Description

NZ 11 NW GAINFORD ALWENT MILL LANE
(North side, off)

Alwent Mill and
5/87 mill race

II
GV

Water-powered mill for grinding corn. Dated 1792 with later C19 alterations.
Dressed sandstone with ashlar mill race; cast-iron and timber mill wheel;
pantiled roof with triple course of sandstone flags at eaves of central section
and single row to left section. 2 storeys, 4 bays. Single-bay left section
and quoined, single-bay central section project and have boarded door to left
and two blocked openings to right. 2-bay right section has central Dutch
door with flat surround and lintel dated 1792; first floor has two boarded
openings. Roof has slightly-projecting eaves and raised verge to left.

Mill race enters to rear of left return via a wooden sluice. Stream formerly
drove a high breast-shot water wheel, over 4 metres in diameter, which worked
three pairs of different grindstones. Small, oat-drying kiln in room above
waterwheel.

Alwent Mill is one of the few watermills in County Durham with its machinery
still in situ and it remained in use until about 1948.

Single-storey addition to left is not of special interest.

(Vera Chapman, Rural Durham, 1977).

Listing NGR: NZ1452318368

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26414284

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Sheffield and the South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Wiltshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Liverpool: Pevsner City Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)