The Holystone Mill Race - A Copious Runnell
"The mill race – the pride of the villagers – is a copious runnel of fine clear water which passes through Holystone and is the motor power for the wheel of the corn mill at the entrance to the village" – David Dippie Dixon, 1903
This August, Holystone History Group walked the line of the old mill race which once took water from Holystone Burn and diverted it round the village to join the stream from the Lady's Well. The route of the mill race is clearly shown on the first Ordinance Survey map of 1860.
On the ground one can see the stonework of a well-constructed sluice at the upstream end but no relics of any kind of weir. The channel of the race is clear as far as the road, being lined with mature trees, and the remains of an aqueduct with stone pillars is visible. The channel can be seen again in the field beyond the road, running parallel to the edge of the mediaeval rig and furrow and again marked by mature trees, until finally it discharges into the well stream. Its present course through the village is well known and it ended by supplying an overshot wheel on a building which no longer exists.
The first documentary evidence of the course of the mill race is the 1765 plan of the Farquhar estate and this shows that the race powered a fulling mill before running to the corn mill. On the 1840 tithe commutation award map the race takes its present route. However, the mill itself is much older than 1765, with written records dating to 1539 mentioning the existence of the mill.
In order to further consider the date of the mill race, Duncan Hutt, Chair of the North East Mills Group, joined us the group for a site visit. He pointed out that the original mill, which was probably even earlier than 1539, was in all likelihood a very modest affair, powered by flow from the well alone without the mill race. The mill race may therefore be of a later date than the mill.
The end of the mill's existence is better understood, as both documentary evidence and oral histories are available. The mill was bought in 1876 by Percival Fenwick-Clennel, but on the OS map of 1920 the legend reads 'Old Mill Race' as if it were already defunct. Carol Plater, resident of Holystone, reports that her father James Rutherford (b. 1910) had, as a boy, helped his grandfather maintain the mill race, but that when the last miller, Joseph Oliver, died in 1914 the mill was not kept running. Photographic evidence supports this. Eventually the mill was sold privately to Major Renwick, and the mill yard became used as a diesel-powered sawmill and kennels for the Major's prize winning greyhounds.
The full history of the mill into the twentieth century remains to be written before memories and documents are lost. And maybe one day we can exploit the flow of this copious runnel to generate a little electricity for the village in anticipation of all the fossil fuels running out.
Click here for a more detailed report on the archaeology of the Holystone Mill-Race. (PDF file, 64kb).
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