History of corn milling .. - Centrostudirpinia.it

SOME FEUDAL MILLS. 197
proved to be first of the Liverpool mills alienated bv iv.
1 ^ ,, .
r i_ T T
the Crown ;
on May 29 ot that year James
t 1 KING'S MILLS,
1. mclud- Liverpool.
ing '' a windmill and horse-mill in West Derby with 27 West
appurtenances, value 31s. 8d. per annum," in a batch Derby Mill,
of about one hundred mills in different parts of the
country, which formed one instalment of his wholesale Text, in. 19.
sales of mills to the large speculators in these properties,
Edward Ferrers, mercer, and Francis Philips, gent.,
both of London. In due course a Molyneux repurchased
the mills, and, apparently abolishing the horse-mill,
enlarged the windmill this ; subsequently appearing in Croxteth
°^
the rentals of the estate down to the close of the
Lefses^'^
eighteenth century. It remained leased out at the 1607- 1796.
rental of 31s. 8d. till 1767, being then raised to 40s.,
at which it stood till 1 796, when it was abolished.
The site of the structure may still be identified,
being shown on Perry's map of the Liverpool district
of 1768, and on a map of the Croxteth estates in the
following year. It stood near the main road leading
from Liverpool to the village, overlooking from its
eminence Mill Lane, the ancient way called Milne
Gate juxta the chapel of West Derby.
28. Referring, in conclusion, to milling affairs within the borough 28. Appendix:
towards the close of the seventeenth century, the ancient soke is found Their
to have been entirely broken by the action of the corporation granting
Immediate
their building lease in 1689 to William Hands for the erection of a Successors,
windmill, and quickly following this with various similar leases for
the same purpose. Private owners of land in the borough soon
did the same ; and within a century mills developed with so marvellous
a celerity that corn milling in even that age assumed the
position of one of the foremost industries of the town. Windmills
were most suitable for the locality ; and it was amid a group of the
sturdy, squat towers of these that the old peg-mill of Townsend
ended its days. Within these primitive evolutions of the art of mill-
building, an excellent trade, for that period, was conducted by individual
owners, whose energy founded the nucleus of the vast milling
business now characteristic of Liverpool. In their day, without
doubt, many interesting little histories clustered round these now
long-vanished mills, many a story of enterprise and success; for on
the whole the period was one of vast prosperity ; but scarce a