WATERMILLS AND MILLING:

Ever since man first grew cereals such as wheat, oats and barley for food, he has had to break down the grain by grinding to make it edible. One of the earliest methods was simply to pound the grain between two stones. From these, the pestle and mortar evolved, the grain being pounded and rubbed by the pestle in the mortar. Then followed the use of a flat stone, which became curved through usage, hence its name -saddle stone. The grain was placed on the stone and rubbed with a smaller stone called a 'muller'. The rubbing action was a true grinding process, as opposed to the earlier methods of pounding which only crushed the grain.

On the top floor of the mill is an Iron Age saddle stone about 2300 years old which was ploughed up in a field near Pitstone Green Farm.

The rotary quern was a marked improvement It had two circular stones, a bottom one which was flat or slightly convex and a top one shaped like an Upturned bowl fitted with a wooden handle and with a hole, the "eye" in its centre. Grain dropped a little at a time into eye, was ground by rotating the top stone with the handle. It emerged as "meal" at the edges of the stones. Meal is the product ot grinding before any further processing.

Part of a Romano-British quern is displayed in the mill. It is made of Hertfordshire pudding-stone and was found in a well dating from the 2nd century AD on land below Pitstone Hill which became No- 2 Quarry serving the now closed cement works. The other quern is modern and was imported from India where such querns are still being made for village use. This principle of grinding by feeding grain into the eye of a circular stone turning upon another is used in all stone mills such as Ford End - indeed power driven millstones are essentially little more than large, power driven querns

Water power has been used for more than 2000 years, the Greeks being credited with adapting to milling cereals in the first century BC. The Romans also used grain watermills and introduced them into Britain. The saxons are known to have had numerous watermills - The Doomsday Survey in 1086 following the Norman conquest lists more than 5600. a figure meriting caution since an individual pair of stones may have been recorded as one mill. The Survey lists 137 watermills in Buckinghamshire.

From the 12th century onwards, the number of watermills increased significantly, most of them belonging to either the manor or monastery. The dissolution of the monasteries in the 1530s followed later by improvements in farming methods, by changes in the eating habits of an increasing population and by the development of better transportation, all contributed to the establishment in the late 18th century of the independent miller who milled for a living.

The heyday of the water driven stone mills lasted from the mid 18th century to the end of the 19th when they were largely superseded by the more efficient roller mills driven by water turbines or electric power and using spirally grooved steel rollers instead of millstones. They were capable of producing large quantities of meal which, after purification became the fine white flour then much in demand, a demand which could not be satisfied by stone mills.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF FORD END WATERMILL:

Ford End is a typical example of a small farm mill, in its early days probably producing meal and animal feed for the local Manor of Neyrnut (one of the manors of Pitstone). Later it would have milled for local farmers and villagers. Towards the end of its working life, it milled only animal feedstuffs for use on the farm. However, little is known of its early history, and further research is necessary, after which it is hoped to publish a separate historical account.

Although not listed in the Domesday Survey (1086), there has probably been a watermill on the site for several centuries. It may have been the mill recorded in 1232 as being "handed by Ralph de Bonville to one William, son of Herbert" together with Pitstone watermill (a quarter of a mile upstream, also known as Brookend or Beesley's mill, now converted into a house). There is a suggestion that the mill belonged to Neyrnut Manor in 1346, and the 'Victoria County History of Buckinghamshire' records that "the watermill in Ivinghoe was held in the 14th century by the Sigurnal and Alberd families". There are further references in 16th and l7th century documents but these provide insufficient evidence to identify the site positively as that of the mill at Ford End.

It is thought however that the present mill replaced the earlier one but when is not known. A reasonable guess would be during the early years of the 18th century; the mill seems to have been well established by 1773.

The earliest documentary evidence from this period has been found in the Land Tax Returns dating from 1781. Then, Ford End was owned by Mrs.Judy Reddall and tenanted by Bernard Wilkes. In 1784 he was succeeded by William Heley who worked the farm and mill until 1798.

In that year, the the mill is mentioned in the 'Posse Comitatus', a survey prepared by county as part of the precautionary preparations against the expected French invasion during the Napoleonic Wars. It lists all persons between the ages of 15 and 60 capable of acting in a military capacity but excluding Quakers, clergymen and those already in military service, as well as all available wagons, carts and horses, and all wind and watermills together with an estimate of the quantity of grain ground in a week. The Buckinghamshire survey lists 97 watermills including one in Ivinghoe occupied by William Heley "grinding 16 sacks a week". He also had 5 horses, one wagon and 3 carts. This reference seems to confirm the initials and date 'W H 1795' painted on a board on the wall of the first floor.

The Land Tax Returns indicate that from 1798 to 1831 the mill was owned by George Griffin, but it was probably tenanted by various millers, including Edward Hill and Benjamin Anstee.

In 1826 the mill was purchased by the Bridgewater (Ashridge) Estate from George Griffin, and there is an account in 1830 of £10-4s-5d being paid to the bricklayers from Ashridge for "stripping and retiling Mill and Shed and repairing walls of Washbrook".

The Census returns from 1841 to 1881 list William Tompkins as being the farmer and miller at Ford End and he was recorded as such in Directories of the 1860's. He was known locally as 'Miller Tompkins'. When he died in 1886, he was succeeded by his second son Moses, whose death in 1890 without issue brought the long family tenancy to an end.

It is not yet known who had the mill afterwards but in 1903, Kelly's Directory gives Charles Jellis as being 'farmer and miller (water)'. He bought the mill from the Brownlow (formerly the Bridgewater) Estate in 1924.

Since then, as part of Ford End Farm, the mill has been occupied by four generations of the Jellis family, many of whom had nick-names as was the common practice in the area. Charles ('Nippy') Jellis was followed by his son jesse ('Dick') in about 1920 and he farmed until his death in 1962. Arthur Jellis, Jesse's son, then took over and continued until his own death in 1976 when he was succeeded by his son Richard who farms today (1996).

PITSTONE LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETY AND RESTORATION OF THE MILL:

In 1963, the mill was in such a poor state of repair that it was scarcely usable. After coming to an arrangement in 1965 with the farmer, Arthur Jellis, the Society carried out urgent repair work to the wheel and penstock (sluice gate) to enable the mill to be worked - and it has been involved with the preservation of the mill ever since.

In the following years general repairs and renovations were undertaken, and parties of visitors shown round the mill.
On the Sunday and Monday of the August Bank holiday 1976, it was opened to the general public for the first time. Nearly 200 visitors came each day and saw the mill working. Adults paid lOp and children 5p admission!

In 1979, a 25 year lease was signed with the present farmer, Richard Jellis giving the Society full responsibility for the maintenance and operation of the mill.
Larger projects followed such as repairing and tarring the roof, alterations to the stairs, renewing all weather-boarding, construction of the new bridge, replacing the wooden wheel boards by metal ones, replacing the pentrough and rebuilding the wheel-house wall.

In 1980 millwrights were engaged to replace the wedges securing the waterwheel and pit wheel to the axle, to balance the waterwheel and to improve the penstock operation - all work considered best done by experts.
Following advice from the millwrights, the Society embarked upon more projects with a view to working the mill on a regular basis for demonstration purposes. These included fitting emergency stop planks across the pentrough entrance, refurbishing the main post bearings, fitting the wallower with new wedges, replacing the stone spindle bearings and checking all the gearing for proper alignment.

The result of this endeavour was that meal was produced again in August 1991 using the French burr stones. These were dressed in 1993 to enable milling to be done more efficiently.

The repair and restoration of the mill has not come cheaply and the Society is indebted to, among others, the Shell Better Britain Campaign, the Buckinghamshire Council for Voluntary Service the Civic Trust (as administrators of the UK2000 Projects scheme) and the South Eastern Museums Service for grants received.

THE MILL BUILDING:

The mill has three floors - a ground floor, called the 'meal' floor since that is where the meal was delivered from the millstones to the meal bins; a first or 'stone' floor (where the millstones are) and a top or 'bin' floor (where the grain was kept in bins).

The building is very traditional. The walls, of local red brick with interspersed burnt (glazed) headers and stretchers, support the timber frame which forms the stone and bin floors above. The frame is weather-boarded on the outside. The main beams and joists supporting the stone floor are poplar, a wood much favoured in the middle of the 18th century. The fibrous nature of the beams is clear to see. Those supporting the bin floor are pitch pine. The floorboards have metal tongues.

Many of the timbers have been re-used from other buildings. Some in the back wall of the stone floor, which are thought to date from the l7th century, can be recognised by their shape, joints and peg and mortise holes.

Originally the mill had a common rafted roof with peg tiles - documentary evidence of the re-tiling of the mill in 1830 confirms this. Possibly because of damage or deterioration towards the end of last century, instead of re-tiling again, the roof was 'tinned', that is covered with corrugated iron. This was invented in 1844 and was in regular use for roofing by the 1860s. The present mansard roof was almost certainly constructed at the same time to give more headroom.

Originally the wheel was open, but was enclosed later by the wheel-house built from yellow Foxen bricks made locally near Cheddington station. It too has a corrugated iron roof.

The external appearance of the mill has been much altered over the years to suit the needs of both miller and farmer. A low shed to the left of the mill has been demolished, as has the one at the rear. The bricked-up door which gave access to this latter can still be seen. Altered doors and windows as well as other changes are easily recognisable.

THE WATER SUPPLY:

The millpond is formed by three sides of a rectangular moat, which may have encircled the original farmhouse since demolished and replaced by the present one. The moat would have created a defensive barrier and would also have been an additional source of food - fish and waterfowl.

Water for the millpond comes from springs below the chalk in the field near the Dunstable road junction, not far from Pitstone windmill. A small stream, called Whistle Brook, is formed and it flows between the villages of Pitstone and Ivinghoe, marking the parish boundary between them. It then passes through what was Pitstone (Brookend or Beesley's) watermill and under the road by the Bell Inn, past Brookmead school and on to the millpond - a distance of about half a mile. Surplus water flows from the millpond over the small weir on the farm side of the pond, into a funnel-like cavity, along a 3 foot (0.9m) diameter brick culvert under the mill to rejoin the brook about 20 yards (18m) downstream on the right.

From the mill. Whistle Brook continues northwards for some 3 miles to the former Slaptonbury Mill near Slapton where it joins the River Ouzel, sometimes called the Lovat, which in turn flows into the Great Ouse at Newport Pagnell.

THE WATERWHEEL:

Ford End has an overshot wheel with cast iron axle and spokes. It is 11 feet (3.3m) in diameter and 5 feet (1.52m) wide. Originally the 30 wheel buckets were formed by oak boards but these were replaced in 1985 by galvanised metal ones because the wooden boards rotted too quickly, through not being kept constantly wet. The late Stanley Freese, an eminent mill expert, recorded that the present wheel replaced a wooden one in about 1890, but no hard evidence of this has yet come to light.

There are four main types of water wheel - The 'overshot' on which water enters the buckets at the top on the down-running side; The 'undershot' where water flows underneath the wheel which is more like a large paddle; The 'breastshot' where water enters the buckets at about the middle of the wheel, and The 'pitchback' on which the water enters the buckets at the rear of the wheel beneath the pentrough. Overshot and pitchback wheels are more efficient than the other type because they are driven both by the weight of water (1 cubic foot (28 litres) weighs 62 Ibs (28 kg)) and by the force or pressure of water directed into the buckets by the 'pentrough'. Both types of wheel require a good "head of water" that is the difference between the height of water in the mill pond and the tailrace - some 14 foot (4.27 m) at Ford End.

The power, and to some extent the speed of the wheel are determined by the amount of water flowing onto it, that is, by flow (mass per unit time) and fall. The flow is controlled by the 'penstock' (a sluice gate) located in the pentrough, which is raised and lowereed by a rack and pinion turned by a lever on the stone floor behind the left hand pair of stones. The higher the penstock, the greater the flow (mass) of water. The fall is given by the head of water mentioned above. It has been calculated that the wheel at Ford End generates about 10 hp.

THE DRIVE TO THE MILLSTONES:

As with most contemporary mills, all the gears intermesh wooden cogs with iron teeth. There are several sound reasons for this. Firstly, as the wooden cogs are detachable, they can be removed and replaced easily when worn or broken. If iron teeth were broken, the miller would have had to have a complete new gear wheel cast - very expensive for him - whereas replacing one or two broken wooden cogs would be a simple and inexpensive task that he could carry out himself.

Secondly, the smooth-wearing qualities of the wood minimises wear on the iron gears and so extends their life as well as contributing to the quiet and even running of the mill. Thirdly, by preventing sparking, the risk of fire - the miller's nightmare - is greatly reduced. The preferred wood is well-seasoned apple or hornbeam although beech will suffice. There are examples of old and new wooden cogs on display in the mill.

The first gear-wheel inside the mill (see section drawing) is the large 'pit wheel,' which, because of its size, is placed over a pit, hence its name. It is made in two halves of cast iron and clamped onto the waterwheel axle. The wooden cogs of the pit wheel mesh with the teeth of the iron 'wallower' mounted on the vertical wooden main shaft, and as this latter is a bevel gear-wheel, it converts the horizontal drive to a vertical one. As the wallower is smaller than the pit wheel, it means that the main shaft is now rotating faster and in a clockwise direction.

Above the wallower is the large cast iron 'great spur wheel'- with wooden cogs which transmits the drive to the two iron 'stone nuts' (gear-wheels). These are lowered by the 'jack ring' to engage with the spur wheel so that the drive can be passed to the runner stone to mill. The millstones at Ford End turn anti-clockwise.

The gear-wheels alternate between large and small, by which means their speed is increased in direct proportion to the lesser number of teeth on each successive cog.

The number of teeth on the gear wheels is as follows:

(A) = Pit wheel----92                (B) = Wallower----33
(C) = Great spur wheel----122         (D) = Stone nuts----23
(E) = Crown wheel----73         (F) = Lay shaft bevel----20

The speed of the runner stone can be calculated thus:

say 15, revolutions of the runner stone for each revolution of the water wheel.
So, with a waterwheel speed of 6 rpm, the milling speed will be approximately 90 rpm.

SECTION THROUGH FORD END WATERMILL: