THEN & NOW on the Outer Circle – stage 1

The mill building at Sarehole Mill is almost 250 years old although it seems that there was a mill on this site from the middle of the 16th century. The mill was closed almost a hundred years ago and restored in the Sixties after a public appeal against its demolition.

The mill was originally used for grinding corn, but as the industrial revolution encroached on the area it was used for a number of metalworking purposes. The mill was leased by Matthew Boulton’s father between 1756 and 1761 when it was used it as a ‘flatting mill’, producing sheet metal used for button manufacturing. He lived at the time in Sarehole Farm, which was along Wake Green Road.

Sarehole Mill was one of 16 mills on the River Cole as it ran though Birmingham to the Tame near Coleshill. The River Cole is 26 miles long, coincidentally the same length as the Outer Circle Bus route.