Modern watermill (site of) and associated water management.


The Ordnance Survey 1:2500 First Edition mapping of 1868-9 shows a building at the grid reference provided, together with the annotation, 'Corn Mill'.


The mill was a small structure located immediately adjacent to the road bridge crossing the Glen Rushen river in the bottom of the valley. It was part of a complex that included several other structures (possibly a grain store and a miller's cottage) on the south side of the road and a miller's house to the north. The complex predated improvements to the road which left the gable of the mill protruding into the roadway, leading to it featuring prominently in archive photographs of this part of the village.


The mill was supplied by two leats. The more northerly extended 130m upstream, where it was drawn off the Glen Rushen river by way of a weir. An overflow race lay just above the miller's house, so protecting this and the mill.


The second leat captured the entire flow of the stream descending from the direction of 'The Sound', the confluence of two narrow valleys draining the north side of Dalby Mountain. The lower 240m of this stream was canalised and channelled along the roadside to a point immedately above the roadbridge, where it joined the other leat.


A tail race extending 20m returned the water to the Glen Rushen river just downstream of the bridge and mill.


The mill has been demolished to widen the highway; its site is partially occupied by a pumping station. The line of the northerly leat is now occupied by a footpath, but the more southerly one still carries water until diverted along a line approximately similar to the former overflow race.