Very little information about milling in Williamsburg has survived from colonial days—or at any rate has been unearthed by diligent research. We do know that Williamsburg was considered to offer many choice locations, and that several mills were erected in the town or in its immediate vicinity before the Revolution. As far back as 1699, when the burgesses were thinking of moving the capital from Jamestown to Middle Plantation (as Williamsburg was then named), a student of the College of William and Mary extolled the proposed site in a formal speech, one of several made to an audience that included the governor and his council as well as the burgesses.

The college itself was already located at Middle Plantation, on the ridge between the James and York rivers and with creeks flowing to each. In the words of the student orator, “The neighbourhood of these two brave creeks gives an Opportunity of making as many water mills as a good Town can have occasion for, and the highness of the land affords great conveniency for as many Wind mills as can ever be wanting.”

All the known watermills lay outside the corporate limits of the city. The nearest, apparently, was a paper mill built by William Parks, founder of the Virginia Gazette, and described by him as “The first Mill of the Kind, that ever was erected in this Colony.” It stood about a half-mile south of town on a stream that is known to this day as “Paper Mill Creek.”

When he married the rich Widow Custis, George Washington became the owner of two plantations close to Williamsburg and a water grist mill not three miles from the town. Samuel Coke, the Williamsburg silversmith, owned a grist mill, also water powered, less than one mile away.

What information we have concerning Williamsburg windmills is limited to three fragmentary items. First, in 1723 William Robertson, clerk of the General Assembly, holder of a number of other government offices, lawyer, and land speculator, deeded to John Holloway four lots in Williamsburg, “being the lots whereon the said William Robertson’s wind mill stands.”

Second, during the Revolution an American soldier who kept a diary of his experiences mentioned being “near the windmill, in Williamsburgh” one night before the siege of Yorktown.

Finally, an unknown French mapmaker, presumed to be in the service of Rochambeau, drew a very careful and complete billeting map of Williamsburg and the buildings in it. On this map appears a representation of a post mill just on the southern edge of the town.

Beyond these three items the story of milling in Williamsburg has to rest on careful deduction, the cross checking of every pertinent fact, the following of every lead, the consultation of every source—in sum, on a mass of research.

For example, evidence as to how the Williamsburg windmills functioned has long since disappeared. Because Robertson’s mill was within the city, however, it can be said with reasonable certainty that it operated as a custom mill, not a plantation mill.