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Bark mill function recorded
The tower mill site is recorded as having functioned as a bark mill.
Site overview
Cockermouth Windmill stood at High Sand Lane, near the confluence of the Rivers Cocker and Derwent. The site is associated with a tower mill used as a bark mill, a specialised industrial use rather than a corn mill. The listed mill and brewery building adjoining the present brewery includes a circular hand-made brick structure, now three storeys high, re-roofed with a gable and attached to a stone mill building on its east side.
The structure is probably early nineteenth century, and the circular part is identified as possibly having been a windmill. The windmill remains have been reported as ruinous and possibly destroyed, with one account noting that they may have been washed away in a flood. The surviving record is strongest for the site's location, industrial character, probable early nineteenth-century date, and later fragmentary survival.
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
Cockermouth Windmill was located at High Sand Lane, beside the meeting of the Rivers Cocker and Derwent. The site differs from many Cumbrian tower windmills because its recorded function was as a bark mill. Bark mills were associated with the preparation of bark for tanning and related industrial processes, placing the Cockermouth site within the town's broader riverside industrial landscape rather than a purely agricultural corn-milling setting.
The listed mill and brewery building at the confluence includes a circular building of hand-made brick. The circular element is now three storeys high, re-roofed with a gable, and attached on its east side to a stone mill building. The structure is probably early nineteenth century, and the circular part is described as possibly having once been a windmill. This survival gives the site its main architectural and industrial interest: a probable former wind-powered industrial structure incorporated into later mill or brewery-related fabric.
Specialist mill records identify the site as a tower mill and associate it with a bark-milling function. Later notes record the remains as ruinous and possibly destroyed, with one report stating that the remains had been washed away in a flood. The site also has a later planning history, with a windmill-related planning application refused in January 2005. The known history therefore centres on a probable early nineteenth-century industrial tower mill whose circular fabric was absorbed into a riverside mill and brewery complex, leaving a fragmentary and uncertain survival at the confluence of Cockermouth's two rivers.
Timeline
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Circular structure incorporated into later mill fabric
The surviving circular brick structure was re-roofed with a gable and attached to a stone mill building on its east side.
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Ruinous survival recorded
The windmill remains were recorded as ruinous and possibly destroyed, with one report stating that they may have been washed away in a flood.
1800–1830
Probable early nineteenth-century mill building
The circular hand-made brick structure at High Sand Lane is probably early nineteenth century and may have formed part of a windmill.
2005
Planning application refused
A planning application relating to Cockermouth windmill was refused in January 2005.
Sources and records
Windmill World site entry
Mills Archive record
Historic England archive and listing information
Old Cumbria Gazetteer listed building extract
Mills Archive record
Historic England archive and listing information
Old Cumbria Gazetteer listed building extract