Winchester City Mill is located on a site used for milling flour since Saxon times.
It spans the River Itchen in the heart of Winchester, once capital of late Anglo-Saxon England. King Alfred held court here in the 8th century.
The name City Mill came into being after Queen Mary Tudor gifted it to the city in 1554 following her wedding in the nearby cathedral.
A short history of the mill
Domesday and a time of prosperity
A Saxon mill, owned by the Benedictine nunnery of Wherwell, almost certainly existed on the site more than 1000 years ago. The location is close to a major entrance to the city where the East Gate in the city walls led to Soke Bridge.
In 1086, the Domesday survey records the mill as returning a rent of 48s (£2.40) per annum to the Abbess. This amount was well above the average mill rent in southern England.
Wherwell Abbey leased the mill to a long series of medieval millers and it prospered for more than 200 years until the end of the 13th century; the Abbess received a healthy £4 per annum rent in 1295. During this period the mill became known as Eastgate Mill.
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Decline, and Eastgate Mill becomes derelict
A series of bad harvests in the early 14th century, coupled with Winchester having lost its capital status, quickly reduced the value of the mill. The Black Death, which struck in 1348, followed by the loss of the wool trade to Calais soon after, would have accelerated the decline. The mill eventually fell out of use and it appears from records to have been derelict by 1471.
A royal gift to Winchester
King Henry Vlll took the still derelict Eastgate Mill into Crown ownership at the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539. His daughter Queen Mary Tudor then gave it to the city in 1554, partly to offset the cost of her wedding to Philip of Spain in the nearby cathedral. It was also partly in response to earlier pleas for financial assistance from the impoverished city.
At this time, the mill became known as the City Mill. Despite many attempts with successive leases, the city failed to have the mill restored and for many years they only received 10/- (50p) rent per annum plus ‘two chickens for the Mayor’.
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The present mill is built
Finally in 1743 a new tenant, the tanner James Cooke, rebuilt the mill. This is the building you see today. The central section with its fine gable was completed first and the eastern section was added later. It seems materials from an earlier building were re-used, as some of the roof timbers date back to the 15th century.
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Private ownership, demolition threats
In 1820 John Benham, who became the first private owner of the mill, bought the mill and adjoining land. It remained with the Benham family for more than 100 years and for much of the 19th century would probably have operated profitably as a corn mill.
By the 1880s, however, roller milling, introduced initially to meet the demand for low-cost white flour, had largely replaced stone grinding. Large factory mills had been developed mainly at the major ports. It is hardly surprising that the tenant miller in 1892 at the City Mill had to appeal against bankruptcy. It seems that milling ceased here in the early 1900s.
Following its use as a laundry during the First World War, the mill was offered for sale in 1928. It was saved from demolition by a group of local benefactors who bought it and presented it to the National Trust.
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Leased to the Youth Hostels Association
In 1931, the Trust leased the City Mill to the Youth Hostels Association. It became one of the first hostels in southern England. A condition of the lease was that public viewing of the mill should be allowed by the YHA at convenient times. More recently, the Trust has taken responsibility for opening the mill to visitors.
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Milling once again
In March 2004, the City Mill successfully milled flour again after a gap of at least 90 years. A major restoration programme, which took about 12 years, saw the construction of a grain loading platform, new hoppers and mill gearing, which used parts saved from other local mills.
The large undershot waterwheel, which powers the milling process, has been built to the same design that was last used in commercial days at the mill. New sluices have also been provided to control the mill.
The French millstones are believed to have come from a village mill near Winchester. Milling could not begin until the stones were ‘dressed’ (patterns chiselled into the stone to ‘cut’ the grain) by one of the few craftsmen available who possessed the necessary skills.
Visitors can now see the waterwheel and mill gears turning each day the mill is open, and regular flour milling demonstrations are given at weekends. The product, stoneground wholemeal flour, is sold in the mill shop and is very popular for making bread either by hand or in a machine.
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Island garden
The pretty island garden at the rear of the mill is open to mill visitors. Millers once kept pigs in this garden, fed no doubt on the mill’s by-products, and there was also a stable for horses. As at so many mills, eel traps once provided useful additional income.
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