29)); restored 1997. Timber-frame with replacement weatherboard cladding on basement (pit floor) of red brick in Flemish bond. Replacement plain tile roof. 3 floors; 1 x 3 bays, gable-end on. Windows are C20 replacements. Old board doors with strap-hinges. East end has door at ground-floor and loading door above with narrow window over. Alongside south side is breast-shot water-wheel of 1870, much-decayed. The brick basement has two round-arched openings for shafts, and 3 windows to ground floor. Further door to north side. Interior: Original timber frame survives well, having unjowelled posts braced to rails and sole-plate, vertical studs; roof has raking queen struts up to principal rafters, coupled common rafters with plank collars nailed on, no ridge-piece; large-scantling chamfered cross-beams and joists; old floorboards, particularly to 1st floor. Pit floor retains some horizontal board lining. In roof, six grain bins set between wooden staging, with trap-doors for sacks. Much original machinery remains (some parts collapsed) including: pit wheels and gearing linking waterwheel and millstones, sack-hoist and flour grader. Of the two original pairs of millstones, one basestone survives in situ with the wooden housing for the other. An unusual example of an C18 weatherboard watermill which retains much of its original machinery. D Stidder, The Watermills of Surrey (Barracuda Books Ltd), 1990, pp 28-30, illus p 16.

Listing NGR: TQ2351747960