Listed Building record MDO3835 - Springhead Mill, Fontmell Magna

Springhead Mill is a two-storey building has rubble walls and a thatched roof. The record for this monument has been enhanced with support from Wessex Water.

There appears to have been a mill on or in the close vicinity of this site since the medieval period. The mill building, formerly known as Higher Mill, acquired the name Springhead some time after 1805. The present building was a fulling mill, but operated as a corn mill from 1807 to 1871. In 1885 the Flower Brothers’ brewery occupied the building, but by 1895 it was an engineering works – John Walter Flower’s Eclipse Works, manufacturing (presumably) the John Flower Eclipse Bottling and Corking Machine, but the 1901 Ordnance Survey maps <2> shows the building simply as the Springhead Engineering Works. In 1907 the leaseholder was John M Andrews, a cheesemaker.

Springhead Mill house (87311691) is a two-storeyed house of the early 19th century, with rubble walls and a thatched roof. The corn mill, adjacent, of two-storeys with brick walls and a tiled roof, has been disused since 1881 and now forms an extension to the house. <2>

Springhead. Grade II. <3>

<1> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey map 1:10,560, 1962 (Map). SDO18658.

(ST 87311691) Springhead (NAT)

<2> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1972, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume IV (North), 26 (Monograph). SDO99.

'Unless otherwise described the following mills and associated buildings are of the early 19th century. .. (31) Springhead Mill (87311691), house, of two storeys, has rubble walls and a thatched roof. The corn mill, adjacent, of two storeys with brick walls and a tiled roof, has been disused since 1881 and now forms an extension to the house.'

<3> DOE (HHR), 1985, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest: North Dorset District, 17 (Scheduling record). SDO17732.

<4> Ordnance Survey, 1900, Ordnance Survey 25-inch map, epoch two (Map). SDO11594.

<5> National Record of the Historic Environment, 205999 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Aug 22 2024 8:07PM