Mill Lane and Millers Close, Stratford

Mill Lane is in Stratford, which is a Northern suburb of Salisbury. In turns into a smaller path, which is popularly known as Stink Pot Alley. Millers Close is a road leading off from Mill Lane.

There seem to have been a number of mills, at different times, in the Stratford area.

In Stratford in the 13th Century there were at least two mills, one belonging to the bishop and the other belonging to the Prior of St Deny.

In 1353, there was a mill called ‘Colemans Mill’ in an area called ‘Newton Westgate’¹. As far as I can tell, ‘Newton Westgate’ was Stratford. It is believed to have been a name for the ‘Western suburbs of Old Sarum’². Given that you need the water to power a mill, my guess is that the suburbs must have been Stratford.

In 1549 the mills were leased by William Herbert, who was to become Earl of Pembroke

Between 1709 and 1716, the mills were leased by Robert Pitt.

In 1773, there was a single ‘Stratford Mill’

In 1637, there was a fulling mill and a grist mill.

In 1920 the mill was owned and used by the Stonehenge Woollen Industry. After that it was run as a ‘bone mill’, possibly linked to the abbatoir that gave Stink Pot Alley its name, until it was shut down in 1933.

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Footnotes

1. ‘Salisbury: Bridges, bars, gates and mills’, A History of the County of Wiltshire: Volume 6 (1962), pp. 87-90. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=41788 Date accessed: 14 September 2009. [↩]
2. Wiltshire County Council – Wiltshire and Swindon Sites and Monument Record Information [↩]