Copperas Gap Portslade
Right...here we go...
Copperas Gap is the name used formerly for the seaward end of Portslade parish, known from about late 17th cent until mid 20th cent.
Name of a ward here was Copperas Ward until 1974 local Govt changes, then it becomes Portslade South.....(a loss here I think)
Copperas is ferrous bi-sulphate, a hard mineral deposit washed out of the London Clay that underlay the creek that lay south of the hamlet of Copperas Gap.
Copperas Gap Wind MIll was north of the present North St just east of the Junction with West
St.
It closed when the large Brittannia Steam Mills opened on the coast road where Hatchard Engineering now is.
It was a good location on slightly rising ground able to take the coastal breezes but suffered as housing was built nearby and could not compete with the steam mills
If you look on pre 1960's maps the mill can be located exactly as there are a set of roads that have the shape of a wine glass with a stem and foot. The mill was right in the bowl of the glass.
There are illustrations of it in various Hove picture history books and in ditto Portslade books.
I'm sure Portslade branch library has pictures
Geoffrey Mead
(From a reply to a query, dated 30th October 2001)
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