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| Oak Bank Mill pond, on the Harrop brook |
For the mill owner dependent on the flow of water to power his mill, the mill pond was an important feature for the storage and regulation of the flow of his water. A mill would not operate satisfactorily on a small river like the Dean because of the variability of the volume of water in the river. If you observe our river you will notice that the level increases sharply after a heavy shower of rain and then declines once the runoff has been carried away. The basic flow of water changes with the seasons, more in the winter, less in the summer, very little in a dry summer.
The mill required a constant flow of a minimum quantity during working hours and then nothing for the rest of the time. The only way to ensure this was to store water in a mill pond when the mill was closed and release this water to the water wheel during working hours. The mill highest up the river was limited to the amount of water stored in its own mill pond. Those further downstream benefited by having their mill ponds topped up during the working day by the water coming down from the mills above! The down side to this advantage was that after the end of the working day there would be less water in the river to fill your pond until the ponds above you were filled and overflowing.
There are still several ponds to be seen in Bollington though all are not obvious and don't necessarily contain water! Above the waterfall at the top end of Ingersley Vale is Ingersley Clough pool. This is visible from the public footpaths either side of it. It is very badly silted up and is no longer of any value for water storage. Next is the site of the mill pond for Rainow mill. This is the rough piece of ground between Mcnulty's glass works and Ingersley Clough mill. The pond was filled with demolition rubble many years ago. At the start of Ingersley Vale we still have Higher mills pond. What we have today is only about two thirds of the original pond. Part was used to build Dyers Close. There was then a pond for Lower mills. One can guess its location as the mill yard but I need to confirm this.
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Defiance mill and the
Bobbin mill, Queen Street |
On the Harrop brook (between Shrigley Road and Ingersley Road) there remains Oak Bank mill pond (pictured above). This is in quite good condition, having been dredged some years ago. The next one will surprise you - Pool Bank car park was once a mill pond! I believe this supplied Defiance mill and the Bobbin mill that stood next to it on what is today called Queen Street (left) but years ago the top end, from Defiance mill to Heathcotes, was known as Defiance Brow.
So far as I know the corn mill did not have a pond, it used a very long leat that came off the river behind the Bridgend Centre and is visible today only in the Recreation Ground - the small bridge by the tunnel was an aqueduct for the leat and the watercourse followed where the path is today. It then went out into the street and all along the side of Wellington Road to the mill just beyond Garden Street.
There is one other big pond, in Ingersley Park, which remains but out of public sight. I have no idea whether this was used by any mill. It's on a very small watercourse, the Lima brook, running into the Harrop brook just above Oak Bank pond, so continuity of supply would would have been a problem.
Clarence mill has a pond in the fields above the mill but this was to provide water for steam engines, not water wheels.
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