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In the year 1780 Frew’s mill was destroyed by fire, and the 
existing buildings were erected on the same site the year follow- 
ing, under the direction of an eminent engineer, John Smeaton, 
designer of Eddystone Lighthouse and many other great works, 
whose life forms one of the most interesting and instructive of 
the biographies contained in “Smiles’ Lives of Engineers.” 
Smeaton was born at Ansthrope, near Leeds, in the year 1724, 
and he died in 1792. He had been consulted by the Magistrates 
of Dumfries on other matters beside the Mills. ‘One of the 
earliest subjects on which Mr Smeaton was consulted,” says Mr 
Smiles, “was the opening up of river navigation. In 1760 he 
reported to the Magistrates of Dumfries as to the improvement 
of the Nith, but his advice—to form a navigable canal rather 
than deepen and straighten the river at a much greater cost— 
was not carried out for want of funds.” The drawings for the 
mills furnished by Smeaton are among the Town’s papers. 
Before the erection of Frew’s Mill, the Town possessed, on the 
Dumfries side of the river, a water-mill, situated in the Millhole; 
another water-mill, called the “Sandbed Mill of Dumfries ;” 
and a horse-mill, the site of which is now occupied by part of the 
west side of the Brewery, at the head of Brewery Street. 
We have no record regarding the erection of any of the three 
mills on the Dumfries side of the river, but there is evidence of 
the existence of buildings of this description in the Town at an 
early period. There is mention of ‘“ Adam the Miller” about 
the middle of the 12th century, when Richard, son of Robert, 
was arraigned for his murder in the Castle of Dumfries ; and in 
1307, the Castle being in the hands of the English, command is 
sent, on behalf of the King, to James de Dalileghe at Skymber- 
b] 
_nesse to provide wheat and barley, and have it ground at 
Dumfries. 
Later we have reference to a mill-dam, in such terms as to 
indicate its locality. In a Charter, by the King, dated Dumfries, 
10th October, 1510, confirming the Charter which William 
Cunninghame, Burgess of Dumfries, had previously granted to 
the Parish Church of Dumfries (St. Michael’s) of certain houses 
and lands within the Burgh of Dumfries, mention is made of— 
“©8/ from the tenement of Shir Finlaii Makgilhauch, Chaplain ; 
4/ from the Orchard of the said Chaplain, hard by the mill-dam ; 
12/ from the tenement of the late John Steill, situated between 
the mildam and the Clerkhill.” 
