Engine house and steam engine

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Derelict roofless remains of a three-storey engine house and steam engine, built between 1830 and 1834 as part of a now demolished former flour mill. The building is set on the S side of Mill Street, Caledon, and stands isolated on a grass expanse, the last remaining section of what was a mainly six-storey mill. It is presently surrounded by metal fencing, with the mill race still discernible to the S side.

The building is rectangular in plan and set roughly on a N-S axis. It measures approximately 9.7 x 5.1m externally, and 7.65m in height (to the verge). The walls are constructed in random rubble with flush in-out dressed sandstone quoins. The N, S and E walls were originally largely exposed, however the W wall was in fact part of the E gable of the six-storey mill building itself, to which the engine house was added a few years after the former was built.

The E wall contains the entrance, a pedestrian doorway to the right hand side at ground level, with a metal door. Much of the rest of the E wall is covered in thick ivy growth, but to the left hand side at ‘first floor’ level there is a small square opening with sandstone dressings, and the outline of the gable of a former single-storey abutting structure, (apparently originally the boiler house), can still be discerned.

The much narrower S wall is has a basement level, (which sits within the former mill race), and three large openings, one above the other. The two upper openings were windows, and the lower of these, (which is still largely intact, but minus its frame), has a sandstone cill and lintel, and brick dressings. The upper window has now lost its lintel and is completely open above. The ground level opening may have been a doorway, which, 1960s photographic evidence suggests, was accessed via an external balcony. This opening is finished in similar fashion to that above it, but no actual door has survived.

The N wall is featureless, with a large section covered in thick ivy growth. The remains of render to the ground floor level of the wall suggests that a small lean-to structure may once have abutted this side.

As stated above, the W wall was actually the E gable of the mill itself, and as such, shows the hallmarks of having been significantly altered with the addition of the engine house. Former window openings belonging to the mill have been blocked up in brick, and other openings inserted in order to accommodate the shafts of the engine etc. The large cast-iron flywheel is still set in place at ground floor level.

The building originally had a gabled roof, but almost all of this has fallen away (along with much of the E gable apex itself), however the twisted remains of iron trusses and lathes are still in situ.

Historical information

Although long known as Caledon Woollen Mills, this complex was originally built by the Earl of Caledon in the 1820s to grind cereals. In its day, the mill was probably one of the largest such enterprises in the province. Despite its initial success, grain milling lasted no more than 40 years; in the 1880s it was converted into a woollen mill which ran for another 40 years.

Early Development

Caledon flour mills were erected by the Earl of Caledon in the mid 1820s. The first contemporary reference to them is in an estate account book entry dated February 1824 which records an expenditure of £441 on the 'new mills'. They appear to have been set to work by late 1826: in November of that year, 12 employees are recorded, including George Palmer (miller), Henry Mathers (flour dresser) and James Griffin (kiln man). By the end of that year, almost £12,000 had been expended on their construction.

Although now operational, building work appears to have continued: in 1827 a further £3,300 was expended, and £1,350 the following year. Initially the complex was powered by a single waterwheel, 18ft in diameter by 18ft wide, the water being drawn off the River Blackwater at a weir in the vicinity of the road bridge. By April 1830, a second wheel, of identical dimensions, had been installed. Their size suggests that they were probably of a design pioneered by the eminent English millwright William Fairbairn, although whether they were actually manufactured and installed by him has yet to be proven.

The 1834 Ordnance Survey 1:10,560 map shows the ground plan of the complex to have attained the form which is illustrated by George Bassett in 1888. Its colossal scale is noted in the 1835 Ordnance Survey Memoir: "The flour mills at Caledon rank among the most extensive of the class in the kingdom. ...Lord Caledon is sparing no expense in improvements here, and the four mills which he has erected supply the country from Belfast to Lough Erne and nearly equal distances north and south. They sell about £250 worth of flour per diem". The enterprise is also noted in the 1844 Parliamentary Gazetteer as "one of the largest and best contrived corn mills in Ireland". At that time, the landscape was very different to that of today, with over 9,000 tons of wheat being grown locally and ground at the mill per year.

By 1858, Lord Caledon had leased the site to William Browne and James Clow, and it is likely that provender (animal-feed) milling was its mainstay at this time. The mill had ceased production by 1864 and it lay idle until restarting around 1877. However, it had once again come to a halt in 1880.

Steam engine
The first definite reference to a steam engine at Caledon Mill is to be found in the 1835 Ordnance Survey Memoir: "There is also a subsidiary lower pressure steam engine of 25 horsepower. The average consumption of coal is four hundredweight per hour. ...The seeds or refuse of the gram is also used a fuel and it is found that one ton of seeds is equal to four hundredweight of coal".

As noted above, the 1834 plan of the complex suggests that the associated engine house and boiler room were probably extant by this date. It is unlikely, however, that the engine was installed before 1830. Writing to Lord Caledon on 2 April 1830 about the impact of the new waterwheel, his agent William Knox noted: "I am fully convinced from the experience I have had that the effective power of the mill for the year round is doubled: and considerably more than doubled in light water. In fact, the rate of advantage on the new wheel increases as the water gets lighter and I am persuaded that it is the best laid out money that your lordship has expended on the Caledon Mills". His remarks indicate that the mill relied solely on water power at that time, and therefore that the engine was installed sometime during the period 1830-34.

Wollen mills
In 1882, the defunct complex was leased to John Charles Sherrard and Oliver Smith who reconfigured it for the manufacture of woollen cloth. This process involved spinning, weaving and finishing. Bassett describes the operation thus in 1888: "Forty looms of the best description sets of carding machines, with self-acting mules to match, and all the requisite machinery for preparing, dyeing and finishing were put into position, and the work begun under the most encouraging auspices. ...The water supply continues fair all year round. Steam is used as an auxiliary. The manufactures consist of tweeds, friezes, serges, blankets, flannels, coatings, costume cloth and knitting yarns. Messrs. Sherrard, Smith & Co do business only with the wholesale trade of the United Kingdom, the European Continent, the United States and the Colonies".

The two waterwheels were replaced by turbines in 1892 and 1897 respectively. Around 1900, the mill was purchased by Messrs John Fulton & Co of Belfast, thereafter trading as the Caledon Woollen Mills Co Ltd. Sometime before 1914 the steam engine was superseded by a gas engine. During the First World War, the mill employed over 700 people, mainly in the production of khaki for the armed forces.

The mill finally ceased working in 1931 and over the ensuing decades gradually fell into disrepair. Photographs taken by the industrial archaeologist W.A. McCutcheon in the mid 1960s show many of the smaller items of machinery to have been removed by that date. All the buildings were eventually demolished in the mid 1980s with the exception of the engine house, the base of the chimney, and some 20th century dyehouse-related concrete buildings at the north end of the complex.

Primary sources
1 PRONI D 2433/A/IO/17-19 Caledon estate account book, (1824-26)
2 PRONI OS 6/6/67/1 OS map, Co Tyrone, sheet 67, (1834) [Unfortunately the first Valuation book of 1836 (VAL 1B/ 66B) does not specify the measurements of the various buildings which then comprised the site (nor any other building in Caledon)
3 PRONI Ordnance Survey memoir, Aghaloo Parish, Co Tyrone (1835)
4 S. Lewis, ‘A topographical dictionary of Ireland’, vol.1, p.243 (1837) [Lewis states that the mills were erected in 1823. G.H. Bassett, writing in 1888, erroneously dates the mills to 1852, but this is incorrect (The book of Armagh, p. 153)
5 ‘Parliamentary gazetteer of Ireland’, vol. 1, p.297 (1844)
6 PRONI Griffith valuation, published 1860 [There is, however, no mention of the mill in the 1858 manuscript version (PRONI VAL 2B/6/6C)]
7 PRONI VAL 12B/38/8B, p.28;/8C, p.33 (1880)
8 George Bassett, ‘The Book of Armagh’ (Dublin, 1888), p.153
9 A brochure entitled ‘A successful Irish industry' which summarises the mill's operation was issued by the Caledon Woollen Mills Co. Ltd. In 1919
10 Linen Hall Library, Belfast News-Letter, 27 April 1962, p.4
11 EHS Photographic survey of Caledon Mills by W.A. McCutcheon (c.1965)

Secondary sources
1 H.D. Gribbon, ‘A history of water power in Ulster’, (Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1969), p.64

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Z. Rarity
W. Northern Ireland/International Interest

Evaluation

Derelict roofless remains of a three-storey engine house and steam engine, built between 1830 and 1834 as part of a now demolished former flour mill. To quote industrial archaeologist Dr Fred Hamond, (writing in 1997): “The Caledon engine is one of only eight beam engines to survive in Ireland, and the only one still in its original position in Northern Ireland. It also appears to be the oldest surviving in the entire country and is unique in being the only in situ example of the ‘house-built’ variety”.