Castleton Mill

SCHEDULE ST 6416 OBORNE ROAD 2/450 (East Side, off) II Castleton Mill

Water pumping mill. 1869 by John Lawson (of Westminster) for Sherborne Local Board of Health; extended and wheel replaced 1898; late C20 alterations. Coursed rock- faced stone; roof of Spanish slates (replacing Welsh slates). Single storey. 1 x 2 bays, the front bay added 1898; wheel-chamber at rear, the wheel fed by 3 leats all at different levels. Chamfered plinth. Round-arched windows with chamfered sills and small-pane glazing. Gable front has segment-arched doorway on left with diagonally- boarded double door; window on right; raised verge with shaped kneelers and coping with roll-moulded apex. Right return: projecting wheel: at eaves, to left of this, stack with gabled base. Rear: 2 windows boarded up; below right window arched pipe for leading water to wheel (the middle-most feed). Left return: window to right; projecting attached stone wall at centre not of special interest; on left, opening for lower-most water-feed: above it an iron pentrough projects from the wall, formerly carrying water to wheel at highest feed-level. Interior: front bay has encaustic tile floor and pit for former pumps. Wheel chamber retains the 1893 39" pitch-back water-wheel made by Edward White of Redditch; it is 26' in diameter, has a perimeter drive (gearing now removed) and drove three vertical drive pumps. The original water tank and launder, cast by Sothert and Pitt of Bath, survive, as also the winding gear to open up and shut off the water supply. The water wheel is unusually large and a rare survival; and the complex planning of the feed system (taking into account 3 different sources of water and the nearby railway) is of interest. The mill was designed to pump water to Sherborne, but was unable to meet demand and was first supplemented by a turbine-powered pump-house built nearby (in 1874), and then itself extended 1898).

K. Falconer England's Industrial Heritage p.91

Listing NGR: ST6460616900