[From Folk Life Survey 1950]
From the beginning of this book to here, I have covered the period of fifty years during which we have seen the decline of our Corn Mills from a busy industry with stones singing in every mill, to today when it would be difficult to find one pair of stones working,
No longer do we find the miller who speaks of his mill as a "grand Mill." No longer do we hear the Millers discussing the making of flour, and oatmeal, the dressing of stones, and the difficulties they have overcome, we only hear them talking of the past, what they remember when they were young, how they worked to earn a living, how their fathers would clout them if they did not do the jobs in the mill properly. Today we find in all the mills still working a steel grinder and an electric motor. This will help to keep our mill doors open for a little while longer, but the days of the mills and the millers are slowly but surely passing. Though our mills were indispensable in their day, their day is gone,
It is the same sad story regarding our barn threshing mills. They are also gone and soon no-one will know how they were made, how they were worked, nor even what they were. Just a raised bank of soil marks that path where the horses walked, and in the barn perhaps a hole or two in the wall where the mill timber was fastened. Again a sad story.
As I mentioned earlier we had a threshing mill at Kella Mill. This was driven by the water-wheel and was made by my grandfather in 1895/96. It was quite a modern machine, Its drives were all belts. It had a winnowing arrangement, and delivered a clean sample of grain ready for sale, This threshing mill had replaced an older one, and it is about these older mills which I will write,
There was also a hand-threshing mill. This was a small affair turned by the hand and helped by a treadle by the person feeding the corn to be threshed. We find these hand-threshing mills on the hill farms where there were either no buildings to hold a full size mill, or the amount of grain was too small to warrante the installing of the horse-mill.
Various powers were used to drive these old barn threshing mills, we find scores of them along our streams. There were scores of them driven by horses, and not a few by wind. A good example of the latter still stands at Connor Mooar or Ballacoraigue, Ballaugh. The threshing mill in all cases followed the same principle. All the drives were cogs or a chain made at the smithy. These chains were used in conjunction with a "wood cog". This was a solid piece of wood into which teeth were driven, and this formed a chain drive.
Where horses were used for the power, a raised bank was formed at the back of the barn. This was termed the "horse walk". In the centre of this "horse walk" was an upright shaft having a large bevel cog about three feet below the ground, and on top of this upright shaft was the lever.
This lever was a strong wooden bar about thirty feet from end to end, and to either end of it was hitched a pair of horses. To prevent the lever running on the horses' heels should they stop, a ratchet arrangement was fitted at the centre where the lever was attached to the upright. Engaging in the big bevel cog below ground was a small pinion on the end of a shaft which extended into the barn, and on the end of this shaft, just inside the barn well, was another large cog with several smaller ones to gear the speed up for the drum. All drives here were cog, although we find always the chain drive to the feeding rolls.
The threshing was done by a combing action, There was a platform at the feeding end of the mill, about three feet six inches from the loft, and on this platform the sheaf was spread in front of the feed rolls. The sheaf was moved forward between these rollers which rolled it slowly into the drum which was situated just behind these feed rollers.
While the feed rollers were pushing the sheaf to the drum, it was combing the grain off the straw while it was held by the rollers. As can be imagined, the straw was usually broken up when finished. See also charts (e) (f) (g) (h) at end of notebook.
The gearing described in (g) is found in Castletown Mill, yet only three pairs of stones are fitted around the spur wheel. In this mill the gearing appears to be arranged to get speed rather than accommodate four pairs of stones. The fourth pair is drive by belt. Castletown wheel is a high one and therefore slower - probably six runs per minute, In Kella Mill, with similar gearing, we find the wheel doing 10 to 12 runs per minutes.
We do not find a winnowing arrangement in this type of threshing mill. All the power available was used for the threshing which was done during the day, and a spell of winnowing would be done at night after supper.
After the straw had been threshed, it was caught by a drum arrangement having long wooden spikes, about fifteen inches, in it, These lifted the straw and threw it out onto a rack. This rack was formed of lats through which the chaff and grain fell to the barn below, while the straw was left on the loft,
Whether the power used was wind or horses, the arrangement outside, below the ground, was the same, but in the case of the windmill, the upright from the big bevel cog below ground would extend to the head of the windmill, and was there connected by cogs to the windshaft or the heavy shaft carrying the vanes,
In the case of the waterwheel for driving the threshing mill, we find many very ingenious ideas, In the case of Squeen Mill, Ballaugh, the threshing mill is situated quite a distance from the corn mill, and at least sixty feet of shafting was used to drive it. The drive was not straight, but had an angle drive in the middle of the yard, At the Lhen Mill, Andreas, we find the threshing mill driven off the outer end of the waterwheel axle; the wheel hung situated between the corn mill building and the threshing mill building, While at Milntown and Castletown Mills we find separate water-wheels used to drive the threshing mills.
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Water powered Mills etc |
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Any comments, errors or omissions gratefully received The
Editor |
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