The Old Mill Edit

Mining first took place at Lecht in the Cairngorms during the late eighteenth century, when the York Mining Company established workings on land forfeited to the government following the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion. Both ironstone and manganese ore were mined at the site and were transported to Culnakyle for smelting. The most prominent feature of the mining landscape at Lecht is a two-storeyed, rubble-built building with a large arched doorway, which was restored and re-roofed with local slate in the 1980s. It dates from a second, post-1841 phase of activity at the mine, and probably served as a crushing mill, powered by a water wheel measuring almost 8m in diameter which was set at one of its gable walls. When production reached its peak during the 1840s, 63 people were employed at the mine.
The Iron Mill Edit features, Crescent Down Works, Post O'Alls, orSlow, Viberg and Inis Meain