Stevens' Mill

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At one time there were 4 windmills in Burwell. 2 were in the Toyse Lane area (Which is at the northern end of the village.) There is very little trace of these. Another mill stood near Newmarket Road. This mill became disused around the end of the 19th Century and the beginning of the 20th Century and was converted into a barn (it was reduced to 2 storeys and a thatched roof added to the remaining stump) This barn is still standing and is now part of a modern farm yard. It is privately owned and is not open to the public although it can be seen very clearly from the farm yard entrance (next to the Doctors Surgery). It is also visible from the 2nd floor of Stevens' Mill.

The 1 remaining mill is Stevens' Mill which is located next to the Museum.
Stevens' Mill was built around 1820. There may have been an older mill on the same site previously, but their are no accurate records to confirm this.
Stevens' Mill (sometimes incorrectly referred to as "Stephens" or "Steven's") was owned and run by several generations of the Stevens family (hence its name), producing flour and animal feeds, until the mid 1950s, when it closed. By this time the mill was only producing animal feeds for local farmers. The mill and the adjacent field were then sold to a local construction firm a few years later. The field was built on and became Mill Close. The street may have had a different name if the builders had demolished the mill! Luckily there was a lot of opposition to the proposed demolition and the builders changed their mind. They sold the mill to the local council who in turn sold it to a preservation trust.
The trust then started the enormous task of restoring the mill. The mill was in quite a bad state as about 15 years had passed since the mill closed and probably more than that since any maintenance was done.
The sails and fantail had rotted badly. The wooden cap had rotted away exposing the inside of the mill to the elements. Thankfully no major damage was caused to the inside of the mill apart from rotting the floorboards. The machinery and structural beams survived in fairly good condition.
The cap was rebuilt with an aluminium sheet skin instead of a wooden one (aluminium is virtually maintenance free). The aluminium soon weathered to a dull white colour - very close to the colour the old wooden cap was painted before the mill became derelict.
The internal woodwork was repaired and in the case of the floorboards replaced. The fantail was also rebuilt.
Up to this stage the restoration was mainly just standard carpentry work. The task of installing new sails was a major one. Unlike floorboards, these do not come ready made from the builders merchant! The sails are made up of hundreds of pieces of wood with scores of nuts, bolts, hinges and iron rods. This is all attached to a very long and thick wooden post which is itself bolted to an even longer wooden post with another sail at the other end. This larger post is attached at its centre to the windshaft which turns the gears inside the cap to power the machinery. The length of a pair of sails from tip to tip is actually more than the height of the mill. As the sails are attached to the mill in the halfway point between each pair and over 40 feet above the ground the end of a sail at its lowest position is sightly above the height of the top of the doors on the ground floor.
A Burwell based firm of carpenters was given the job of making a pair of sails. Measurements were taken from what remained of the old sails and casts were taken of the surviving metal brackets and hinges to enable the new sails to be as close to the original ones as possible.
Due to their size the sails were actually made outside the firms workshop just in case they were too big to get out of the building!
The new sails were eventually fitted to the mill in the late 1980s and cost around £15,000. This immense cost was the main reason only one pair were made. The mill can work with just one pair of sails but would be much more efficient with its second pair. We do have plans to fit the 2nd pair of sails in the near future, but as they will now cost up to £30,000 we feel the maintenance of the mill is more important at present.
The majority of the restoration was completed by the late 1980s, enabling the mill to be opened to the public once a month occasionally with working demonstration of milling.
The money for the restoration of the mill has come from English Heritage and local council grants. Money has also come from donations by visitors to the mill and the museum.
The mill is a Grade II* Listed Building, the only one in Burwell.
What are 'listed buildings'? Click here for information.

© T C Vickers