The Humble Gristmill

by Denise Farnsworth

It could be argued that the gristmill provided life to a community of the 1700s and 1800s, grinding corn or wheat into meal to make bread, porridge, grits, and feed for livestock. Not only that, it served as a gathering place for neighbors to catch up on gossip, for families to picnic, and for baptisms to occur in the mill pond. And yet, we rarely find it as a central location for historical fiction novels. That plus my experience working as a docent at Freeman’s Mill in Gwinnett County, Georgia, inspired me to make the heroine of my recent novel a miller’s daughter, then a miller in her own right.

Let me take you on a virtual tour of how Freeman’s Mill on the Alcovy River—constructed shortly after the Civil War by brothers John Griffin and Levi Loveless—operated.

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Freeman's Mill

A dam stores the water at the highest point above the mill. When the miller arrives, he turns the wheel on the millstone platform inside the mill to open the sliding sluice gate in the dam to channel water through the millrace to the wheel. The mill is in operation.

When a farmer approaches the ledger desk, the miller weighs his corn and keeps a portion for payment (often a tenth), which he places in the toll box. A peg panel on the side of the receiving hopper is used to tally the totals. The remaining corn is run through a sheller to separate the kernels from the cob, then sifted over to the receiving hopper with screens of various sizes to clean the kernels. Next, the miller lifts a lever on the side of the hopper to open and close the chute and drops the kernels to the basement. A grain elevator carries them up to the attic. Then they drop to the second floor through a gravity chute and are cleaned again as they pass a grain blower. The kernels land on the grinding surface of the millstone where the furrows crush them into cornmeal.

Using a wheel, the miller can raise or lower the stones. The base or bedstone is stationary. The top runner stone does the grinding. The stones should never contact each other. The smaller the space between the millstones, the finer the meal. The meal is dropped off the edge of the stones into the receiving bin. 

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Inside & outside Hagood Mill, SC

A mill might operate six days a week during harvest season (June to October). The miller re-sharpened the stones at least once a year. The runner stone was removed using a millstone crane with bails attached to the end to lift it from the casing. Once the stone was safely laid down, the dresser would use the bush hammers and picks to redress the stones. The bush hammers removed the high points, then the picks chipped a pattern to create grooves called furrows and lands. The furrows allowed air to pass through and let out heat and ground material. The picks needed constant sharpening, and the miller would go through a bunch of them to dress a pair of millstones. A millstone dresser required a good blacksmith to re-temper his picks.

Book Two of The Twenty-Niners of the Georgia Gold Rush, The Maiden and the Mountie, is now available. A marriage of necessity. A secret buried deep. In Georgia’s gold country, love may be the most dangerous treasure of all. https://www.amazon.com/Maiden-Mountie-Twenty-Niners-Georgia-Gold-ebook/dp/B0FNYFLLJ3/

Denise Farnsworth, formerly Denise Weimer, writes historical and contemporary romance mostly set in Georgia and also serves as a freelance editor and the Acquisitions & Editorial Liaison for Wild Heart Books. A wife and mother, she always pauses for coffee, chocolate, and old houses.

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