Minster Windmill (Pigtail Corner)

Situated along Mill Hill road, 1/2 a mile to the east of Minster village.

Originally a post mill between 1596 and 1610. Later replaced by a smock mill believed to have been in existence for over 200 years.

The parish clerk noted ‘The windmill at Minster in Sheppey was finished and made fitting and did grind the first wheat’ on 2 August 1777.

After the last miller it was damaged in a gale, and left standing derelict for a number of years, before being burnt down in 1889.

Millers

1839: Balwin Howe
1862: W. Hook
1878: G. L. Franks

Mr. Geo. E. Ride noted:

“This mill did very little work after Mr. Franks left it. One or two had a try at it but only for a few months. I remember it standing so long idle that the Rural District Council complained of it standing in a dangerous condition with the sweeps across the road, and I was the last one to help the caretaker to pull her round in the opposite direction. There she stood until the sweeps and head of the windshaft were blown off, and she was later burnt down.”

North sea pilot, 1869:

“Minster mill, nearly half a mile to the south-eastward of the village, is also very conspicuous”.

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