19th century mill and brewery at The Mill (EHER 15105)

Late Victorian four-storey, brick and slated building with weather boarded top floor and central lucam, and double flight of entrance steeps to landing platform. Built as a brewery by 1880 but converted to corn milling before 1923. Millstones by Hughes and Clarke and Dunham, both of London.

Original HER entry merged with NRHE data import: Mill (disused) [NAT]. <1> Late Victorian. A 4-storey, brick and slated building with weather boarded top floor and central lucam, and double flight of entrance steeps to landing platform. Built as a brewery by 1880 but converted to corn milling before 1923. Now (1977) under reconstruction. Millstones by Hughes and Clarke and Dunham, both of London. <2> A wholly functional building presenting evidence of 3 floors to the road- side, but with probably another and lower floor on the opposite side which is built on sloping ground. The structure is brick, but the top floor and lucam are weatherboarded. The lucam is central, facing the road and situated above the doorway, which is above ground level and approached from a double flight of steps which end in a platform. The mill has HATFIELD HEATH MILLS painted along the roadside face. The structure appears to be late Victorian which raises difficulties as the site is marked as a brewery in 1880 and 1897 OS maps. <3> <4> It was, however, a cornmill by 1923 and apparently also in 1950. <5> Hatfield Heath Brewery began in the Sullins family – Peter was a maltster (1839) and his son Henry took over this business and became a brewer also. Another Peter Sullins took over and then sold it to Capt. C.A.S. Warde in 1892 and brewing ceased in 1900. The building itself has four floors with access on both the (lower) ground floor and the first floor via steps. Brick built but painted white now with weather-boarding painted black to the top storey. The roof is now of a corrugated material. There is a lucam to the top floor and a small chimney on the north-west elevation. Adjacent is a pond and opposite is the brewer’s house (now a residential care home) with a plaque with Peter Sullins’ monograph and the year '1863'. <6> A four storey, five bay mill building with a gable ended corrugated iron clad roof and a pitched roof lucam to the roadside. The lower three floors, including the basement, are brick built while the upper storey is timber-framed and weatherboarded. An external chimney stack rises up the north-west gable elevation from second floor level. Original window apertures have segmental arch heads and all fenestration is modern. The ground floor is reached by a double flight of brick steps while access to the basement is via a large modern opening inserted into the north-west gable wall. Adjacent is the brewer’s house (now a residential care home) bearing a plaque with Peter Sullins’ initials and the year 1863. Each floor is carried by large Baltic pine binding joists (north-east to south-west) which are in turn supported by cast-iron columns with plain capitals. In the north-east corner of the mill is a large brick-built structure presumably a bread oven or kiln which rises through all floors of the building. Built in red brick in English bond the brick oven has an opening in its north-west wall on each floor, apart from the upper floor which had been demolished. No internal features or fittings survive within the structure and this is the case for much of the building, although the original winding mechanism for the external hoist (via the lucam), hursting, pulleys and access gantry remain within the central bays of the mill roof structure. The roof structure comprises large soft wood king post trusses with raking struts and back purlins. The king post also carries the ridge plank and common rafters. Softwood match-boarding or sarking overlies the rafters. At the time of the survey the mill was in the early stages of building works associated with its conversion into apartments. The hoist mechanism and most of the surviving floors are to be retained within the scheme (pers. comm.). <7> A full building record was undertaken of the structure prior to its conversion to offices. <7>