King'S Meaburn Mill

KINGS MEABURN

154/0/10003 King's Meaburn Mill 11-JUL-03

II Corn mill, disused at the time of inspection (5/2003). Dated 1811, with minor C20 alterations and additions. Coursed rubble stonework with dressed stone quoins, and door and window surrounds. Slate roof covering, mostly laid to diminishing courses.

PLAN: Mill with external wheelhouse to left and attached corn-drying kiln to right, sited below leat from River Lyvennet, which runs through the wheelhouse.

EXTERIOR: 3-storey mill, with 2-storey drying kiln to right, the roof of the kiln extended to join the C20 canopy to the front of the mill. Main entrance in right-hand end wall, with basket arch headed double doorway with ashlar quoins and voussoirs. Front elevation with 2 upper floor windows within dressed stone surrounds and 16 pane window frames. Set between the windows, a circular datestone, a former millstone, bearing the date '1811.' First and ground floors each have a single window, each with 16 -paned frames. Gable apex to right with triangular opening with dove perches. Kiln House to right with single upper floor opening and with C20 single storeyed lean-to against gable. Left-hand gable supports external wheelhouse, now roofless. Rear elevation with windows to upper and first floor, and 2 ground floor doorways.

INTERIOR: Wooden interior floor carried on substantial floor beams. King post trusses support 3 tiers of purlins. Ground floor retains horizontal and vertical shafts that support wooden-toothed metal gearing which formerly transferred power to the stone floor above. Heavy wooden framing supports the 4 pairs of in-situ millstones on the first, or 'stone' floor which is accessed by means of a flight of wooden steps. The attic floor, similarly accessed retains the hoist mechanism which lifted sacks of grain through hinged trap doors to the highest point of the building, to be gravity fed-onto the stones below. Wheelhouse retains composite low breast wheel with wooden shaft and spokes, with iron side plates shaft housings and bearings. Kiln house with ground floor hearth and parts of the pierced metal mesh drying floor above. Renewed roof structure and covering has replaced original ventilation louvre.

An early C19 water-powered corn mill, little-altered externally and retaining a composite low breast waterwheel, primary and secondary gearing, 4 pairs of millstones and corn drying kiln.