Our remaining windmills are shameless romantic slices of old England. Last spring, those who were still working took it up a notch to meet local demand for flour, Eleanor Doughty reports.

Brixton Hill in south London is pretty much the last place you might expect to encounter a windmill – but there you are, at the end of Blenheim Gardens, about halfway up the hill, the behold, a great windmill with four sails, shining in the Sun.

Inside, the mill is running and there’s quite a commotion – flour is being made. The Brixton Windmill was built in 1816 and operated by the Ashby family, who owned a few mills locally. In the early 1860s her sails were removed and she remained silent for a century, before new sails were installed by London County Council.

Friends of Windmill Gardens was established in 2003 with the intention of restoring the mill, and reopened eight years later after a long construction program. Today, the sails are turning, but an electric motor powers the mill. The resulting flour is sold in over 10 stores in South London and is supplied to local food banks. Brixton is back in his job.

There are around 140 windmills left in the UK today, of which around 40 are still in operation. For comparison, says Mildred Cookson, president of the mills section of the Society for the Protection of Old Buildings (SPAB), there were over 1,000 in the 1890s. They tend to adopt one of the following two styles: the brick tower mill, where only the cap spins, or the wooden post mill, which revolves completely around a vertical post and dates from around 1185, when one was built in Weedly , East Yorkshire. .

Those who remain are a diverse group. The six-story windmill at Quainton, Buckinghamshire, is owned by a descendant of its 1830 commissioner. In Mayfield, East Sussex, the Argos Hill Windmill – a post mill with a pretty red top – is currently being restored. Near Cambridge, miller Jonathan Cook produces flour from Fosters Mill and near Sheringham in Norfolk is Cley Windmill, turned into a home in the 1920s and partly sponsored by Mary, Duchess of Bedford. In 1979 it was inherited by Colonel Charles Blount, father of singer James Blunt, who spent much of his childhood there.

Some are better known than others. John Constable painted the Mill in Petworth, West Sussex, and, in Buckinghamshire, Cobstone is the home of Caractacus Potts in Ian Fleming’s 1968 film adaptation. Chitty chitty bang bang. In the BBC Mystery Mystery Series Jonathan Creek, with Alan Davies, King’s Mill in Shipley, West Sussex, steals the show.

Nearby, above Clayton, stands a remarkable pair of windmills, better known as Jack and Jill. The latter was built in Brighton in 1821, as a post factory called Lashmar’s New Mill, “but as Brighton grew it was moved to Clayton, where since 1765 had been a position called Duncton, ”says retired accountant Simon Potter, director of the Jack and Jills Windmill Company. The two worked together for about 12 years, before Duncton was demolished in 1866. Jack, a brick tower mill, was later built, but was turned into a house in 1906.

In 1953, the pair were purchased by golf writer Henry Longhurst, who ultimately gave Jill to the board, leaving Jack in his will to his son – who predeceased him. Jack remains in private hands today; the seven bedroom house to which she (all windmills are female) is attached was recently sold for £ 3million. Mid Sussex District Council still owns Jill and the company maintains her, raising money by selling flour and open houses (“Jack and Jill Came Up the Hill,” September 4, 2019).

Windmill tours may have been suspended due to the pandemic, but working mills have really taken off. “Covid-19 has been incredible for traditional mills,” enthuses Ms. Cookson. “People couldn’t get flour from supermarkets and we hope people will continue to buy flour locally.”

At Holgate Windmill in York, North Yorkshire, four times more flour than usual was produced to meet demand during the first lockdown. This five-sail tower mill was built in 1770. Today it stands in the middle of a working roundabout. In the old days, says Richard Green, a former RAF engineer involved with Holgate for the millennium, “it was in the middle of the ground with fields on both sides, but after World War II they started building houses along from the road leading to the mill. . ‘ Now the windmill is circled, and in 2012 Holgate won the Roundabout of the Year from the Roundabout Appreciation Society. “Windmills are beautiful icons wherever they are,” says Green. “It doesn’t matter if it’s on a roundabout.

The Berkswell Windmill, near the village of Balsall Common in Solihull, West Midlands, is rather too well located. Purchased by Jeanette McGarry in 2005, and restored with the help of English Heritage, it is, according to Ms McGarry, “the most complete windmill in the UK, with all of its original machinery”. Built in 1826, Berkswell is a brick tower mill with four sails, with an upside down ‘Warwickshire hat’ in the shape of a boat. It sounds idyllic, especially now that Berkswell is producing flour again, but the green belt land surrounding the windmill has been earmarked for development. It would be a disaster, McGarry said: “We are very concerned about the impact construction work may have on the wind flow.” A decision is pending.

North-east of Berkswell is a land heavily populated by windmills: Lincolnshire. Coming to Lincoln from the A46, it’s not just the Cathedral that can be seen on the horizon, but Ellis Mill. Twenty miles away, overlooking the village of Kirton-in-Lindsey, is the Austin family’s Mount Pleasant Windmill and Bakery. Full east, six miles from the coast, is the Alford Windmill, with seven stories and five sails; Maud Foster Mill, which is the same size, is 40 kilometers away in Boston.

The fact that Lincolnshire is famous for its flat county is one of the reasons there are so many windmills – “you don’t have fast flowing rivers for watermills,” says Charles Pinchbeck , Chairman of the Heckington Windmill Trust and Deputy Lieutenant of Lincolnshire. Its windmill, five miles from the market town of Sleaford, is unique in that it is the only working eight-sail windmill in the world. “In the 18th century, as cast iron became more available, there were experiments with larger mills,” he continues.

The most important thing was to be able to mill in light winds and the more sails the lower the wind that can be milled – hence the Heckington eight. The mill produces a range of flours, sold both online and on site. Last spring, when basic supplies were scarce, “people came to Heckington just to buy flour. There was a time when my job was to manage the queue, and I was delighted to do so, ”recalls Pinchbeck, who has lived in Heckington his entire life.

For every windmill with queues for flour, there are plenty where none are produced. The National Trust owns the Tower Windmill at Burnham Overy Staithe, near Wells-next-to-Sea, Norfolk, which was built in 1816. Tailwinded in 1914 – this, says Ranger Keith Miller, is when “the wind blows” blows quickly and turns the sails upside down, the worst thing that can happen to a windmill ‘- it ceased to operate in 1919 and was converted into holiday accommodation. In 1958 it was donated to the Trust and is now a popular vacation home, accommodating 19 people, although it is currently closed for renovations Twice a year, mechanics come to turn the sails.

Those involved in our windmills all seem to be unabashedly in love with structures, those romantic slices of old England. Famous fan, the Honorable James Savile, son of the Earl of Mexborough, put it perhaps best: “On the one hand, they represent a simpler world, ruled by the growing season and the winds – and, d On the other hand, there is the technical ingenuity, the interconnected cogs, wheels and pulleys. Something that is so picturesque on the outside is a mechanical marvel on the inside.

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The redevelopment of a house in a former windmill complex inspired a remarkable contemporary home with striking interiors. John