Andrew Cox was employed as the miller at Place Mill for thirty years from 1878 until the mill stopped working in 1908. Mr. Cox started his working life as a miller when a boy with his father at Corfe Mullen Water Mill.

He lived with his family in the red brick tithe cottage near the Mill on Town Quay and was responsible for all of its operation and for repairs to the machinery.

The working hours were long by todays standards - from six in the morning to six at night, six days a week, although he did finish a little earlier on Saturdays and made his way to the offices of his employers Messrs Cuffs and Sons, Corn and Forage Merchants, in Christchurch to collect his wages for the week.

A survey of the structure of Place Mill was made in 1908 and it was determined that it could no longer withstand the constant vibration caused by the working of the machinery. Messrs Cuffs and Sons, the lesees of the Mill decided it was uneconomical to carry out the necessary repairs especially set against competition from modern rolling mills. Thus Andrew Cox's employment at Place Mill came to an end.

He worked in the rolling mills at Warwick and Somerset until 1916 when he took an opportunity to return to Christchurch as miller at Knapp Mill.