Abbey Mill

Abbey Mill is a corn watermill and mill-house, now converted into a house, located in Easby. It dates from the late 18th century to early 19th century and is built on much older foundations. The structure is made of coursed rubble with a stone slate roof and has two storeys with six bays, featuring quoins.

In the fourth bay, there is a part-glazed 20th-century six-panel door beneath a plain fanlight, all set in an ashlar surround on plinths, with imposts, voussoirs forming a semicircular arch, and a tripartite keystone. The ground-floor windows are sashes with glazing bars in ashlar surrounds, with the windows in the first to third bays being 20th-century copies. On the first floor, the windows have flat arches; the first and second bays have nine-pane unequally-hung sashes, while the remaining bays feature sashes with glazing bars. The building has shaped kneelers and ashlar copings, with brick stacks located at the ends and between the second and third bays.

The corn watermill originally occupied the first three bays and had a matching doorway in the third bay. Below the second ground-floor window, there is a blocked small square surround for a window that once illuminated the gearing. The mill originally served the nearby Abbey and was connected to the River Swale by a head race and tail race, with the ashlar-lined wheel chamber located below the first bay. The watermill continued to operate until the 1950s, during which time it generated electricity for the hamlet of Easby using a turbine that remains in the wheel chamber, until it was replaced by the National Grid.