The historic Cow Creek Grist Mill on Route 14 in Gloucester, known to many as the Old Mill, will possibly meet the bulldozer again, a fate that the structure faced almost 25 years ago.
After complaints made to the county regarding the conditions of the old mill, owner Tommy DuBose obtained a demolition permit in October for the Old Mill.
“Some of our local residents were complaining about the condition of the building, so because of that and the complaints, the county required me to obtain the permit, because I am not able to go in and renovate it at this moment,” said DuBose.
DuBose said that he has six months from the time the permit was issued either to demolish the building or start working to renovate it.
DuBose further elaborated by saying that he had “no intention of getting a demolition permit, but it’s required by code enforcement.”
“This permit has essentially brought me another six months,” said DuBose. “And I am just tired. I am tired of fighting with them (the county). I have had to bury three children, so if I have to bury the Mill it’s not really, you know … it doesn’t even get up into the same category.”
DuBose also said that he hopes that the Cow Creek Mill can be saved and he will keep trying, but it has been a little difficult.
“The last time we (DuBose and others) did any major renovations was just before I lost my first son (back in 2010),” said DuBose. “Then I just lost my last two children two years ago within 30 days (of each other).”
DuBose has owned the building and the property since he purchased it from the Cow Creek Mill Pond Homeowners Association back in 2000.
“The building was falling down when I bought it,” said DuBose. “The reason I bought it was because they were going to bulldoze it in 1999 and that’s the only reason I bought it, so they wouldn’t bulldoze it. I mean, I tried and I am still trying. But that’s all I can do.”
The Cow Creek Mill Pond Homeowners Association had brought the property from Brenda Kirchbaum, who is the daughter of Myron Hall. Myron Hall purchased the property in 1950 and was the last person to operate the Old Mill.
DuBose currently has limited plans for the building and the property and the future of the building is unknown.
“I really can’t think that far ahead (to the future),” said DuBose. “The first priority is to save the building and dry it in. It’s a lot of money to actually completely 100 percent renovate the building.”
DuBose also said that “hopefully things will change” regarding the status of the Old Mill and that “we still have a little bit of time.”
History of the Mill
The construction of the Old Mill dates to the 1800s.
An article written by Charlotte Lanford in the Gazette-Journal in 1973 notes that Dr. Harry Tabb, a former owner of the mill, had his lawyer “trace the mill’s history and its beginnings, but the county’s records had been destroyed during the Civil War,” leaving the year of construction of the Old Mill a mystery forever.
The earliest record of ownership is dated 1825 by Josiah Deans, who owned half the mill and the property. A man by the name of Isiah Deans also owned the mill after him and the mill was referred to by many as “Dean’s Mill.”
It was owned by many people after according to the article including, James K. Dabney, James M. Talbot, E. Wright Noble, and Myron H. Hall, who still owned it at the time of the article’s publishing. Hall owned the whole mill and the property surrounding the mill pond. The mill’s water wheels still turned at that time.
Back in the day, according to that article, Melvin Foster, who worked as a miller at the Old Mill in the early 1900s as well as his brothers, talked about how the mill on “Fridays and Sundays were custom days and people from the neighboring counties brought in their own corn.”
The article also said that people would make payments “by the miller taking one-eighth of the quantity ground or a charge of 35 cents.”
He said in this article that the “average day’s ground was about 2,000 pounds to 3,000 pounds an hour.”
