Types of Water and Wind Powered Mills

An overview of different types of mills such as sawmills and gristmills powered by water for mass production.

CONTRARY to popular belief, what we think of as the industrial revolution was not really powered by steam, but by water power. Steam power did not start to make a major contribution until the 1820s — by which time water power had already transformed English society.

Thus it will be of interest to know what types of goods were actually produced by water powered mills, and what those mills were called.

There are a lot of them so I am organizing them into categories. Please note that most of these mills required water power. I will list at the end which of the mills could also be driven by windmills. Many of these mills also operate in a similar fashion so they could in principle be changed to do other related operations.

Food and Oil

• Gristmills — This is probably the best known example of a mill. It grinds grains into flour. The grain would be ground between two large mill stones.
• Oil mill — Crushing oil bearing seeds such as linseed, hempseed, peanuts or olives. The oils got use for cooking or lubricants. For example, a gun smith would use linseed oil.