Saxtead Green Post Windmill is a Grade II* listed post mill

Post mill

The post mill is the earliest type of European windmill. The defining feature is that the whole body of the mill that houses the machinery is mounted on a single vertical post, around which it can be turned to bring the sails into the wind. The earliest post mills in England are thought to have...

 at Saxtead

Saxtead

Saxtead is a small village in the Suffolk Coastal District, in the county of Suffolk. Saxtead gives its name to the settlements of Saxtead Green and Saxtead Little Green and the windmill Saxtead Green Windmill. Saxtead is located on the A1120 road in between the town of Stowmarket and the village...

 Green, Framlingham

Framlingham

Framlingham is a market town and civil parish in the Suffolk Coastal District of Suffolk, England. Commonly referred to as "Fram" by the locals, it is of Anglo-Saxon origin and is mentioned in the Domesday Book. It has a population of 3,114 at the 2001 census...

, Suffolk

Suffolk

Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...

, England which is also an Ancient Monument

Scheduled Ancient Monument

In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a 'nationally important' archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorized change. The various pieces of legislation used for legally protecting heritage assets from damage and destruction are grouped under the term...

 and has been restored.

History

Saxted Green Mill dates back to at least 1796 when the miller was Amos Webber. In 1810, the Mill House was built for Robert Holmes. The mill was raised a total of three times during its working life. The mill was tailwinded c1853. As a result of this, the mill was completely rebuilt in 1854 by Whitmore and Binyon, the Wickham Market

Wickham Market

Wickham Market is a large village situated in the River Deben valley of Suffolk, England, within the Suffolk Coastal heritage area.It is on the A12 trunk road thirteen miles north-east of the county town of Ipswich, five miles north-east of Woodbridge. Its railway station is located approximately...

 millwright

Millwright

A millwright is a craftsman or tradesman engaged with the construction and maintenance of machinery.Early millwrights were specialist carpenters who erected machines used in agriculture, food processing and processing lumber and paper...

s. New cast iron

Cast iron

Cast iron is derived from pig iron, and while it usually refers to gray iron, it also identifies a large group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic. The color of a fractured surface can be used to identify an alloy. White cast iron is named after its white surface when fractured, due...

 machinery was fitted, and the layout of the machinery changed from Head and Tail to Breast stones. It was in this year that the mill was raised for the third time. Collins, the Melton

Melton, Suffolk

Melton is a village in Suffolk, England, located approximately one mile north east of Woodbridge. The 2001 census recorded a population of 3718. The village is served by Melton railway station on the Ipswich-Lowestoft East Suffolk Line....

 millwright worked on the mill in the 1870s and Whitmore and Binyon again worked on the mill in the 1890s. From 1926 millwright Jesse Wightman was responsible for repairs until the mill ceased working commercially on the death of the last miller in 1947.

The mill passed to Mr S C Sullivan, who presented it to the Ministry of Works in 1951. The mill was completely rebuilt between 1957 and 1960 under the supervision of Jesse Wightman. A replacement crowntree was obtained from a windmill at Wetheringsett

Wetheringsett

Wetheringsett is a village in the Mid Suffolk district of Suffolk in eastern England. Located to the east of the A140, it is the largest village in the parish of Wetheringsett-cum-Brockford....

 which had been demolished. The mill is now in the care of English Heritage

English Heritage

English Heritage . is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...

 The buck was rebuilt with new larger windows to admit more light. A lightning conductor was fitted at this time.

The mill is currently under repair, with one pair of sails under repair and a new pair of sails being made.

Description

Saxted Green Mill is a post mill with a three storey roundhouse. The mill has four Patent sails

Windmill sail

Windmills are powered by their sails. Sails are found in different designs, from primitive common sails to the advanced patent sails.-Jib sails:...

 carried on a cast iron windshaft and is winded by a fantail

Windmill fantail

A Fantail is a small windmill mounted at right angles to the sails, at the rear of the windmill, and which turns the cap automatically to bring it into the wind. The fantail was patented in 1745 by Edmund Lee, a blacksmith working at Brockmill Forge near Wigan, England, and perfected on mills...

. The mill has two pairs of millstones in the breast. All the machinery is of cast iron except the Brake Wheel, which is of oak

Oak

An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...

.

Millers

• Amos Webber 1796
• Robert Holmes 1810
• William Holmes
• Meadows
• Frederick Aldred
• Alfred Aldred
• Alfred Stephenson Robert Aldred - 1947

Reference for above:-

Public access

The mill is open to the public on Friday, Saturday and Bank Holidays between 21 March and 30 September each year.

External links

• Saxtead Green Post Mill - official site at English Heritage
• Windmill World webpage on Saxted Green Mill.