Lincolnshire Mills Group exists as a forum for mills owners, millers and mill enthusiasts to share their skills and knowledge. It has links to the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings (SPAB) Mills Section though COGS (the Committee of Groups and Sections).

The aim of the Group is “to preserve and promote the milling heritage of the region”. This is done by:

• providing practical help to millers and mill owners
• researching and collecting archive material
• acting as an advisory body to other groups and organisations
• encouraging public interest in mills and milling

Our biggest regular job is probably the production and distribution of the annual Mills Open to the Public leaflet, featuring over twenty mills. This information is now also available on this website. By collaborating to produce a joint leaflet, the mills benefit from a level of publicity that their small budgets would never otherwise afford. Maintaining a mill is an expensive business, and most of the income from visitors goes directly towards maintaining the building for the benefit of the public. This is especially true of mills run by volunteers.

Each mill is owned and managed independently of the Group, but there are times when we have helped to establish a Friends organisation for a particular mill, by taking the lead in holding a public meeting to focus local interest. This happen most recently at Moulton, near Spalding, where the resulting local group has since raised nearly a million pounds to restore the tallest windmill in Britain. Lincolnshire Mills Group has been in close contact with the Moulton Windmill team to ensure the success of this worthy project. We intend to give the same level of support to the proposed Friends of Burgh le Marsh Windmill, due to form this year.

Lincolnshire alone once had about 500 windmills, and almost as many watermills. Many have now disappeared completely, some remain as empty shells, some contain odd remnants of their working days and only a few are capable of working as they were designed. We regularly give advice to planning authorities, owners and architects when proposed developments affect mills or mill remains, and promote a philosophy for use of mills based on the guidelines set down by SPAB.