Appendix C - Essex fulling mills

Summary

This appendix summarises documentary references to the Essex fulling mills known to have been in existence between the later thirteenth and early sixteenth centuries and mapped and discussed in Chapter 3. It makes no pretence at being comprehensive. In particular, because of the sporadic nature of some of the sources involved (such as inquisitions post mortem) and the sporadic survival of references to mills in others (such as manorial court rolls and accounts), one must not presume that the earliest recorded reference to any single mill coincided at all with its construction, nor that one isolated reference, or even two references separated by many years, imply that a given mill was continually in operation throughout the period. The author here gratefully acknowledges references to fulling mills in Britnell, Growth and decline in Colchester, pp. 14, 76, 157, 185, 229, from which several of these references were taken.