The Death of Walter Smith 1919 Woolwich

As I say on the video  many years ago I recorded my Grandfather and his Elder sister and over the last few years I have selected a few short sections of the audio to upload as a record. 

This is a section describing the death of my Great Great Uncle Walter in Woolwich, South London, tragically within months of having survived the First World War. 

Brixton Mills

I have to admit that when I was younger, even though I lived in Peckham only a few miles away, I'd never heard of Brixton mill, and by that I mean the windmill and not the other one (of which later).

In fact even when I started to research this article I still hasn't seen it!* (despite going to Brixton College round the corner in the 1970s)

Yet the mill was a local landmark having been about a long time. Not far away is another famous (or infamous) landmark, Brixton prison, built around the same time it is London's Oldest Prison.

It was in fact hearing a radio programme with that name, about the prison, which drew me to writing about these neighbours, for such they are, and is not just location that connects them...


Of course when Ashby's Mill was built in 1816 Brixton looked very different surrounded by fields to supply its raw material. It looks an idyll in the picture on the left.

A few years later, around 1820, a prison was built nearby, the Surrey House of Correction, and they have been neighbours ever since. It was intended to house 175 prisoners, but regularly exceeded that with 200 prisoners making overcrowding an early problem. Combined with its small cells and poor living conditions it soon had a reputation as one of the worst prisons in London.

The Windmill worked until 1862 when a watermill at Mitcham succeeded it, during that time it suffered competition, because for as well as the Watermill(s) in Mitcham there was a wholly different sort of mill on its doorstep; a Treadmill.

Invented in 1818 by William Cubitt the treadmill was installed into Brixton Prison in 1821 and was the main implement of punishment in the days of hard labour, driving millstones grinding flour for the prison bakery. The prisoners would tread for 20 minutes then rest for 5 minutes then repeat for up to 12 hours or during daylight whichever was shorter and for 6 days a week.

The Windmill got new sails in 1821 called spring sails they now

didn't need cloth to be spread as these sails use shuttered wood (also invented by Mr Cubitt); but even these were removed in when the windmill was relegated to use as a store, which it remained until 1902 when the lease on the watermill expired. The mill was then pressed back into use, but driven by engine, which continued until 1934 supplying wholemeal flour to West End hotels and restaurants.

After the war, there were proposals to demolish the mill and build a block of flats. The proposal was rejected and it was decided to conserve the mill, which was restored in 1964 by London County Council. New sails were fitted, and machinery from a derelict windmill at Burgh le Marsh, Lincolnshire installed to replace that which had been removed, the work being done by Thompson's, the Alford millwrights.

Today? Well once restored the mill was opened to the public in 1968 and three years later

passed to Lambeth Council There have been several restorations since with the most recent being completed in 2011.

Meanwhile in the prison? Well Brixton made the treadmill famous and, within two decades, half the prisons in the country would have one. Then in 1852, overcrowded and with a reputation for brutality, Brixton was closed as a local prison for the south of London. Its notorious treadwheels were dismantled and the land and buildings sold at auction.

Except, at the eleventh hour the government made a compulsory purchase of Brixton and converted it into a prison solely for female convicts (the first of the  kind in the country). This had become necessary as the end of transportation to Australia in the 1850s meant Britain suddenly had to find prison accommodation for thousands of serious offenders. But the history of the prison in detail is a whole other story including its use as a military and remand prisons, All of which you can read here.

Well times move on and in 2012 as part of a television documentary the Bad Boy's Bakery in the prison was set up which supplied coffee shops across London with products made with flour! (Though I see today 2017 - the website has gone so I don't know if it still does)

Ironically the building where this happened is where once the Treadmill's mill stones ground flour!.

Laurie Smith

*Though of course I have during the writing to give you the picture above.