Swalwell mill

HER Number:
697

District:
Gateshead

Site Name:
Swalwell mill

Place:
Swalwell

Map Sheet:
NZ26SW

Class:
Industrial

Site Type: Broad:
Water Power Production Site

Site Type: Specific:
Watermill

General Period:
Medieval

Specific Period:
C14

Form of Evidence:
Documentary Evidence

Description:
The earliest explicit reference to a mill at Swalwell is in Hatfield's Survey (c.1382), when it was held communally by the tenants. As William Swalwell held the milldam it must be assumed to have been a watermill. But note that Boldon Buke (1183 survey of land belonging to the Bishop of Durham, Hugh du Puiset) records a mill under the heading of Whickham, and this may have referred to Swalwell. The Parliamentary Survey of 1647 lists "...a Water Corn Milne...called... Swalwell Milne...now quite decayed and fallen to the ground", as the only mill in the manor of Whickham. Bourn noted the existence of a watermill in the early 19th century.

Easting:
204

Northing:
624

Grid Reference:
NZ204624

Lats/Lons:

Sources:
<< HER 697 >> W. Greenwell, ed. 1852, Boldon Buke, Surtees Society, 25, p. 67 W. Greenwell, ed. 1856, Bishop Hatfield's Survey, Surtees Society, 32, p. 93 D.A. Kirby, ed. 1972, Parliamentary Surveys of the Bishopric of Durham, Surtees Society, II 185, pp. 81-2 1770, Whickham and Swalwell Low Ground, belonging to Sir James Clavering, BP/3/165 -Gateshead Library Local Studies W. Bourn, 1893, Whickham Parish, p. 113 R. Surtees, 1820, History of...Durham, II, p. 247; Eric Clavering and Alan Rounding, 1995, Early Tyneside Industrialism: The lower Derwent and Blaydon Burn Valleys 1550-1700, Archaeologia Aeliana, Series 5, Vol XXIII, page 255