James was born in Nuthurst in 1806 the son of James and Anne. A descendant of the local Turner family who owned Oldland. James was the farmer at Newlands in Keymer, with 206 acres and employed 9 men and 2 boys. He married Mary Marten in Keymer in 1836 and they had 2 children, Ellen and Henry born there. But Mary died in 1852 aged 41. James remarried in Brighton in 1864 to Elizabeth Cooke, she came from Clayton.
James was still a farmer but also a miller at Newland by 1878, but by 1890 he was miller and farmer at both Newland and Oldland, and by now was living in Gurr’s Croft. Although he was 83 by then he most likely used John Frederick Newnham and another assistant called David Driver to do the day to day milling activities. James died on 12th February 1895 aged 88, whilst working in the fields on Oldland Farm, when he was seen by one of his workers to collapse but died before he could be helped.
Text from: “The Millers’ of Old Land Mill” by Colin Hewitt.
