There are three windmill sites in the old parish of Nonington. The first, a smock mill stood by the road at the top of Mill Hill near Esole Street until the early 1960’s when it unfortunately burnt down. The second, a seed mill demolished about 1905, was a hundred yards or so down a track to the east of the first site. A third site lies about half a mile south along the road to Barfrestone where, just within the parish of Nonington, a pair of windmills stood next to the road on the north side of Barfrestone cross-roads. No sign of these mills remains but the adjacent on the west side of the site is still called Mill Field. The site is now occupied by a pair of cottages. One other site has been recorded as a possible mill site, this is a mound situated near Mount Ephraim. Local oral tradition records that the mound was a mill site but no documentation is known to exist to support this.

An early mention of a mill on the first site apears to be in the 1548 will of William Boys, Esquire, whose family owned the Fredfields (Fredville) estate for two centuries, which allows his mother to take half the profits of the Wind Mill. Nonington is shown on Symonsons 1596 map as having a windmill, at this time a post mill. In 1626 a marriage settlement of between : Sir Edward Boys the Elder of ffredvile; Sir Edward Boys the Younger son and heir apparent of the Elder, also of ffredvile; and his son and heir John Boys , Esquire and Nicholas Miller, Esquire of Wrotham and his daughter Margaret, refers to " all that piece of land there called the Millner Downe with a wind Mill thereupon late in the tenure or occupation of John Jourdan this assign containing by estimation nine and twenty acres and two roods more or less". This description of Millner Downs location coincide with the pieces of ground in 1859 as Down. A mill appears on subsequent maps of 1695 and 1736 but by 1769 no mill is shown, this may be because the mill had transferred to the Barfrestone site where the mills appear to have begun operation in about 1765. William Coles Finch in his 1933 book on Kent mills says that he believes that the old post mill disappeared just before this time to be replaced by the smock mill which stood until the 1960’s.

About 1890 the mill was clad with heavy duty iron sheeting this would have been done as the cheapest form of repair as replacing timber cladding would have been very expensive and the profitability of the mill would not have justified the cost. By this time most commercial flour milling would have been carried out by large steam powered commercial mills which could grind a much finer, purer flour. The smaller, old fashioned mills would have survived by processing local crops for animal feeds.

Mill burnt down about 1965.

The seed mill next to the corn mill first appears in the parish tax register in the 1770’s, the registers of 1819 describe it as a seed mill and a clover mill. From 1826 onwards the seed mill was in the ownership of the Pain family which along with the malt house and seed store in Esole Street became the nucleus of what later became John Harvey & Bros., later & co., seed merchants, for many years an important employer in the parish. In 1850 the parish records note that Vincent Pain and Son, as they had become, had installed a steam engine in the mill resulting in an increase in its rateable value from £5.0.0 to £10.0.0 p.a.. In 1905 as the mill cap and sweeps had been blown off during a storm, apparently the same one as severely damaged its neighbour necessitating the removal of its sweeps, the seed mill was demolished by John Harvey & Co. A few pieces of foundation and a small mound are all that remain.

1829 Vincent Pain and Son., which eventually became John Harvey and Bros., seedsmen and maltsters. Ownership continued until the mill was demolished in 1905.

A Mrs. John Knott is recorded as the occupier in 1765, her length of tenure prior to this is unknown as large sections of mid-18^th century parish records have been lost. Subsequent parish tax records record the mills as having a rent (rateable value) of £15.10.0 p.a. until late 1821 when William Spanton, the occupier, moved to the corn mill down the road at top of Esole Fields (Mill Hill). William Finch Coles records that:" From a correspondent. I have found a person who, seventy years ago, lived in the base of a mill which was converted into a cottage at Barfrestone, and from information gleaned I think there was a smock mill there over eighty years ago (1852), said to have been pulled down because a plantation of trees grew and obstructed the wind." This seems strange as the mills belonged to the Fredville estate. Production appears to have ceased in both mills at the same time.

Wm. Finch Coles writes that a pair of mills appear on the 1819-43 map but only one appears on the 1858-72 map, this later map would appear to have shown the remains of one of the mills. The 1839 records no mills but the large scale 1859 map shows a round, indicating at least one of the mills had a sound base. Censuses of 1851, 1861 and 1871 refer to the building as the Mill or Round House, The 1861 census lists the occupier with several railway labourers as lodgers, the railway at that time was under construction through the parish. In 1881 the two cottages had become one and listed uninhabited. This must have been temporary as it was certainly inhabited until about 1905 when it was destroyed by fire. It was said that brought this about when the old lady occupying the cottage cleaned her grate and put the hot ashes in her lodge (out-house) before they had cooled sufficiently so causing the fire which destroyed the cottage.

1815 William Spanton