Water-Powered Flourmills in Nineteenth-Century Tasmania
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AUSTRALASIAN HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY I5, I997 Water-PoweredFlourmills in Nineteenth-CenturyTasmania WARWICK PEARSON The author, a consultant in archaeology and heritage management, presents a physical survey of the production technology and processespreserved at five of nineteenth-century water-poweredflourmills in Tasmania. These mills were included in data collected for comparative analyses of nineteenth-century watermills in Britain and Australia for a recently completedPh.D. in historical archaeology at the University of New England, Armidale N.S.W. The aim of the research was to construct a model for technology transfer between the two counties in the nineteenth century. The results of the research have been published previously in this journal. This paperpresents the resultsof field surveyscarried out on Tasmaniaand the New England Tablelandsof New South the materialremains of five nineteenth-centurywatermills in Wales.From this, a generalisedmodel for the transferand Tasmania(Fig. I ). Thesesurveys represent part of thedatabase adaptationof industrial technologyinto nineteenth-century for researchundertaken by the author for a Doctoratein the Australiawas put forward.lThis emphasisedproduction inputs Department of Archaeology and Palaeoanthropologyat the and physicalresource endowments in the recipientcountry as Universityof New England,Armidale, from 1991to 1995.The the most influential selection pressures,and defines the aim, rationale,methodology and resultsof the researchhave relationshipsof these with other factors, including the beenpreviously published in thisjoumal. presenceof skilledoperators and supportiveindustries for the Briefly, the aim of the researchwas to answerthe question, technologyin therecipient country and the cultural makeup of 'Can we constructa model for the transferand adaptationof both thedonor and recipient countries. industrial technology from Britain to Australia in the There is a general lack of published research on nineteenthcentury'? In order to answer this question. nineteenth-centuryAustralian watermills.2 Further, no publishedresearch on internationaltechnology-transfer was previously published researchon watermills in Australia used to identify and define the most importanteconomic, contains a detailed description of how the technology environmental, industrial, human and cultural factors worked. Finally, only a handful of the many hundredsof influencing the process.These factors were then used as watermills built throughout Australia in the nineteenth startingpoints for a comparisonof two countries,Australia and century preservetheir technologyand productionprocesses Britain,between which a giventechnology, that of watermills, for study,and the continuedpreservation of still lessof these was transferred.From this comparison it was possible to is assured.With this in mind,this papercontains a detailed hypothesiseabout how the technology should have been description of the technology of five water-powered adaptedas a resultof its transfer.These hypotheses were tested flourmillsin Tasmania,set in a contextualdiscussion of the by a comparisonof the physical remains of watermill history of that industry in nineteenth-centuryTasmania and technology preservedin the West Midlands of England, Australia. This sampleof Tasmanianwatermills represents only one part of the spectrumof conditionsinto which the technology was introducedin nineteenth-centuryAustralia, however. A more completepicture will be given by comparisonof this sampleof mills with a discussionof thehistory and technology of a second sample of nineteenth-centurywater-powered flourmills from the New EnglandThblelands of New South Wales.3Viewed in conjunction,the two samplespresent a wider range of technologicalresponses to a wider range of adaptivepressures. Both thesesamples form thedatabase upon which the generalmodel for transferof the technologyfrom Britainto Australiawas formulated.a WATERMILLS IN NINETEENTH. CENTURYTASMANIA The climateof Tasmania(known as Van Diemen'sland until 1853)lived up to the expectationsof the Britishcolonists in beingmore akin to thatof Britainthan the climate of any other Australiancolony. Bum, writing in 1840-1841,states: The riversof Van Diemen'sLand which take their rise in the greatWestem tier of mountains,have always had an amplevolume of water,even in the driestsummer, suchfor instanceas the Sorrel,Thames, Plenty, Styx, Russel'sFalls, Jones,Broad River etc., which flow 0h from LakesSinclair, Echo, Clarence, and the nineteen 0 50 16km Lagoons,are alike fortunatein a never-failingample stream- a circumstancewhich not only rendersthe Fig. I: Location of watermills studied in Tasmania.All are Jlourmills, arul operationsof the miller continuous,but enablesmany range in date of constructionfrom the I 820s to the I 850s. of thelandholders to irrigatetheir meadows.5 66 This naturallyled to a heavy relianceon watermillsto Table 1 powerearly industryin Tasmania.The first of theseclustered aroundthe initial settlementsat Hobartand Launceston. YEAR Water Steam UnsDecified & Wind RobertNash, who hadconstructed the first watermill in the Australiancolonies on Norfolk Islandin 1795,is reputedto 1834 I 121 havebeen the first to takeadvantage of the favourableclimate. 1840 J/ t4 31 After the forced closure of his mill on Norfolk Island due to 1845 26 2 12 30 1850 46 '1 11 4 was relocationof the settlementto Hobart, he recompensedin 1855 45 9 223 1 1814with landto build anothermill in thesecond colony.6 It is 1860 42 2 19 probablethat a flourmill equippedwith an overshotTwater 1865 45 9 321 wheel and suppliedwith waterby a weir and race from the 1870 45 727 '1875 '5 HobartRivulet, in operationby 1816,was this secondmill of 36 5 22 Nash's.8By Januaryof 1818,Nash had sold this mill, known 1880 33 J 323 1885 26 'I 123 asthe 'Old Mill', to AmoldFisk.s 1890 24 '| 120 Hobart's secondwater-powered flourmill, the 'Waterloo 1895 20 13 Mill', built by Fisk,was also in operationby 1818.r0Also in 1900 14 16 this year,after requestsfor machineryto be sentfrom England South Table l: Statistics the use of water-power in the Tasmanianflourmilling as early as 1805, a govemment-ownedwater-powered Jbr er and industry throughout the nineteenth century.Numbers of steam-powered flourmill, built and operatedunder the supervision entury of the fourmills are adr)edfor compttrison(lnstiture of Engineers 1988). inputs convict EdwardYates, was opened.llBoth thesemills were equippedwith overshotwheels supplied with waterfrom weirs 0try as Table 2 :s the erected in the Hobart Rivulet. From the 1820s, the rg the GovemmentMill was leasedto privateentrepreneurs.l2 In STATE FlourmillsSawmills Mining Textiles TOTAL 1826it wasdescribed as, for the N.S,W 45 21 194 2 262 eupof ... a brick stuccoedbuilding 80 by 35 feet at the V.D.L 509 2 62 basementand four storeyshigh. In theeast end aresix vrc. 18 10 443 471 :h on good apartmentsoccupied by the miller, and in the S.A. 6 6 W.A. 11 4 15 r. no otherare machinery for two pair stones.13 QLD. 1 25 26 istralia After a shortperiod as GovemmentMilleq Yatesopened rology 130 45 662 852 his own water-poweredflourmill in 1820,in partnershipwith eds of powered Table 2: Comparison of water-power use in Tasmaniawith thal in other 'teenth JamesTedder.la This was also by an overshotwheel, fed by a race from the Hobart Rivulet. This was followed nineteenth-century Australian colonies (Co ktnial Statistical ReRisters, cesses by WilliamRayner's'Sorell'Mill in 1822,which was powered by Returns and Blue Books). f these two overshotwheels.15 etailed r* ered The nameof PeterDegraves was prominentamong these A summary of pattems in watermill use in all of the of the earlywatermill ventures on theHobart Rivulet. In additionto a Australian colonies in the nineteenthcentury is presentedin ia and sawmill, which was powered by a conventional22 foot Table2. Thesefigures show the maximumnumber of watermills diameterovershot wheel, he had erecteda flourmill powered recordedin operationin the Colonial Statisticsof eachcolony at by a Fourneyronturbine by 1836.16This must have been Jy one any point during the nineteenthcentury. Reference to Table 1 amongthe first usesof the new turbinetechnology nology outside shows that throughout much of the nineteenth century France,where it had beenpioneered tn 1821 Degraves rer. A .t't had particularlythe latter part, the actual number of watermills in erecteda secondwater-powered flourmill on Rivulet of this the by the operationin any onecolony wasmuch lower thanthis maximum I nology 840s.r8 figure.Also, thesemaxima did not all occur at the sametime in nuered Thus, therewere no fewer than sevenflourmills powered all colonies, but at various times throughout the nineteenth South by the watersof the Hobart Rivulet operatingby the early century.Finally, the figures quoted in the Colonial Statistics sent a 1840s.The Rivulet also poweredsawmills operated by Peter sometimesdo not agreewith data availablefrom other, more n-seof Degravesfrom 1825and ThomasStace from 1827.teFurther reliable, historical sources,such as newspapers,so that the . upon north,the first watermillwas erected in theLaunceston area by figures in Table 2 should be seen only as a guide to the v from JamesBrumby and EdwardYates in 1821-1822.20This was importanceand role of water-powerin the nineteenth-century locatedon theNorth Esk River. Australianeconomy. At times the supply of water tappedby water-powered Figure 2 showsthe relativedistribution of the maximum mills could becomean oversupply.Sibbald and Ferguson's numberof