Cleadon Hills - Water Tower & Mill

Drone footage and photographs from the Cleveland Hills, Tyne & Wear. The flat light and strong winds proved to be a challenge, lending some of the footage being black and white to match the dull grey day. I will have to revisit one summers evening for a sunset shoot.
Mill
The ruined Cleadon Windmill sits at the highest point of the Cleadon Hills and has wonderful views of the surrounding area. The windmill itself was built in the 1820s, but was damaged in storms during the 1870s. During the First World War it was used as an artillery base and probably also target practice.
Legend has it that a local girl called Elizabeth Gibbon was heartbroken, threw herself from the top of the mill tower and apparently her ghost still haunts the windmill to this day.
Water Tower
Built around 1860, the tower was part of the Sunderland and South Shields Water Company plant providing clean water to the nearby area. There was a Victorian steam-powered pumping station to pump fresh water reserves from the limestone and the tower was actually the chimney which provided a draught for the boilers as well as the dispersal of smoke, steam and waste gases.
By 1930 the steam plant was removed as it was then replaced with electrical equipment. During the Second World War it was used as a navigational aid and also a lookout for enemy aircraft. There was even a telephone installed on the top and a bunker at the base.
The plant was retired from use in the 1970s when Derwent Reservoir opened, however a lot of the original buildings still remain. The tower houses a number of radio aerials, while the boiler house and engine house have been converted to luxury accommodation.