Ruined windmill

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Ruined windmill stump, set on a slight rise in a field to the W of Ringdufferin House (E of Ringdufferin Road), c.2.5 miles N/NE of Killyleagh.

The windmill is in random rubble and was harled at one point. It is battered and roofless and measures c.9.5m internally, by c.6.25m in height. At ground level there is a timber sheeted door with a small window opening above.

Historical information

This windmill probably originally belonged to the owners of near by Ringdufferin House, the Baillie family. It may have been built by James Baillie c.1790, when he was extending the house itself. The building is marked on the 1834 OS map, but it is not referred to in the 1837 valuation and although it is shown on the OS map of 1859, it is not marked ‘windmill’. All of this could suggest that it was abandoned shortly after 1834.

James Williamson’s 1810 map and the 1834 OS map both show a windmill just to the south of this one, however this appears to have been abandoned by 1859 also. No apparent trace of it remains.

References- Primary sources
1 ‘Taylor’s and Skinner’s Maps of the Roads of Ireland (Dublin 1777), map 281. [The windmill is not marked on this map.]
2 PRONI D.616 James Williamson’s Maps of County Down.
3 PRONI OS/1/3/24 OS map, 1st ed. 1834, Co. Down 24.
4 PRONI OS/6/3/24/2 OS map, 1st rev., 1859, Co. Down 24.

Secondary sources
1 E.R.R. Green, ‘The Industrial Archaeology of Co. Down’ (Belfast HMSO 1963), p.56.
2 EHS IHR 3062
3 EHS SMR DOW 24/14

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Disused windmill stump of probable late 18th or early 19th century origin, now roofless but with rubble walls largely intact.