Great Falls Mill

Remember these photos I posted a while back. As I mentioned before, this place always had my attention ever since I can remember. Well I my curiosity got the best of me.... so I did some research to see if I could find anything out... this is what I found.

This was an old cotton mill that was built in 1838 and was called Richmond Manufacturing Co. or the Richmond Mill. In 1865, during the civil war- General William T Sherman marched his troops through and burned it down along with several other places from the south. His attempt was to destroy everything that could be of aid and resourceful to the enemy. So he ordered his troops to burn down everything in sight basically. After the mill was burned by General Sherman's troops , it was rebuilt in 1869 and renamed Great Falls Mill. The huge water fall was still flowing from what I could figure but was dammed up to make a pond for a grist wheel. Great Falls Mill stayed in operation until the great depression shut it down in the 1930s and was then used to store cotton. Plans were to make a million dollar textile museum but in 1972 the mill caught fire once again and this is the ruins of it. Folklore says someone did not want this to happen and set fire to it for destruction... So here is my question. If that is true who did it and why. If someone did set fire to this place then I would say there is a good chance that someone is still living. That is the unsolved mystery. I am not certain someone set fire to it - it could be anything. I know one thing though, if they stored cotton in this place then I would say this mill was a huge furnace when it went up in flames. There is so much more history to this but I tried to narrow it down the best I could. I read most of these articles from a site called http://www.rockinghamremembered.com/YeOldeScrapbook2.html. If you want to check it out then you will have to look for Great Falls Mill links. This page has several links to click on but very interesting if you like seeing how things were in the old days. My next event is to go to Rockingham library and see what else I can find out about the Great Falls Mill. I will keep you posted if and when I find out something.