1751–1800
Tower mill constructed
The tarred red-brick tower mill was built in the late eighteenth century.
Site overview
Lawson's Mill at Shepeau Stow is a late eighteenth-century tower corn mill. The Grade II listed structure is a four-storey tarred red-brick tower, missing its cap and roof, with dogtooth eaves, segment-headed openings, and visible remains of machinery. The mill originally had four sails and worked by wind until the 1920s.
By the mid 1930s it had lost its roof and become ruinous. Surviving fabric includes collapsed upper floors and machinery partly visible through ground-floor openings, including a pair of stones beneath rubble and wood.
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
Lawson's Mill stands at Shepeau Stow on the north-east edge of Whaplode parish. It is a late eighteenth-century tower corn mill built of tarred red brick. The four-storey tower is roofless and has lost its cap and sails, but the dogtooth eaves and the rhythm of segment-headed door and window openings preserve the original form of the structure.
The mill originally worked with four sails and continued wind-powered operation until the 1920s. A photograph from the inter-war period records the mill before its later ruinous condition, and by the middle of the 1930s the roof had gone. The listed description records surviving technical evidence inside the tower: collapsed upper floors, partly visible machinery, a pair of stones buried beneath rubble and timber, and the former clasp-arm great spur wheel arrangement.
Drive belt wheels survive on the south side above and below the ground-floor opening, indicating later mechanical adaptation. The tower remains a prominent fragment of the hamlet's milling history.
Timeline
1800
Four-sailed mill recorded
The mill was a four-storeyed tower mill, originally with four sails.
1920–1929
Wind working ended
The mill worked by wind until the 1920s.
1930–1939
Mill became roofless
By the middle of the 1930s the mill had lost its roof and become ruinous.
1940–1949
Mechanical working ended
After the loss of wind power the mill was machine operated until closure in the 1940s.
1987
Listed building designation
The surviving windmill tower was listed at Grade II.
Sources and records
Historic England listed building entry: Windmill, Shepeau Stow Lane
Windmill World site entry: Shepeau Stow windmill
Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology photograph catalogue
Geograph photograph records: Lawson's Mill, Shepeau Stow
Wikishire article: Shepeau Stow
Windmill World site entry: Shepeau Stow windmill
Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology photograph catalogue
Geograph photograph records: Lawson's Mill, Shepeau Stow
Wikishire article: Shepeau Stow