HAWKESBURY UPTON'S WINDMILL

The large ancient parish of Hawkesbury had no shortage of mills: grist mills for grinding corn and fulling mills for finishing cloth. These however were all water mills taking their power from the Kilcott stream. At the time of Domesday (1086) three mills are recorded and by the 1560s the number had doubled.

Windmills were introduced into England comparatively late and are hardly known before the 13th century. The windmill at Hawkesbury Upton was almost certainly a Post mill - a wooden structure balanced on a central post housing the grinding stones and bearing the sails, which could be turned into the wind by means of a pole at the back. It would, of course, have ground corn.

We found several 17th C documents at Gloucestershire Record Office listing parcels of arable land in the two open fields of Upton. The majority of the old furlong names are unrecognizable today but some have survived as field names e.g. Cats Brain, Barley Ridge. In these early 17th C documents there are frequent references to The Myll Pathe in the Southfield and more specifically the acre behind the windmill and one acre of land near the windmill.

The mill is known to have been in the ownership of Nicholas Botiller and Margaret his wife until they were forced to sell their manors of Stoke Hawkesbury, Inglestone, Hillesley, Kilcott, Tresham, Saddlewood, Upton and Little Badminton in 1609. For a while the mill passed into the hands of a husbandman of Upton and his eldest son, both of whom were called Thomas Longden. Around 1613/14 Arthur Crewe, who had taken the Hawkesbury manors from the Botelers, conveyed the mill, along with the manor of Little Badminton, to Edward Earl of Worcester (the g.g.grandfather of the first Duke of Beaufort). There was obviously some ambiguity over the wording of this conveyance as a subsequent document dated 5 Dec. 1614 (1) is described as An explanation that Arter Crewe conveyethe nothing in Upton sarving only the windmill and the heriotts to Edwd Earle of Woster (heriots being the dues paid to the Lord of the Manor on the death of a tenant). The document stresses that the conveyance did not mean the "towne" of Upton but merely "one windemill and one acre of land whereon the same stande". The Earl of Worcester would have been entitled to the rents and profits of the mill and his tenants of Little Badminton entitled to have their corn ground there as would the inhabitants of Upton.

We know nothing more about the fate of the windmill except that it (or a later version) was still standing in 1723 over a hundred years later, by which time the manor of Upton had passed to the Jenkinson family.

WHERE WAS IT?

The clue to the location of the windmill is to be found amongst the Badminton archives in a lease dated 21 Dec 1715 (2) whereby a piece of waste ground measuring 2 roods 21 perches was leased to Abraham Turner of Hawkesbury for a period of 11 years.

There is a small sketch map accompanying the description of the ground on which the caption Jn. Stinchcombe’s windmill piece can be made out. The lease describes the ground as, amongst other things, being "bounded South by ... Jn. Stinchcombes windmill piece".

The piece of waste ground was situated at the end of what is now known as France Lane at the junction of the A46. It later became the site of the Turnpike House (now known as Pike Cottage).

A Map of Upton Fields drawn in 1782 by William Hitchman for the Duke of Beaufort (3) shows Windmill piece to be a curiously shaped field - very roughly triangular. We believe the site of the windmill to have been on the western side of the triangle within its apex.

A: Abraham Turner's House
B: Abraham Turner's Garden
C: Mr Wastfield's Piece
D: Ld Duke of Beaufort

Sketch map from 1715 of a piece of waste ground (D on the map) to Abraham Turner from the Duke of Beaufort.

A path / green lane (i.e.the mill path) leading from Upton to Petty France enters the field at this apex and skirts the southern boundary wall. By the time of the Tithe map (1840), Windmill Piece had become known as Turnpike Piece and a house and garden occupied one small part of it.

The 1903 six inch to the mile Ordnance Survey map clearly marks the highest point of Turnpike (or Windmill) Piece as being 570 feet above sea level. The mill must have stood on or close by this high point.

The old Myll Pathe still exists today following the same route from Upton to Petty France.

By starting at France Lane and following the path towards Petty France it is possible to see a slight, but long, ridge of ground rising ahead after the hollow of Britain Bottom. A solitary Sycamore tree is visible on the barely discernible high point of the horizon. The tree stands on quite stoney ground - could this be all that remains of the foundation of the mill? There are also abundant nettles here which are known to be indicators of enriched soil. Enriched by animal traffic and corn debris from the mill perhaps? The site certainly catches the prevailing south westerly winds!

1  Gloucestershire Record Office D2700/NC4/1
2  Gloucestershire Record Office D2700/NC4/33
3  Gloucestershire Record Office D2700/QB/17/5/7

Small section drawn from the Plan of Upton Fields (William Hitchman 1782).
X = Probable site of windmill.
(Coloured text not on original map)

  1.                2.                3.

1.  Windmill ridge, the sycamore tree on the skyline marks the probable site of the windmill. Windmill path follows the field boundary on the extreme right.

2.  Hawkesbury Upton as seen from the Windmill ridge.

3.  Sycamore tree at the highest point (570 feet), marking probable site of the windmill.