1650–1699
Seventeenth-century windmill built
Dysart, Windmill Road, Old Windmill Tower was built as a windmill in the seventeenth century.
Site overview
Dysart, Windmill Road, Old Windmill Tower stands on Windmill Road at Dysart. It is a seventeenth-century tower windmill and is among the early surviving Scottish windmill structures. The tower later ceased to work as a mill and survived as a prominent local ruin.
Map
Map markers and directions links are provided for location reference only and do not indicate public access or permission to enter a site.
No site photograph is currently available. Images will be added as field visits are carried out.
History
Dysart, Windmill Road, Old Windmill Tower is a former windmill tower at Dysart in Fife. The structure is also known as Quarry Brae. It dates from the seventeenth century and is one of the older surviving windmill structures in Scotland.
The windmill ceased milling by the eighteenth century and had become ruinous by the nineteenth century. It was later adapted as a lookout tower and also had wartime use in the twentieth century. The surviving tower remains a recognised feature of Dysart.
No complete machinery inventory, ownership sequence, or precise final working date has been established.
Timeline
1750
Windmill ceased milling
Dysart windmill had ceased milling by about the middle of the eighteenth century.
1854
Windmill ruin recorded
Dysart windmill was ruinous by the mid-nineteenth century.
1939–1945
Wartime reuse
The former windmill tower had wartime use during the Second World War.
Sources and records
Trove / Canmore place record; Historic Environment Scotland listed building record; local heritage information; Hume industrial archaeology record