Windmill at Windmill Farm, Malton, North Yorkshire

Summary

Windmill (tower-type), built late C18 to early C19, with C19 and C20 alterations.

Description

Windmill (tower-type), built late C18 to early C19, with C19 and C20 alterations.

MATERIALS: fair-faced orange brick with a slate-clad conical roof, and timber floors.

PLAN: the windmill lies approximately 1.2km north-by-north-west of Old Malton village. It is situated at the centre of a rectangular-plan farmstead and has battered circular-plan walls. The adjacent farm buildings are not of special interest and are excluded from the windmill's listing.

EXTERIOR: the windmill is a four-storey brick-built tower with window openings to all floors and it has a circular brick foundation bed. The ground floor is raised approximately 1m above ground level and is entered on the eastern side through a double plank door, off a raised brick-built loading platform built against the east elevation. The platform has a Yorkstone surface that has been re-surfaced in concrete and is approached by steps with stone treads. A two-light timber window is situated on the south side of the ground floor and a slightly off-centre, blocked window is to the west. The first floor has a former doorway on the south side that has been partially blocked to form a narrow rectangular window. There is a narrow notch cut into the brickwork above this doorway, possibly for the fitting of a timber gibbet for raising or lowering sacks of corn. The second floor has two opposed blocked window openings, and the third floor has two window positions tight under the eaves; the one to the north-east is boarded over and the other to the south is blocked-up. There is no evidence in the brickwork of putt holes for a luffing gallery, and the cap, sails and the fan tail are all missing; the cap has been replaced by a conical Welsh slate-clad roof, topped by a lead cap finial.

INTERIOR: the ground-floor double plank door is opened by a finger latch. A secondary timber stair rises on the south-eastern side to the first-floor. There is a secondary butt-jointed brick chimney stack with a narrow, blocked fireplace against the northern wall surface, which rises only to the soffit of the first floor above. A secondary steel frame supporting a small belt driven mid-C20 corn milling machine is set into the west wall and suspended from the ceiling beams, flanked to the right by modern electrical switch gear, and to the left by a grain sump in the concrete floor. The stair opening to the first floor is guarded by timber handrails, a mid-C20 timber grain bin is situated against the western wall over the milling machine below, which has a galvanized steel auger pipe to its immediate left. There are four substantial timber bearing blocks attached to the ceiling joists, each roughly aligned on a cardinal point. The ladders to the second and third floors are absent; however, a timber handrail remains on the second floor. Two cast-iron sack pulley blocks are set into the soffit of the ceiling. No windmill machinery has been retained.

History

Little is known of the history of this windmill apart from what is shown by map evidence, which shows two names in use: Old Malton Mill and Old Malton Moor Mill. Anecdotal evidence from a former tenant farmer claims the earliest known mention of a mill at this location dates to 1780, and occurs in estate papers, identifying it as 'The Old Malton Mill'. It is unclear whether this refers to the existing structure, which stylistically appears to date from around the late C18 to the early C19. The 1844 Tithe map shows a group of buildings, including the windmill, a long shed, and a house with an outbuilding, set within a garden boundary, with an apportionment that records it as a wind flour mill and house owned by John Race.

The windmill would have competed for trade with the C18 water-driven King's Mill at Malton, which was rebuilt in 1802 after a fire. However, once the King's Mill was substantially extended and enlarged between 1846 and 1848, it is likely that the windmill's trade would have reduced substantially. Thereafter, it would have chiefly served local farmers, milling smaller quantities of grain for flour or feed.

The first edition six-inch Ordnance Survey map depicts the same group of buildings as shown on the Tithe map, while the first edition 1:2,500 map, surveyed in 1889, shows some small additions and variations in plan form, with an enclosed trapezoidal farmyard surrounding what is depicted as the 'Old Windmill'. It is believed that the sails were blown off the windmill in a great gale on 26 October 1906 and it is unlikely that it was ever repaired as a windmill. However, new floors were installed around this time to permit belt-driven milling. A drawing of the mill dated 7 June 1935 shows it without sails and with a conical roof. In 1950 maps indicate that it was still called Old Malton Moor Mill, however, by 1972 it was simply recorded as Windmill Farm.

The author of Tyke Towers: Yorkshire Windmills was informed in 1990, while researching his book, that the mill machinery was dismantled around 1952, 'as the clattering frightened the yearling horses'. The building is currently (2023) used as a farm store.

Reasons for Listing

Windmill at Windmill Farm, Old Malton, late C18 to early C19, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* a late-C18 to early-C19 windmill reflecting in its design and machinery, the specific function it was intended to fulfil;
* forms a landmark building in the surrounding flat countryside of the Vale of Pickering;
* an important survival of an increasingly rare agrarian-industrial building type;
* internal fittings and fixtures allow a clear understanding of the process flow;
* the continued evolution of the building, retaining fittings and machinery from different periods, including the early C20 refitting of the windmill for belt-driven machinery and a small mid-C20 belt driven corn mill.

Historic interest:

* the early-C20 adaption of the mill illustrates the changing social and economic situation in the countryside, due to the industrialisation of corn mills at ports like Kingston upon Hull and Selby, and the cheap transportation of flour and feed by road and rail.

External Links

Historic England Listing

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