The Norfolk Broads - a singular noun, it denotes an area - is an artificial landscape. Left to its own devices, this area of shallow river valleys and the flooded medieval peat diggings which are the Broads themselves would be swamp - fetid in summer and non-negotiable in winter - rather than the bucolic, if seasonally crowded, holiday destination that it is today.

It looks the way it does because from the 18th century, the land was drained by a gradual proliferation of wind-powered drainage mills which lifted water into the rivers from a lattice of marsh dykes. By the early 19th century, over a hundred mills were working although supplementary steam pumps would shortly appear, to be followed in the early 20th century by internal combustion engines. It was the subsequent spread of the National Grid which led to the present day regime of electric pumps.

But while the wooden drainage mills of the more intensively cultivated Fens to the west have disappeared, many Broadland mills were brick-built and are still very much in evidence, converted to other uses or simply redundant and often derelict but a haunting reminder of times past. In the slate greys and muddy greens of a marshland winter between the lower reaches of the rivers Bure and Yare, their stumpy and now usually sail-less remains punctuate the flatness in a way which throws into the stark relief the world of the marshmen who attended them.

Some marshmen lived in their mills and a solitary existence that would have been, perhaps a mile - and often a difficult mile - from the nearest neighbour and more from the village, at a time when Broadland's roads were hardly worth the name,. True, when a mill was working and perhaps lived in, it would have had some life about it, and in summer, on land less waterlogged with a riverbank fringed with reeds and yellow flag irises, it might have made a modern day idyl. But the mills and marshmen still had to take what nature sent and they had to work hardest when nature was doing its worst.

Unfortunately, drainage mill history is a little sketchy, particularly that of the individual structures, but these were workaday machines and the concept of marsh drainage had anyway been around since the Romans tried to drain the Fens although the present day Fenland system of dykes dates mainly from the 16th and 17th centuries.

Drainage came later to Broadland partly because smaller land areas could not offer vast returns to venture capitalists. Broadland's mills began to appear probably when existing flap sluices were coping less well with increased tidal flows brought by river dredging, increased run-off from up-river land reclamation and perhaps rising sea levels. Some mills were built by individual landowners although the Enclosure Acts produced quite a few, often stipulating that a mill be erected and maintained by the local Drainage Commission.

The 1797 map produced by William Faden, geographer to King George III, shows most of Broadland's mills concentrated on the silt soils of the lower river valleys, rather than on the peat soils further up, Only later would the peat be drained.

Mill design varied according to the land area served - the smaller the patch, the cheaper the design. Sometimes in the early days, even simple horse-powered scoops were used on the smallest plots although in the 19th century came the cheap wooden skeleton - or trestle - mill and the hollow post mill, both specifically for small areas of marsh.

The earliest of the more substantial mills are reckoned to have been of timber weatherboard structures of the 'smock' design which also featured in the Fens. Many were duly replaced by brick mills on the same site, but even then in Broadland, cost remained a consideration. At the end of the 18th century, though better technology had developed, Broadland drainage mills mostly still had 'common' sails covered in canvas and a single scoop to lift water from the marsh dyke over a low wall into a higher dyke or the river. When the wind changed, the marshman had to stop the mill and move the cap and sails by a long tail pole which stretched down from the cap. For that reason, early mills were relatively short.

But already, in 1745, Edmund Lee had invented the fantail wheel which, mounted at the back of the cap, kept the sails turned into the wind, and that was followed in 1772 by a sail developed by Scottish millwright, Andrew Meickle with parallel shutters which could be opened or closed according to windspeed.

The big advance however was the 'patent sail', introduced by William Cubitt, a Norfolk man, in 1807, which could be adjusted without stopping the mill. Thereafter, mills could be taller with longer sails and thus more powerful which explains why many towers in Broadland were heightened during the 19th century. They often have the tell-tale change from a conical to a cylindrical shape at the top though few Broadland mills built before 1825 apparently adopted the new technology in the post-Napoleonic War recession.

A further innovation, the turbine pump, came in 1851 with rapidly rotating vanes in a cylindrical metal housing which could lift half as much again as a conventional scoop wheel.
Today 72, mostly brick-built, mills survive in recognisable condition in Broadland. Some are close to a road and a majority are close to a river and thus accessible by boat even if mooring nearby isn't always be possible. And some are in dangerous condition. But many anyway are close to a footpath and can be reached by those able to walk a mile or two. And as this is holiday country, most villages have a decent pub for food and refreshment afterwards.

Three of the later and bigger mills have been restored (though none pumps water these days) and are open in summer. Horsey Mill, (OS ref TG456222) entirely rebuilt in 1912 and now owned by the National Trust, sits beside the B1159 and Horsey Mere at the north-eastern extremity of the Broads. Another at Stracey Arms (TG442090) beside the River Bure and the A47 between Acle and Great Yarmouth is owned by the Norfolk Windmills Trust.

The third, the late 19th century Berney High Mill (TG465050) on the River Yare at the south-western edge of Breydon Water, is maintained by English Heritage and, at 22 metres, is the highest working mill in the country. Not accessible by public road, it can be reached by the occasional train which stops at Berney Arms halt, one of the most remote railway stations in the country. Those who fancy a (dry weather) walk can stroll three miles along the Weavers' Way footpath across the marsh from Halvergate village or a little further further from Great Yarmouth. The mill's only neighbours are a farm house and an equally remote pub also open in summer.

Possibly the oldest survivor, dating from 1753, is Oby Mill, (TG409138) on the River Bure two miles above Acle Bridge. Clippesby Mill, half a mile downstream and now undergoing refurbishment is undated but of similar vintage. Further up river, the 18th century Benet's Abbey mill (TG380158) stands in the ruined gateway of St Benet's Abbey and was probably used occasionally for grinding seed when not shifting water. Several mills did other work during the summer months. This one, two miles south of the village of Ludham, can be reached by car along a signposted track.

Another old one, Brograve Level (TG 448236) dating from 1771, can be found on Waxham New Cut a mile walk north of Horsey Mill. Only two hollow post mills have survived, both restored to working order although not on their original sites. Palmer's Mill was moved from near Acle in 1976 and now stands next to the dyke at Upton, (TG403129). Clayrack Drainage Mill was moved in 1981 from Ranworth Marshes to its present site beside the Ant at How Hill (TG369194), close to Boardman's Mill, built in 1897 and now one of only two surviving trestle mills.

The only surviving smock mill in good condition is Herringfleet on the River Waveney (TM465977) built in the 1820s, St Olaves Mill (TM458998) downriver below St Olaves Bridge is something of a smock/trestle hybrid. The fortunate thing overall is that the 72 survivors between them include examples of most types and that is mainly down to the fact that even at the end of the 19th century when steam had taken over in the Fens, Broadland's mills were still being extensively refitted and even built anew. Many were still operating at the start of the Second world War and that at Ashtree Farm (TG507095) on the river Bure, three miles above Yarmouth, was only abandoned when its sails blew off in 1953. It is one of a handful due for refurbishment.

The reason they worked for so long was that wind power was cheaper and it might have lasted longer in the Fens, too, were it not for the fact that the Fenland peaty soils shrank under arable use to the point where the land surface was too far below river level to be drained by wind power. Broadland's silt soils shrank less and remained mostly under pasture for which a higher water-table, more easily maintained by wind drainage, could be tolerated.

Add in the prevalence of brick construction and, even when out of work, their contribution to the Broadland landscape lasted those critical years necessary for public sentiment to rise sufficiently in their favour. Now with the Broads Authority, the Norfolk Windmills Trust, and many individuals on the case, their future looks reasonably secure.

Further reading, The Norfolk Broads, a Landscape History, by Tom Williamson.
Ordnance Survey Outdoor Leisure series, map 40 - The Broads.

This article first appeared in the magazine, Antiques Lifestyle.