Briggate Mill, the Kray twins and Norman Lamb

© Evelyn Simak

If you watched the video about the North Walsham & Dilham Canal I posted the other day, you will have been surprised to come across a reference to the Kray twins.

This was because Briggate Mill once stood beside and relied upon the canal, though it predated it. And in 1975 the disused mill burnt down.

As a result Geoffrey Allen, described as an associate of the Krays, received a seven-year sentence for insurance fraud.

The mill ruins (the photo above shows the derelict wheelhouse, which I believe still stands) were eventually demolished in 2012 after all attempts to find who the legal owner was failed.

Aided by Norman Lamb, the Liberal Democrat MP for North Norfolk, the locals tried to have the land around the mill given the status of a village green.

That attempt failed, but I don't know what has happened to the site.