Millvale Road

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Tall, imposing, rubble-built, five and a half-storey, gable-ended flour mill of c.1840s, believed to have been disused since the 1930s and now much overgown. The building is set gable-end on to the western side of Millvale Road, within the small settlement of the same name, roughly 3km north-west of the centre of Newry.

The site appears to have been unused for some time, with other structures which once occupied the site having been cleared away. Remnants of the mill race survive at the western side of the mill. The pit in which the waterwheel was located remains on the north side, but the wheel has been removed. Nearby, to the south and west of the sie, there are a number of recent housing developments.

The front façade faces east north-east, for ease of description this is referred to as east, and the orientations of all other facades are similarly ‘corrected’.

The east front gable façade faces Millvale Road;. At ground and first floors there are centrally positioned flat-headed door openings. At the top floor and the apex of the gable there are three small flat-headed window openings. The gable is topped with a centrally positioned dressed granite chimneystack.

The south façade is much overgrown and no clear view was possible. There are a number of openings on the ground floor.

The western gable is heavily overgrown. There are a number of flat-headed window openings.

The northern façade is also overgrown. There appear to be a number of regularly arranged window openings; these are now all bricked up.

Walls are constructed in random rubble field stone, with dressed granite quoins. The pitched roof is covered with natural slate with brick skews. The roof structure was collapsed in places.

The mill race approaches the western side and terminates in a series of sluice gates. The final delivery of water is through a pair of circular metal ducts.

Adjacent to the front east façade there is a cast-iron gate that gives access to what may have been a side yard; this is now overgrown.

Historical information

A group of buildings is shown on this site on the OS map of 1835, none of which match the present configuration. These buildings contained a 'log wood and starch manufactory', and a flax mill, all in the hands of a John Bell, and although extensive in terms of plan, were all of one or one and a half storey, the tallest a 'stove' (presumably a boiling house of some description) of 14ft.

On the revised OS map of 1860 a different configuration is shown, with what appears to be the present structure, (with appendages to the north-east and south-west) marked as a 'flour mill'. The presence of the current building is confirmed by the second valuation of c.1862 which records the flour mill as measuring 17yds x 11 x 5(storeys), with kiln of 8 x 9 x 2, dwelling house of 10 x 5 x 2, offices of 10 x 4 x 1, 4 x 4 x 1 and 9 x 7 x 1, and the flax mill (which appears to have been located to the northern end of the site) of 27 x 8 x 2. The main mill is noted by the valuers as containing 'four pairs of stones all French bur, wok[ing] three at a time, with three sets of elevators, one set of screens and two sets of fans'. It worked for '24 hours per day for nine months of the year, and the same, 3 months at 12 hours per day.' There was a 'scarcity of water some years three months in the year', and the leaseholder, Edward D. Atkinson, worked 'on his own account'. The flax mill had '12 stocks and one set (three) rollers, and worked 'about four months in the year, ten hours per day; both it and and the flour mill had class 'B' machinery.

In 1866 the whole complex was acquired by John Grubb Richardson, the owner of the large spinning mill at near by Bessbrook. In 1885, the Richardsons converted (or rebuilt) one of the buildings to the north of the main mill to a turbine house (with 62hp turbine) to generate current for the hydro-electric tramway built to connect Bessbrook and Newry. This railway, which transported coal and flax from Newry Quays to the mill at Bessbrook, as well as mill workers, was the second of its kind in Ireland, and carried almost 98,000 passengers in its first full year of operation. The tramway continued in use until January 1948 and was subsequently dismantled. The turbine house building survived for some years afterwards as it is shown on the OS map of 1956, but was is demolished at some point prior to c.1980.

The flour mill remained working until some time 1929 and 1935, listed as 'disused' in the latter year. It does not appear to witnessed any kind of log-term use since.

IHR 00551:000:00, oo1:00, 002:00, 00552:000:00, 00527:003:00, 11057:000:00

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL1A/2/26 OS map, Co. Armagh sheet 26, with valuation
references, 1835(-c.38)
2 ‘Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland…vol.1 (QUB, 1990), ed. Anqelique Day and Patrick McWilliams, (1835, 1838)
3 PRONI VAL1B/244A-B First valuation, Killevy parish, 1836
4 PRONI VAL2A/2/26 OS map, Co. Armagh sheet 26, with valuation references, 1860(-c.62)
5 PRONI VAL2B/2/37D Second valuation, Killevy parish, 1862
6 PRONI VAL12B/15/22A Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1865-79
7 PRONI VAL12B/15/22B Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1880-82
8 PRONI VAL12B/15/22C Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1883-94
9 Bassett, G.H., ‘The Book of County Armagh’ (Dublin, 1888), p.237
10 PRONI VAL12B/15/22D Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1894-1900
11 PRONI VAL12B/15/22E Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1900-09
12 PRONI OS6/2/26/3 OS map, Co. Armagh sheet 26, 1906
13 PRONI VAL12B/15/22F Annual valuation revision book, Mullaghglass ED, 1909-29
14 PRONI VAL3B/2/19 First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland, Derrymore ED, 1935
15 PRONI VAL3C/2/13 First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland, Derrymore ED, 1936-56
16 NIEA OS map, Co. Armagh sheet 26, 1956
17 PRONI VAL4B/2/21 Second General Revaluation of Northern Ireland, Derrymore ED, 1957-72
18 NIEA McCutcheon Collection AR/265-70 Photos of flour mill at Millvale, c.1960s

Secondary sources
1 ‘Bessbrook: A record of industry in a Northern Ireland village community and of a social experiment, 1845-1945 (1945)
2 McCutcheon, W.A., 'The Industrial Archaeology of Northern Ireland', (Belfast, 1980)
3 http://bessbrook.bravehost.com//BNT/bnt.html [Website relating to the history of Bessbrook etc., c.2005]

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

This large and impressive building is a prominent local landmark and an example of early Victorian industrial architecture. It is also an important piece of industrial heritage, being one of an increasing few surviving 19th century flour mills, and perhaps one of the largest. Its site has the added significance of once containing an early hydro-electric turbine house, linked to the near by Bessbrook mill. Unfortunately the mill has been disused for some considerable time and its detailing and fabric has suffered as a result, to a point where there is insufficient architectural interest remaining to add to the site's historic interest, to merit listing.