MILL

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A single-bay, single-storey early 19th C water-powered corn mill aligned N-S at the SE end of Mill Bay.
Pitched natural slate roof, with clay ridge tiles and brick eaves and gable copings; some slates on E aspect now dislodged. No rainwater goods. Walls generally of random rubble basalt, with a small admixture of rubble limestone. Quoins also of squared basalt, but with some of limestone. All openings have flat timber heads; windows are without cills.

Entrance is at left end of S gable, with replacement sheeted timber door. This elevation is otherwise blank.
W elevation, facing seaward, has several courses of random rubble limestone under the brick eaves. Window opening at top left (lighting stone floor inside) and middle; the former is infilled with rubble stone and the latter with brick.

N gable formerly had external waterwheel, of which only the narrow stone-lined waterwheel pit survives, largely infilled with debris. Of the wheel, only its cast-iron axle survives. It originally went through the gable, but the axle ope is now obscured by the infill. At small square hole at top left was originally for the sluice gate operating shaft. A larger blind rectangular recess at bottom right gave access to the back of the inner rim of the wheel (in order to adjust the tensioning of the tie rods which held the rims together).

The E elevation is partly cut into the slope. The exposed section is devoid of openings.

Waterworks:
The mill is supplied by a small stream from E, which passed through a masonry culvert under the road and along the top of a built-up rubble headrace, whence it was conveyed to the wheel by a timber trough. After passing through the wheel, the water was culverted onto the shore.

The headrace wall has partly collapsed and the trough is long gone. The water now flows along the bypass at the start of the headrace channel and is then culverted to the shore.

Materials:
Roof: Natural Slate
RWGs: None
Walling: Basalt, Limestone, Brick
Door: Timber

Setting:
The mill is located on a grassy area just above the rocky shoreline, at the base of a steep slope, above which the road. The ruinous vestiges of the associated rubble masonry kiln are evident the junction of the road and access track down to the mill. The mill commands good views northward to the kelp store (HB05/16/005) and Church Bay.

Historical information

The mill is explicitly captioned on the 1832-33 OS map. The 1834 Valuation notes that it and a nearby corn-drying kiln belonged to Rev. Robert Gage, the local landowner, and that there was water for nine months of the year.
The 1838 Ordnance Survey Memoir describes the mill thus: "There is only one corn mill and it constitutes the entire machinery of the island. It is situated close to the shore in Kinkeel townland and is propelled by a breast water wheel 12ft in diameter and 1ft 10 in broad".

The mill is also explicitly captioned on the 1856 OS map. The 1859 Valuation also notes its operator as Rev. Gage. It contained a single pair of stones driven off a breast-shot metal waterwheel measuring 15ft diameter by 1ft 8in wide and containing 36 buckets, each of 8 inches depth. Even though the potential head of water was 18ft, the actual fall made use of was only 7ft. The water supply is described as 'good'. During the winter months (Nov - May), it worked for two days per week. Its rateable valuation is given as £8.10s.0d, of which £6.10s.0d was for the waterpower.

If these wheel dimensions are correct, the fact that it is 3ft bigger in 1856 than in 1838 and of metal suggests that it may have been a replacement of a slightly smaller wooden original. If so, a second set of stones may have been installed at the same time, but there is no confirmatory evidence of this hypothesis.

Rev Gage died in 1862 and the mill passed to his eldest son Robert. When he died in 1891, his younger brother Major General Ezekiel Gage took over operations until he, too died in 1906. Thereafter, the valuation books note his 'representatives' as the mill's owner (in this case agents of Ezekiel's four sons).

Both the 1904 and 1922 OS maps explicitly caption both the corn mill and kiln (to its north), so it would appear to have been still operational under Ezekiel's successors. By 1934, however, it appears to have been defunct. In 1944, following a visit by Viscount Brooke, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, the islanders petitioned for a grant to erect a new mill. However, the Government were reluctant to give them the 100% grant which they had requested. The situation was resolved when Mr Tony McCorraig purchased, on his own account, a tractor and milling equipment driven off it. The mill was never reinstated and is now a derelict ruin, gutted of internal machinery.

When precisely the mill was erected is uncertain, but it might well have been sometime after 1811, when Rev. Gage took over the island's stewardship. However, there is also the possibility that it was rebuilt sometime between 1838 and 1856, as suggested by the larger waterwheel and brick quoins around the windows (a common occurrence from the mid 19th C onwards). However, there is no evidence to test this proposition.

References - Primary Sources:
1. PRONI OS/6/1/1/1. First edition OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 1 (1832-33).
2. 1838 Ordnance Survey Memoir for Rathlin Island Parish. reproduced by A. Day & P. McWilliams (eds), Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland: Parishes of Co Antrim IX - North Antrim Coast and Rathlin, p.131 (Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1994).
3. PRONI VAL/1/B/136. First Valuation book, p.49 (1834).
4. PRONI OS/6/1/1/2. Second edition OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 1 (1856).
5. PRONI VAL/2/B/1/29. Second Valuation book, p.6 (1859).
6. PRONI VAL/12/B/2/18A-D. Valuation revision books (1868-1929).
7. PRONI OS/6/1/1/3. Third edition OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 1 (1904).
8. PRONI OS/6/1/1/4. Fourth edition OS 1:10,560 map, Co Antrim sheet 1 (1922).
9. PRONI CAB/9/B/202/2. Correspondence between islanders, G.R. McConnell (Cabinet Secretary) and Ministry of Agriculture regarding provision of a corn mill on Rathlin Island (14 Aug, 16 Aug and 28 Sept 1944).

References - Secondary Sources:
1. Forsythe W. & McConkey R. 2012. An Archaeological Survey of a Maritime Landscape, pp 222-223 and 444-445 (Belfast: Northern Ireland Environment Agency).

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Z. Rarity
R. Age
S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

The size and materials of this building are typical of many such vernacular mills, making use of local materials, in this case basalt and limestone, augmented with brick. It was ingeniously located at the bottom of a steep scarp and as close as possible to the shoreline in order to maximise the potential head of water available to the water wheel (although it was not fully realised in reality).
The materials of this building are entirely authentic, with no later replacements. It is one of only two corn mills on the island and the best preserved; the other is in Ballycarry Td but little beyond ruinous foundations survive.

The mill would have been of considerable importance to the island's farming community, particularly in the days before imported flour, having been the means of milling oats (the principal cereal grown then) into oatmeal and animal feed.

General comments

Mill might possibly date from period 1840-59 (see discussion in 'Historical Information' box.
Internal Photographs were taken through opening in door to south as the building was sealed at this only opening.