Site of old mill

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Site, to the S of Mill Street (now occupied by modern houses forming Old Mill Court) of former two storey flour mill. The mill was rubble built with a slated gabled roof and partly covered in rough cast. There was a gabled extension to the front and a glass house extension to the rear. The ground floor had a large carriage arch with date ‘1600’ inscribed on the keystone.

First Survey record:
2 storey old mill building now used as joiner's shop. Roof slated, gable ends. Walls scrabo stone rubble with some roughcast on SE gable and cream wash on NE side. NE side has 4 first floor window openings. Gd floor has sheeted door with half-door - window horizontal astragals - coach doorway with elliptical arch head and dressed stone surround with keystone. Glass house on back gable Street front has gabled extension. Corrugated iron roof. Brick gable containing large sliding door. Stone steps up to first floor from within front extension.
Condition fair to poor. Front gable of older building about 25ft wide.

Historical information

The mill formerly on this site was associated with the old Newtownards Manor Mill, much of which is still standing on the opposite side of Mill Street. The roundel on the main building of the extant section implies that it dates from the early 1600s (as did the date stone on the demolished section), but although the original 17th century manor mill was situated on this general site the building demolished in recent years was constructed in 1816 by the Marquis of Londonderry. The plan of the building is shown on the OS Map of 1833/4, and it is noted in the OS Memoirs (c.1832-4) as belonging to John Lanktree and possessed a ‘wheel of 17 feet, breadth 8 feet, breast wheel [and] a fall of water [of] 5 feet’. The valuation records of the same period state that Lanktree paid £100 per annum for the mill and ten acres of land, as well as a flax scutching mill. The building is marked ‘Flour mill’ on the revised OS map of 1858-60.
Precisely when milling ceased is unclear. Latterly the property served as joiner’s store, but appears to have been demolished circa early 1980s to make way for a new housing development.

References- Primary sources
1. PRONI D.654/M35/21 Londonderry Papers- Map of Newtownards town parks also showing the site of the new mill (1816).
2. PRONI VAL 1B/322 p.66 1st valuation, parish of Newtownards, Corporation North, 1833.
3. PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps 1st ed. 1834.
4. Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland Vol.7: Parishes of County Down II, ed. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams (QUB 1991), p. 104.
5. PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps 1st rev. 1858-60.
6. PRONI 2nd (‘Griffith’s’), parish of Newtownards, Newtownards (Corporation North), 1863.

Secondary sources
1. E.R.R. Green 'The industrial Archaeology of Co. Down' (HMSO 1963), p.43.
2. Trevor McCavery 'Newtown, a history of Newtownards' (Dundonald 1994), pp.57, 79, 104.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Building demolished.
Site of former two storey flour mill, probably constructed in 1816 and demolished c.1980-85.with modern housing development built in place.