Winchester City Mill Guide for Teachers and Group Leaders
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Winchester City Mill Guide for Teachers and Group Leaders 0 CONTENTS We want you and your group to have an exciting and informative time at Winchester City Mill. This pack is intended as a detailed guide with ideas for teaching points to prepare you for your visit to the Mill or any related classroom-based work. 2 Introduction 3 City Mill Timeline 5 The River Itchen 6 The History of Making Flour 9 How the Water Mill Works 10 The Grinding Process 11 Stone Floor 13 Lower Floor 19 Wildlife 1 INTRODUCTION Working watermill in the heart of Winchester This historic mill is owned and cared for by the National Trust and is a rare surviving example of an urban working corn mill, powered by the fast-flowing River Itchen, which can be seen passing under the mill. Rebuilt in 1743 on a medieval mill site, it remained in use until the early 20th Century. The National Trust recently undertook an ambitious restoration project, and the mill resumed grinding flour in March 2004. 2 CITY MILL TIMELINE A millennium of milling history Our mill is one of the oldest working watermills in the country; with a fascinating past and a great many historic connections. 871-899 King Alfred rules the Kingdom of Wessex from Winchester; a thriving and bustling town with a population of several thousand people. 989 Queen Elfrida (mother of the Saxon King, ‘Ethelred the Unready’) gives a mill at Eastgate (known as ‘Eastgate Mill’) to the Benedictine nuns of Wherwell Abbey. 1086 The Domesday Book, ordered by William the Conqueror (The Normans), records a mill outside Eastgate owned by Wherwell Abbey paying a rate of 48 shillings per year to the Abbess. It is the most valuable mill in Hampshire. 1295 At the end of a prosperous period in milling, a new tenant, William the Miller, pays 4 pounds in silver as rent per year. In return, the abbess promises to supply 'any great timbers' the mill needs. 1348 The 14th Century sees a succession of poor harvests, so there is less corn to grind into flour. The Black Death (Plague) arrives in England and hits Winchester, reducing the population and the mill’s importance further. Competition from nearby mills, built by the Norman Bishops of Winchester, is the most probable reason Eastgate Mill becomes derelict by the 15th Century. 1536-1540 Henry VIII orders the Dissolution of the Monasteries. All abbey possessions and land (including Eastgate Mill) go to the Crown. The confiscated land is redistributed. 3 CITY MILL TIMELINE 1554 Marriage of Mary Tudor and Philip of Spain in Winchester Cathedral. Queen Mary presents the still derelict Eastgate Mill to Winchester, partly to repay the cost of her wedding. The name ‘City Mill’ appears for the first time. 1662 Leases, which continue until 1820, show that tenants have to pay “10 shillings per annum to the City and two chickens for the Mayor.” Leases require tenants to rebuild but nothing is done so the mill remains derelict. 1744 James Cooke, a tanner of The Soke (SE of the river), rebuilds the mill at last, reusing the medieval roof timbers. A new period of prosperity begins for the City Mill. 1820 The mill is sold to John Benham, and his family owns it for over 100 years. There is an unsuccessful attempt to sell the Mill in 1892. By the end of the 19th Century The Victorian Revolution. Flour milling has moved to the major seaports where large factory mills with iron rollers have been built to handle imported wheat. The flour is distributed to customers using the extensive railway network. Traditional water mills are rapidly declining. 1914-1918 During World War I, the mill is used as a laundry. 1928 The mill is threatened with demolition. A group of local benefactors raise money to buy the mill and give it to The National Trust for safekeeping. 1931 The newly established Youth Hostels Association (YHA) rents the mill from the National Trust. Hostellers wash in the millrace. They end their lease at the mill in 2005. 2004 A 12-year restoration project is completed and flour is made again for the first time in perhaps 90 years. The power of the River Itchen is harnessed once more. 4 THE RIVER ITCHEN The River Itchen is about 45km (28 miles) long. It begins its journey in the chalk hills near Cheriton and is joined by the River Alre and the Candover Stream, close to the town of Alresford. After passing through Winchester and driving our mill, the Itchen makes its way to Southampton where it flows into the sea. Its flow varies little throughout the year making it ideal for driving a mill. The Itchen is a good example of a fast- flowing, chalk groundwater fed river. When rain falls onto the 400 sq. km catchment area – including chalk downland– it soaks through the chalk rock into a massive underground reservoir or aquifer. The chalk acts as a filter and the water emerging from springs is very clear, very alkaline and at a remarkably constant temperature (about 50oF/10oC). Harnessing Water Power Transportation Water power has been harnessed for corn-milling, papermaking, In the 12th Century, the tanning, fulling (wool-processing) and generating electricity. At one river was navigable for time there were 12 mills within the City of Winchester. small crafts from Should we use more water power today; Southampton to a great source of sustainable energy? Alresford. Stone from Quarr was brought from the Isle of Wight by barge and used in the Water Meadows building of Winchester Farmers diverted water to flow across fields close to the river in Cathedral. The last barge winter. The moving water produced an earlier grass crop on which travelled from sheep and cattle could feed. Evidence of these channels can be Southampton to seen in the Winnall Moors Nature Reserve and near St. Cross. Winchester in 1869. 5 THE HISTORY OF MAKING FLOUR If you want to make bread, biscuits or cakes, you first have to make flour. You do this by grinding grain or cereal. Early History- Quern Stones Quern stones, stone tools for hand-grinding, were first used during the Stone Age to grind cereal grains (such as barley, oats, rye and wheat), nuts and other vegetable food products for eating, as well as pigments and metal ores prior to smelting. One of the earliest forms of quern was the saddle quern. People put the grain on a big flat stone (‘quern’) and rubbed it backwards and forwards with a small stone (‘handstone’) We know from studying the skeletons of people from the Stone Age that they spent a long time kneeling down and rocking back and forth to grind their grain by rubbing it just like this. They had to spend 5 hours every day just grinding grain to make enough flour to feed their families. ~Teaching points~ Where does the name ‘saddle’ come from? (The saddle quern is named as such because the motion of rocking or rolling the handstone forms a shape looking like a saddle) It was not easy to produce flour from a saddle quern; the handstone was used to crush the grain, rather than grind, and produced a rather coarse flour. Would grinding in this way take a long time? You can try this yourself. How long did it take you to make a small amount of flour? How long would it take you to make half a kilo of flour? You would need this much to make a loaf of bread. Was your flour fine and white like a bag from the supermarket, or was it rough, brown and full of little bits of stone? 6 THE HISTORY OF MAKING FLOUR Rotary Querns The rotary quern was invented during the fifth to third centuries BC. As the name implies, the rotary quern uses circular motions to grind materials, meaning both the quern and the handstone were circular. The handstone of a rotary quern is much heavier than that of saddle quern and provided the necessary weight for the grinding of grain into finer flour. Did you know…? …In India, rotary querns were used to grind grains and spices. Smaller ones, for household use, were operated by two people. Larger ones, for the community or commercial use, used livestock to rotate the top stone. The grain enters the quern through the centre hole (‘eye’) of the top stone (‘runnerstone’) and moves to the edge as it is ground, coming out from between the two stones as a coarsely ground flour. ~Teaching points~ Have a go turning the rotary quern at the Mill. Is it easier to use? Could you make flour faster? Rotary querns are hand-powered. What problems might that cause? (They are limited in size and milling capacity by the strength of their operator; such methods are time intensive and laborious; they only produce enough ground flour for a household) In many poorer countries, people mill cereals by hand today. Querns were still used in remote parts of Britain in the 20th Century. Can you find out where these places are? In Medieval times people could be fined for milling flour by hand and their querns could be confiscated by the Lord of the Manor. Many people were forced to use the Lord’s watermill or windmill and pay a toll. 7 THE HISTORY OF MAKING FLOUR Mills and Mill Stones As the demand for food grew and populations increased, there needed to be a more efficient method of producing flour. But bigger stones meant they were too heavy to turn by hand.