Cushendall Mill

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A two-storey, four-bay early 19th C water-powered corn mill, now removed of plant and machinery but still retaining two internal grain-drying kilns.

The mill is cut into a south-facing slope at the back of the N side of Mill Street. It is aligned approximately E-W along the bottom of the slope with its principal elevation facing S. It is located in a yard at the back of No. 25 Mill Street, the former mill house.

Pitched replacement natural slate roof, half-round metal RWG. Walls are random rubble with roughly-squared quoins and advanced eaves, all in sandstone; vestiges of whitewash survive. All openings have voussoired sandstone heads and windows to front have sandstone cills.

All the doors and windows are modern timber replacements.

The S elevation, facing to the yard, is five openings wide. Its extreme left (W) end is abutted by a later single-storey building. To the right of this are, from left to right: a sliding timber door, 4x4-paned window, door, and 4x4-paned window. The two windows are set into former door openings. There is a FF window directly above each of the GF opes: two 2/2 sliding sashes, two 8/8 sashes and one with 4x4 panes.
The E gable is blank save for a 8/8 timber sliding sash FF window (with stone head and cill).

Being cut into the slope, the N elevation is visible only at FF level. The left (E) half of the wall is devoid of openings. There is a wide door to centre and three windows to right: 1x1 (possibly a later insertion), and two 2/2 sashes (all without cills). The remnants of a later cast-iron stove flue project between the two latter windows.

The W gable is inaccessible. Its apex is clad with slates and it is abutted at GF by a single-storey roofless lean-to wheel house which enclosed the waterwheel. The rubble masonry headrace is still visible at the NW corner of the premises.

Materials:
Roof Natural slate (replacement)
Walling Random rubble sandstone, vestiges of whitewash
Windows Timber casement & timber sliding sash (replacement)
Doors Timber panelled
RWGs Half-round metal

Setting:
The mill is located in a yard at the back of No. 25 Mill Street, the former mill house (refurbished). The yard is enclosed to N and E by a rubble stone wall and is accessed at S via a laneway from the main road. To the W of the premises is a petrol station, the boundary of which is defined by a rendered wall.

Historical information

The 1832 OS maps captions two corn mills in this townland - this one and another further up the River Dall (at grid D229 279). The 1835 Ordnance Survey Memoir describes the former as "an excellent corn mill with a commodious yard. ... The wheel, which is overshot, is 16ft in diameter and 4ft wide." The upstream mill is noted as being "old" and "in very bad order" and it is probable that it was superseded by the one in the village.

The 1834 Valuation book notes the mill as belonging to Francis Turnly, the local landlord. It measured 93ft by 26ft 6in and stood 19ft high. There were also two one-storey and one two-storey dwellings associated with it. No technical details are given beyond the facts that there was a good supply of water throughout the year and that the premises were very neat and convenient. By contrast, the upstream mill is noted as being "not near so good".

According to the Cushendall Conservation Area booklet (1993), the village, including its mill, was purchased by Francis Turnly in 1813 and he refurbished it in 1838. However, the '1A+' quality letter assigned to the mill in the 1835 Valuation implies that it was slated and built within the last 20-25 years; it would not have required any refurbishment. It is likely that it was the mill upstream of the present one which was bought by Turnly, and that he decided to replace it with the present one. Only someone of his wealth could have afforded such a large, well-built mill incorporating two kilns. When exactly he built it is uncertain, but it was probably sometime in the 1820s.

The mill continues to be captioned as a corn mill on the 1857 OS map; the other one was in ruins by then. The 1859 Valuation notes that Cushendall mill was occupied by George Miller. The premises comprised a house, offices, kiln man's house, corn mill, kilns and yard, the total rateable value of which was £35. The dimensions of the mill and kilns are given as 93ft x 26ft 6in by 19ft (i.e. the same as 1834). Two pairs of stones are noted - one for shelling and the other for grinding. There was sufficient waterpower for both stones to work simultaneously. There were also fans and sifters for processing the grain and meal, but no elevators. Two kiln heads (drying floors) are noted and also the large attached yard. For valuation purposes, the mill was deemed to work 12 hours per day for six months in the year.
A succession of people are recorded as having leased the mill in subsequent valuations: Thomas Thompson (1874), Robert Ferguson (1877), Archibald McKillop (1878), Dorothea Turnley (1880), George Millar (1881), John McGregor (1889), Mary McGregor (1903), Sarah McGregor (1905), James Bond (1912), and Anthony O' Connor (1913).

The mill continues to be cited as a corn mill on the OS maps of 1903 and 1921. The 1912 Valuation notebook describes it as 200 years old [as noted above, this was probably not the case], dilapidated and "only worked five or six months each year at 50-55 hours per week". Its dimensions are the same as before. Mr Bond had rented the mill and three associated houses for a year, with the option of continuing to rent should he so wish.

An entry of 1925 in the Valuation revision book notes the appearance of an electric light station in addition to the corn mill. This was a private undertaking by Mr O'Connor to supply the village with electricity and operated as the Cushendall Electric Light & Power Company. The company may have actually started generating two years earlier as a 15hp turbine (on a 20ft fall) is recorded at Cushendall by Messrs Hay-Maryon, turbine manufacturers of Loughborough, in 1923. Its installation undoubtedly necessitated the removal of the waterwheel. In all likelihood, milling was abandoned at this time (if not before), although corn drying may have continued for a time.

O'Connor's venture appears to have been successful as an application was made by the Company to the Electricity Commissioners for N. Ireland in 1929 to increase the station's output to 20kW (27hp). This was granted in March of that year. This increase in capacity was doubtless effected by the installation of an engine to supplement the existing turbine; according the mill's present owner, it was a diesel engine. It may have been housed in the single-storey building abutting the mills SW corner.

According to the valuations, James Finnegan took over generating from Mr O'Connor c.1937, and was in turn taken over by the Electricity Board for Northern Ireland c.1953. This Board (EBNI) had been set up under the Electricity (Supply) Act (Northern Ireland) 1931 and was empowered, amongst other things, to acquire existing generating stations. The Cushendall undertaking was amongst the last of the rural enterprises to be acquired by the Board. Having acquired it, they closed it down (the village having been connected up to the National Grid) and the building reverted to use as a store.

References - Primary Sources:
1. PRONI OS/6/1/20/1. OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 20 (1832).
2. PRONI VAL/1/B/148B. First Valuation book, p.40 (17 June 1834).
3. 1835 Ordnance Survey Memoir for Layd Parish. Reproduced by A. Day & P. McWilliams (eds), Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland: Parishes of Co Antrim IV - Glens of Antrim, p.48 (Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1992).
4. PRONI OS/6/1/20/2. OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 20 (1857).
5. PRONI VAL/2/B/40B. Second Valuation book, p.58, plot 20 (1859).
6. PRONI VAL/12/B/2/7A-F. Valuation revision books for Cushendall Electoral Division, 1864-1923.
7. PRONI OS/10/1/20/1/1. OS 1:2500 map, Co Antrim sheet 20-01 (1903).
8. PRONI Val/12/A/1/24. Valuation note book, p.80 (1912).
9. PRONI COM/108/32. Application by Cushendall Electric Light & Power Company to Electricity Commissioners for N. Ireland to increase generating capacity (1929).
10. PRONI VAL/12/F/1/3/3. Valuation revision book, 1930-35.
11. PRONI VAL/3/E/1B. Valuation revision book, 1939-54.

References - Secondary Sources:
1. H.G. Gribbon, The History of Water Power in Ulster, p.243 (Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1969).
2. Northern Ireland Electricity Service, 100 Years of Electricity in Northern Ireland: A Short History from 1883 (Belfast, 1986).
3. Department of the Environment N. Ireland, Cushendall Conservation Area (Belfast, 1993).
4. Information from current owner.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
G. Innovatory Qualities
I. Quality and survival of Interior

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
X. Local Interest
Z. Rarity
R. Age
S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance

Evaluation

An unusually substantial and well proportioned early 19th C corn mill, cut into a south-facing slope in the rear yard of No. 25 Mill Street, the former mill house on the N side of Mill Street. Its plan form is unusual in that it retains two kilns (normally only one is found, often in a separate building). Unfortunately its plant and machinery are long removed, although it is still possible to decipher that it was a mill from the presence of the kilns, waterwheel pit, and vestiges of the mill races. The wall fabric and roof framing are original and unaltered. It was of economic value to the local farming community and in later years to the townsfolk as a supplier of electricity as Cushendall Electric Light & Power Company. It is of architectural, historical and local interest, reflecting the financial standing of the Turnlys, the local landowners who were responsible for its construction.