Little La Grange is estate 30 in St. Croix’s West End Quarter. The only indication of a windmill on historic maps is the icon for a decommissioned windmill tower on the 1856 Parsons map. The windmill sits on a ridge above the rest of the sugar-era buildings and ruins in the valley below. The windmill is in good condition.
The name Little La Grange likely stems from its location just east of the company’s plantation, La Grange. The estate now known as Little La Grange appears to have been settled during the French period by Boussonniere. The 1750 map shows the estate to be forested. Both printed Beck maps of the 1750s depict no sugar machinery in estate 30.
Nearly all of the annotated Beck maps along with both manuscript copies from the 1760s include an animal mill in estate 30, with three maps placing the animal mill in the northwest corner and three in the south center.
The 1778 and 1799 Oxholm maps include an animal mill on the border of estates 30 and 33 comprising little la Grange. The 1856 Parsons map indicates a decommissioned windmill tower with no sails at Little Grange at an elevation of 267 feet.
Ownership is not attributed on the 1750 map. All of the annotated Beck maps from the 1760s along with both manuscript copies attribute ownership to Cronelius Hendricksen and on some maps this ownership extends east to estate 29. Oxholm’s 1778 map of Frederiksted attribute ownership to Major Henricksen. The 1790s manuscript copies of Beck attribute ownership to Hendericksen, comprising both estates 30 and 33 to the north.
The 1920s topographic map locates the Little Grange Mill at 330 feet elevation. The 1958 and 1982 topographic maps indicate ruins of a windmill in a similar location at Little La Grange at between 300 and 320 feet elevation, confirmed through field reconnaissance.
As the McGuire geographic dictionary of the Virgin Islands (p. 117) describes, this estate had extensive banana fields in the 1920s.