The Mills Grind Slowly 171 



and wandered south to Croatoan? There are no records or 

 legends of a mill in that locality. Experts have given their opin- 

 ion that the gears had been buried at least two hundred years. 

 One has a bullet embedded in it. There is the possibility that 

 the Roanoke settlers set up the mill there and that shortly 

 afterward most of them, or all, were killed by savages. 



The first mill of which there are records is the windmill 

 which Sir George Yeardley put up about 1620 on his patent 

 Flower de Hundred on the James. A spit of land reaching into 

 the river is still called Windmill Point. The spot has another 

 historical significance, for it was here that Grant's army crossed 

 the river, one hundred and thirty thousand strong. 



Mills, driven by wind or water, soon became common in 

 the Tidewater. Every large estate had its own mill to grind 

 the corn harvest. The mill at Stratford, the historic home of 

 the Lees, has been reconstructed in recent years. 



The first grist mill in Massachusetts was built at Watertown 

 and was owned in part by William Cradock. His half interest 

 was valued at 200. Occasionally this is spoken of as a tide- 

 water mill, but one writer says it was found necessary, in 1632, 

 to move the mill to Boston because at Watertown it was 

 impossible to grind corn except when the wind was westerly. 

 Which seems to indicate that this too was a windmill. 



A well-watered land, Massachusetts soon had a mill turning 

 in every settlement. The noble Sir Richard Saltonstall was 

 miller at Ipswich and charged a toll of one-sixteenth of the 

 grain brought him to be ground. Frequently, mills were built 

 at common expense. The Plymouth records give a court order, 

 dated 1634, providing "that Stephen Deane have a sufficient 

 water wheele set up at the charge of the colony, consisting of 

 one foot more depth than he now useth; the said Stephen 

 Deane finding the iron worke thereunto belonging." At Stam- 

 ford, Connecticut, a dam was built by the townsmen; the 

 frame and body were put up by a carpenter for 51, and the 

 town sold the mill for 75. Many of the early mills in New 

 England are still standing, like that of Governor John Win- 



