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MHG32243 - Corn mill - Bridgend, Dingwall

Summary

A former corn (meal) mill, later converted to workshops and then a museum of agricultural implements, before being converted to a house soon after 1998.

Type and Period (3)

Protected Status

Full Description

1st ed OS shows Corn mill, series of 4 buildings marked at Bridgend, Mill lade to SW.
Report on Bridgend Engineering Works (NH55SW0035) states that the mill, cornmill & associated pond were filled in with rubble from local building sites (Eworks built 1965-6). <1>

Valerie Reid, the daughter of the previous owner of this mill, contacted the HER in July 2011 advising that only the mill dam was filled in to allow construction of the new building for James Reid & Son.
The mill building was converted into workshops by James Reid in 1917. Originally the power came from two waterwheels, one overshot and one undershot. The waterwheels also provided power to Bridgend Cottage where the owners lived. The mill was always described as a meal mill and was then used for many years as a private museum for agricultural machinery. The last owner of the mill died in 1998 and the mill was then sold and converted to a house. The bricks from the original kiln were used to construct a chimney breast. <2>

The late owner, James S Reid, wrote a history of the mill and the Bridgend works. His father, James Reid, took the lease of the mill, then disused, in 1914. Soon afterwards Bridgend House was vacated and was added to the lease of the mill. The original house is described as "a beautiful old estate building with ornate stone built chimney at the east end and imposing crow-stepped gables. Internally however the facilities were rather basic". The author goes on to describe the interior of the house.
The meal mill itself was "a substantial stone built building aligned approximately north-south, the front aspect facing east. Originally the two storied portion would have contained the millstones, grain sifters etc., while on the ground floor would have been further riddles, sids fan and pot barley millstone. The higher part of the building was the drying kiln with its perforated floor at 3rd storey level, the remainder being taken up with the brick built fireplace fired with sids (grain husks) which provided the heat required to reduce the moisture content of the oats prior to milling. The potential of the water power was soon realised when after most of the milling machinery was removed, and the existing gearing re-arranged to provide drives for machinery." <3>

This site was noted during ARCH's 2010-2012 Heritage Along the Kyle Line project. It was recorded in 2011. Cromartie charters mention the mill in the 15th century, and various other references over the next centuries to the mill have been compiled by Sandra MacDonald, Dingwall History Society. A plan drawn in the late 1780s by Daivd Aitken for Tulloch Estate shows the mill pond as much more extensive before the drainage of the the Strathpeffer valley associated with the construction of the Parliamentary Road, completed 1819. The plan also shows the course of surplus water from the pond by way of the Feasaloch Burn. Martin's plan of 1832 drawn to illustrate the boundaries of the proposed parliamentary burgh of Dingwall shows the completed road and a muchsmaller mill pond. The Feasaloch has lost connection with the mill pond. 1st ed OS map shows milldam at approximately NH5412 5933. Listed as a corn mill on the OS map. James Reid took over the mill in 1914 and converted it into a water-powered millwright's works, using water from the mill pond. Information from notes made by Sandra MacDonald, supplied by Alasdair Cameron. The mill had been converted into a private dwelling by 2011, and the lands around the mill and the filled in mill dam were a housing development, called Bridgend Close. Photographs were supplied. <4>

Sources/Archives (4)

Map

Location

Grid reference	Centred NH 5427 5935 (24m by 36m) (2 map features)
Map sheet	NH55NW
Geographical Area	ROSS AND CROMARTY
Civil Parish	DINGWALL

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Related Investigations/Events (1)

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