Smock mill

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The smock mill is a type of windmill that consists of a sloping, horizontally weatherboarded tower, usually with six or eight sides, on top of which is a roof or cap, which can rotate to bring the sails into the wind. This type of windmill got its name from its supposed resemblance to the smock worn by farmers in earlier days.

Smock mills differ from tower mills in that the latter were usually cylindrical rather than hexagonal or octagonal, and built from brick, stone or masonry instead of timber. The majority of smock mills are octagonal in plan, with a lesser number hexagonal in plan, such as Killick's Mill, Meopham. A very small number of smock mills were decagonal on dodecagonal in plan, an example of the latter being at Wicken, Cambridgeshire.

Smock mills exist in Western Europe and particularly in England, where they were common, particularly in the county of Kent, where the tallest surviving smock mill in the United Kingdom can be found. They reached their heyday in the earlier part of the 19th century, after which the advent of steam power started the decline of the windmill.

An example of a standing smock mill is Willesborough in Ashford, Kent.

Designed by the civil engineer John Smeaton, Chimney Mill in Spital Tongues, Newcastle upon Tyne was the first five-sailed smock mill in Britain and the only surviving smock mill in the North East region. However, the sails and original cap are no longer in place.