The earliest known documentary evidence to the mill at Burcroft is in a 42 year lease relating to this site granted by the Duke of Leeds to the Walker partnership of Masborough in 1770 (Munford 2003, 29). The Walkers developed the site with a boring mill and grinding wheel for the finishing of cannon between 1770 and 1777 a move which coincided with an order by the Board of Ordnance in 1774 that all cannon were to be cast solid and then bored to calibre (ibid, 40). Walker cannon were to become the gun of choice for the Royal Navy by the early 19th century. In 1805 the mill was transferred to a John and Thomas Mullins producers of scythes and sickles, a business carried on at this site and within the small works to the south of this area until 1976 (Cumberpatch and Robbins 1998, 18). During much of this period the mill site is depicted as a 'Saw Mill". This industrial complex was described as largely ruinous in 1998 (ibid, 22).