Worstead Mill Worstead · Norfolk · England

Worstead Mill stands on Windmill Road at Briggate, Worstead, and is also known as Briggate Towermill. It was built around 1850 as a six-storey tarred red brick corn mill. The mill had a boat-shaped cap with petticoat and gallery, a six-bladed fan, and a chainpole. Four double-shuttered patent sails, each with eight bays of three shutters, were struck by rack and pinion. The sails drove three pairs of stones controlled by four-armed governors, together with a flour mill. The windshaft had four shallow ribs at the brake-wheel end. The mill stood to the north-west of Briggate watermill and for much of its working life the two mills were operated together.

George Greenacre was listed as a corn miller at Bengate in 1854, followed by Robert Greenacre and Durrell & Greenacre in the later 1850s. In December 1863 a gale badly damaged the windmill, with damage estimated at nearly £100. Sale notices in 1865 and 1866 described the property as a brick tower windmill with patent sails, three pairs of stones, a flour mill, dwelling house, outbuildings, and nearby canal access. The mill was again offered for sale in 1869, and in 1881 the brick tower windmill was advertised under proceedings relating to the Greenacre estates, then in the occupation of Cubitt & Walker. Directory entries record Cubitt & Walker at Briggate Mills through the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, with the concern described as millers using steam, wind, and water in several entries up to 1922.

By 1949 the mill was derelict. In 1970 and 1972 the windshaft, brake wheel, and wallower were still in place, though grinding machinery had been removed before conversion. By 1989 the tower retained its cap, windshaft, and gallery supports. The building was listed as Grade II in 1962 as Worstead Mill. The listing describes a circa 1850 brick tower mill now part of a house, with a six-storey tapering circular brick tower, boat-shaped weather-boarded cap, cap frame, and windshaft remaining. Later photographic records show the cap removed by crane in 2019 and the mill and site undergoing renovation in March 2025.