Historical Comments About Mills In Aston

1850

You can go to the website Delawarecountyhistory.com for more information. At that website you can scroll down to the headline "Delaware County Mills". Click on it and you can view the county mill maps of 1826 and 1843, and an 1826 report about the county mills. Click the X in the tab at the top of the website page to return to this page. Some of the types of mills covered in the report are cotton, plush, wool, grist, paper, rolling/slitting, saw, linseed oil, and tilt/blade. The mills were given numbers in the report. Excerpts from the report are shown at the bottom of this page. Two mills on the West Branch of Chester Creek (yellow arrows) are the West Branch Mills and the Crozerville Mills. Two mills on the the main flow of Chester Creek (blue arrows) are the Lenni Mills and one of the Rockdale Mills. Chester Creek above the joining of the two branches was at one time named the East Branch. Note that Lenni Mills is on the west side of Chester Creek, in Aston Township, while the village of Lenni is on the east side of Chester Creek in Middletown Township. Also note that orange lines depict the raceways that provide the power for the four mills identified by the arrows on the map.

EXCERPTS FROM 1826 REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF DELAWARE COUNTY FOR MANUFACTORIES AND MILLS IN ASTON
WEST BRANCH
No 1  On the west branch of Chester Creek, in Aston township, a Stone mill, head and fall about 26 feet; owned by John D. Duckett, has been used as a Woolen mill; not now in use, but intended for a Paper Mill.
No 2.  On the west branch of Chester Creek, in Aston, a Cotton Factory, head and fall 13 feet, to which 3 may be added; owned and occupied by J. P. Crozier, has 10 carding engines of 24 inches, 2 drawing frames of 3 double heads each, 1 roving frame of 16 cans, 1 stretcher of 102 spindles, 588 throstle spindles, 648 mule spindles, spins about 1,100 lbs of cotton yarn per week, from No 17 to 20, employs about 30 hands; dwelling houses for 9 families besides the mansion house. (Crozerville Mills was where my great grandfather and grandfather worked.)
No 3. On the west branch of Chester Creek, in Aston, a Grist mill, a Saw mill, and an Oil mill, head and fall about 20 feet; owned and occupied by James Tyson; grinds from 5 – 8,000 bushels of grain, saws about 75,000 feet of lumber, and makes about 2,000 gallons of linseed oil per annum.
No 4.  On the west branch of Chester Creek, in Aston, a Mill seat, fall of water 17 to 18 feet; on lands of Mark Willcox, Esq. and Wm. Peters.
EAST BRANCH
No 6 On Chester Creek in Ashton Township, a Grist mill, a Rolling and Slitting mill, and a new stone power loom factory, 41 by 61 and 4 stories high, head and fall 16 feet; owned by Henry Moore, the two first occupied by him in an active operation.  The weaving factory occupied by I. S. Phillip and Co has 200 power looms in operation.  Upwards of 100 persons are now employed at the two mill seats, with tenements for their living accommodation.
No 8 On Chester creek, above the West Branch, in Middletown and Aston, a Mill seat, fall of water 9 or 10 feet, owned by William Martin and Joseph W. Smith. (Lenni Mills?)
No 9 On Chester creek, in Aston, a Stone Cotton mill, 35 by 55 feet, 3 stories high, head and fall 16 feet; owned by William Martin and Joseph W. Smith, and occupied by William Martin; has 10 carding engines of 30 inches, 2 drawing frames of 3 double heads each, 1 double speeder of 20 spindles, 1 roving frame of 16 cans, 1 stretcher of 102 spindles, 648 throstle spindles, 936 mule spindles, spins 1,200 lbs of cotton yarn per week of Nos. 18 to 25; employs 45 hands.  Also, a 2 vat Paper mill on the same race, head and fall 15 feet; owned by William Martin and Joseph W. Smith, and occupied by John B Duckett, manufactures 60 reams of Quarto Post paper and 30 reams of printing medium per week; employs 23 hands, there are on the premises 3 large stone dwelling houses and tenements for 17 families.
No 10 On Chester creek, in Middletown and Aston, a mill seat, on lands of Abraham Pennell and Israel Taylor.
No 11 On Chester creek, in Middletown and Aston, a mill seat on lands of Abraham Pennell, fall of water about 9 feet.
No 12 On the Chester creek, in Aston, above the Easterly branch, a Tilt and Blade mill, head and fall about 9 feet; owned and occupied by Thomas Thatcher, not much used for some time past.
No 13 On Chester creek, in Aston, a Saw mill, head and fall 12 feet; owned by Abraham Sharpless.  There is also from the same dam by a separate mill race, in Middletown, a Blade mill; owned by the heirs of Daniel Sharpless, deceased.
No 14 On Chester creek, in Aston, a mill seat, fall of water 15 feet; owned by Abraham Sharpless and others.
No 15  On Chester Creek, in Aston, a Grist mill, and a Rolling and Slitting mill, head and fall 21 feet; owned and occupied by Abraham Sharpless, grist mill generally employed; rolled last year about 150 tons of sheet iron.
GREEN'S CREEK
No 1  On Green’s Creek, a branch of the west branch of Chester Creek, in Aston, a Grist mill and a Saw mill, embracing the waters of both branches, head and fall 17 or 18 feet; owned by Wm. Peters; grinds from 6 to 10,000 bushels of grain, and saws about 50,000 ft of lumber per annum.

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