Newton – SD 712484
This mill, which served the Brennand Mine, stood alongside the Clitheroe to Newton Road, near Walloper Well, and was built by the Duchess of Buccleuch, in 1814. It probably had a single ore-hearth, and maybe a slag-hearth, which vented into a short horizontal flue. The mill was not working in 1835, when we learn that
“There is a lead mine (Ashnott?) within the manor, from which a considerable quantity of ore has been obtained, but is not now wrought, in consequence of the depreciation in the value of lead. There is also a smelt mill near the mine, with an overshot waterwheel, and the requisite apparatus for smelting ore, and which mill etc. belongs to the Lord of the Manor”
At the time, the liberty belonged to Edward Peregrine Towneley, whose family had purchased the Lordship of the Manor from the Duchess of Buccleuch. The mill, which had closed in the slump of 1830-31, was recorded as a dwelling (Smelt Mill Cottage) in the censuses of 1841 and 1851. The censuses of 1861, 1871 and 1881 make no mention of either the cottage or the mill.
Further information and references can be found in:
- Gill, M.C. Yorkshire Smelting Mills Part 2, Northern Mine Research Society Memoirs 1993, British Mining No 48, pp 132-151
