Bembridge Windmill Bembridge · Isle of Wight · England

Bembridge Windmill stands on high ground at Bembridge and is the only surviving windmill on the Isle of Wight. It is a four-storey stone tower corn mill, built around 1700, with a boat-shaped cap turned by chain and wheel. Much of the machinery is characteristic of the early eighteenth century. During restoration, a reused stair timber was found with the inscription “E BEKER 1746 A C”, providing one of the earliest positive dated features in the building.

The mill worked for the Bembridge community for more than two hundred years. It was known historically as Knowle Mill and was owned by the Dennett family for much of its working life. Its visual prominence made it a frequent artistic subject. J. M. W. Turner began a watercolour of the mill in 1795, showing the surrounding coastal and haven landscape before later drainage changed the setting. The mill was also engraved by George Brannon in 1840.

The mill continued working through the Victorian period. After 1897 it was used only for grinding animal feed, and it finally stopped operating in 1913. During the two World Wars the building served practical local uses as a shelter and lookout. Restoration campaigns in 1935 and 1959 preserved the tower and machinery, and the mill was taken over by the National Trust in 1962 after being presented by Mrs E. Smith of Mill Farm, Bembridge. The windmill is Grade I listed and remains a preserved historic mill with most of its original machinery intact. New sails were fitted in March 2021 as part of a renewed restoration programme.