Old Mill Building At Longfords Mills

Mill building. Early to mid-18th century (shown on a 1766 map), altered in 1828. Constructed from coursed and roughly dressed limestone with a gabled stone slate roof. The building has a rectangular plan with ten bays and four storeys.

On the west side, there are nine windows, all with three lights and flat mullions, many retaining original leaded iron casements, though the ground floor is obscured by later extensions. Two datestones are visible, one dated 1703 and the other 1828. The north gable contains three large four-light casements, with the upper one featuring fixed leaded lights.

The east elevation has similar nine-window fenestration with three-light windows. A timber lintel spans double doors on this side. Two segmental arches, probably from the early 19th century, mark the location of a former wheel pit on the left (south), while a segmental relieving arch sits above a timber lintel over a tall blocked arch (two storeys high) on the right.

An iron overbridge, dated WP 1865, crosses the public road below and connects into the upper floor of Building 13 to the north west.

The interior originally housed two water wheels at the south end, which were removed along with the first floor to accommodate later machinery, including a Bellis and Morcom steam engine of 1904 and a Gordon water turbine of approximately 1915. Timber beams throughout show marks left by driveshafts and mortices with peg holes. Vent openings beneath window seats have sliding shutters and grilles, opening onto an early 19th-century quarter-turn winder stair to the north west.

The roof is a ten-bay collar-truss structure with trenched purlins and a diagonally-set ridge purlin, featuring split rafters and torched soffits.

The site has been in use since the 14th century for cloth making. The mill was leased from Thomas Pinfold by Thomas Playne in 1759, and the Playnes occupied it continuously for woollen manufacture until 1990. A map of 1766 showing land belonging to John Pinfold depicts a complex of buildings around the lower mill site, with this building identified as a fulling, grist and gigmill. An early 20th-century photograph shows dormer windows on the east side of the roof, now removed.

The Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England suggests the mill building was used for manufacturing rather than warehousing, making it comparable in scale to later examples in Gloucestershire and elsewhere. The 1766 plan shows a mill leat passing the south end of the building; the location and stonework of the two wheel arches in the rear wall suggest they may have been a later insertion. The upper storeys were probably originally hand-powered, with cloth finishing being their most likely function.