Conundrum of the Glenmire Windmill.
I am a member of the Hertford U3A group looking at Stanstead Abbots. I have a little conundrum which you might be able to comment on! Your thoughts would be appreciated please.
Also on the website is an article from Stuart Moye which argues a convincing (but conflicting) case for the windmill being built in the late 19th century and states that it does not appear on Bryants map of 1822.
The Allin family were according to Mr Moore, working a windmill before it was built!!
He goes on to say that there were many millers living in the village in the 19th century but there was no evidence in Kelly’s Directory of the census that any worked a windmill.
I have looked at Bryants Map of 1822 (and have a photocopy) and the word “Mill” certainly appears on the map though (in my humble opinion) it does not show the exact site and could possibly refer to “Burts Water Mill”. We know there was a Doomsday Mill in the village so that will have been a water mill. The key to Bryants map shows a windmill as the same picture that we associate today with windmills appearing on an ordnance survey map. I can see no such icon on Bryant’s map.
Guy Horlock goes on to mention the Tythe map of 1841 as evidence and I confess to not having checked this out.
I am intrigued that the website has conflicting documentation and that Ron Dale has chosen (apparently) to go with Guy Horlock’s theory rather than Stuart Moye’s theory.
As I say – a conundrum – I just wondered whether anyone could throw any light on it please?