Col. Wm. Wynne's Mill on Pumpkin Creek circa 1750.

This is the sill and angled planks for Col. William Wynne's Mill on Pumpkin Creek. The planks were typically nailed to the 12" x 12" sill to prevent the water from the mill pond from washing under the dam. This wood has been in this location for more that 250 years.

The red line is the old pioneer road leading from Danville passing near the old Wynne's Mill and crossing Pumpkin Creek and climbing the hill to the North Carolina state line. The road continued through Providence to Caswell Courthouse (Yanceyville) and on to Hillsborough Courthouse (Orance County).

Flour and corn meal were very important to early settlers in colonial Virginia. Very early, community gristmills were constructed to grind wheat and corn for surrounding families. Laws were passed to keep the mill operators honest. The custom was for the miller to keep a portion of the flour or meal as payment for his services. Each mill had a measure holding one-tenth of a bushel, which was used I the tithing process. That portion deducted by the miller was known as a toll.

The town of Danville was established by the General Assembly in 1793, but the location was important long before the Revolutionary War. Prior to this date, the area of “The Great Falls of Dan River” was knows as Wynne’s Falls, after an early settler. Col. William Wynne came here in the 1740s and settled on a land grant of 2,000 acres. He and his sons bought more land and at one time there land stretched from the falls where the Main Street Bridge is no located, to the North Carolina state line.

By 1754, Col. Wynne was operating a water-powered gristmill on Pumpkin Creek. The old pioneer road leading from the Great Falls led out the present Jefferson Street by the mill and on to Caswell Courthouse. The exact location has been located. In the waters of Pumpkin Creek is the typical 12” x 12” wooden sill with remnants of the planks which were nailed at a 45 degree angle more than 250 years ago. There is a steep bank on the south and the northern wing of the earthen dam can still be seen. Just below the dam for the millpond is a sunken area where the water wheel once turned.

This area has not yet been developed. North of the remnants of the dam sill is a deep cut through the woods where the old road was located. A clue to the path of the old road is a short section in Danville still called Walters' Mill Road. The best known Walters' Mill Road is just inside of Caswell County and runs parallel to the state line to Hogan's Creek, where Walters' Mill operated for a long time.