Site overview

Saunderson's Mill at Steeple Morden was a smock corn mill recorded on Ashwell Road. Built in 1805, it formed part of the village's wind-powered milling landscape before later use as a power mill. Twentieth-century photographic records show the mill after its working windmill phase, with the structure disused as a windmill but still connected with milling activity.

Later records place it without sails, retaining the identity of a former smock mill rather than a complete working windmill.

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

Saunderson's Mill was a smock corn mill at Steeple Morden. It was built in 1805 and stood on Ashwell Road, serving the village and surrounding agricultural district as a wind-powered mill. Its smock form placed it within the timber-framed windmill tradition of south Cambridgeshire.

The mill's later history is recorded through twentieth-century photographic and specialist mill records. By 1947 it was disused as a windmill but was still associated with the milling business. Later photographs continued to show it without sails, including views from the late 1960s and early 1970s when the site was recorded as a power mill. The surviving account therefore traces the mill from its early nineteenth-century construction into a later phase in which the wind-powered function had ended but the building and milling association remained recognisable.

Timeline

1805

Smock mill built

Saunderson's Mill was built at Steeple Morden as a smock corn mill.
1947

Disused as a windmill

The mill was photographed disused as a windmill but still associated with milling activity.
1968–1973

Power-mill phase recorded

Later photographic records show the former smock mill without sails during its power-mill period.

Sources and records

Windmill World site entry
Mills Archive database entry
Guy Blythman Windmill Photographic Register