History of corn milling .. - Centrostudirpinia.it

212 HISTORY OF CORN MILLING VOL. IV.
V.
JEDBURGH
CORPORA-
TION MILLS.
1. Purchase,
1670.
Lord Hume the mills passed to Lord Lothian, from
whom, in 1670, they were purchased by the Provost
and Town Council of Jedburgh on behalf of the town.
The borough was deeply involved in debt, and the
purchase of the mills constituted one of the methods
of getting rid of the incubus which commended themselves
to the authorities. The mills, therefore, were
then a valuable property, rendering a definite and, as
the council considered, a sure revenue, the profits from
which ought to be devoted to the discharge of the local
no doubt
debt. It may be stated at once that, though
burgesses ground at the mills, these do not seem
to have ever possessed the thirl or soke of the town.
No evidence occurs that the monks had ever com-
pelled burgesses to grind at them, and the abbot
was certainly not the manorial lord of the town, as it
was a royal borough. Moreover, it does not appear
that the corporation originally thought any such mill-
ing right existed, but simply resolved to buy the mills
and do the best they could with them.
The purchase is thus recorded : ''In 1670 William,
Earl of Lothian, and Lord Robert Kerr, of Newbattle,
his eldest son, sold and disposed to the provost,
magistrates, and town council of the burgh of Jedburgh,
on behalf of the community [infer alia], the three
corn mills of Jedburgh and all and sundry multures,
sequels, and others,
"
and parts and pertinents of the
same respectively ; no mention whatever being made
of any astricted thirl over the burgesses of the town.
The transaction was confirmed by royal charter in
1672, in which the property was described as '' all and
whole the mills denominated of old the three corn mills
of Jedburgh, commonly called the Abbey Mill, Town
Mill, and East Mill ; as also the Waulk [walk or
fijlling] Mill of Jedburgh ; with all and sundry multures,
sequels, mill lands, houses, biggings, yards,
and haill