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Summary

A dry silted leat channel commences on the left bank of Statts Brook 670m downstream from Statts Bridge. The channel measures 1.6m wide and is up to 0.7m deep with a bank 1.8m wide and 0.4m high on its downslope side. This leat apparently emptied into the Walla Brook. It function may have been to augment the water in the Walla Brook above the take off point of a leat supplying a former processing works which probably lay on or near the left bank.

Location

Protected Status: none recorded

Other References/Statuses

• National Monuments Record: SX67NE157
• National Record of the Historic Environment: 913560
• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX67NE/69/1

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• LEAT (Constructed, Early Medieval to Early 20th Century - 1066 AD (Between) to 1901 AD (Between))

Full description

Royal Commission for the Historical Monuments of England, 1987-1993, Duchy Farms Project Survey Visit, S. Probert (Report - Survey). SDV350839.

(03/11/1992) SX 66927987 to SX 67267999. A dry silted leat channel commences on the left bank of Statts Brook 670m downstream from Statts Bridge. The channel measures 1.6m wide and is up to 0.7m deep with a bank 1.8m wide and 0.4m high on its downslope side. This leat apparently emptied into the Walla Brook. It function may have been to augment the water in the Walla Brook above the take off point of a leat supplying a former processing works which probably lay on or near the left bank.

Bird, R. + Hirst, P., 1995, Survey Notes: The Soussons Forest (Northwest) Tin Stamping Mill (SX672799) (Report - Survey). SDV289571.

Water was brought to the site by two leats, one from the Walla Brook, the other from the Statts Brook. The former was taken off the Walla Brook about 150nm NNE of the wheelpit, opposite a channel draining water from the openworks on the other side of the brook. It passes under a bridging stone in the boundary wall and follows a rather sinuous route towards the embankment, but becomes shallower and vanishes about 20m short of the start of the embankment due to a combination of natural infilling and the ploughing of furrows for conifer planting. The Statts Brook leat starts about 700m below Statts Bridge. The exact point is unclear, but once the hummocky tin-streamed ground beside the brook is passed, the channel can be found and followed to where it passes through a drystone enclosure wall 44m SSE of the junction of an inner enclosure wall with the outer. The leat then crosses this inner enclosure and has a single stone clapper bridge at a point a few metres before the route crosses a track linking the two gateways of the enclosure. The leat leaves the enclosure 55m down from the surviving gatepost of the more northerly gateway (91m from the top corner) and follows a route up the valley, the channel being about 0.5m deep in places. Level with the mill, a section of another leat can be seen between the Statts Brook leat and the Walla Brook. (this may be an earlier route). Having passed the mill, the leat initially curves left and loses some height before swinging steadily to the right along a low fragmented embankment to reach the abutment of a stone-built bridge which now only extends to the edge of the Walla Brook, but would originally have carried the leat across. On the far side, a shallow channel passes under a bridging stone in the boundary wall and after a couple of metres vanishes amongst the same furrows as the Walla Brook leat. Nothing therefore can be seen that indicates which leat is the older or whether both were contemporary.
The water from the leat in use then passed along an embankment about 50 long of earth reinforced with stones. This terminates at the wheelpit and has, on the dressing floor side, a small stone-built pillar which, from its orientation, carried a wooden launder tapping some water to feed the stamps or possibly the buddles.

Dartmoor Tinworking Research Group, 1995, The Soussons Forest (northwest) Tin Stamping Mill (SX672799) (Report - Survey). SDV360433.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• EDV7403 - Survey of the Soussons Forest (northwest) Tin Stamping Mill
• EDV8409 - Dartmoor Royal Forest Project
• EDV8423 - Duchy Farms Project

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