Old Viney Bridge Mill

CREWKERNE

ST4409 SOUTH STREET 876-1/7/161 (South side) 06/09/74 Old Viney Bridge Mill

II

Mill. Late C18/early C19 with later C19 additions. MATERIALS: limestone rubble with slate and pantile roofs. PLAN: linear plan at an almost right angle to South Street with former engine house flanked by workshops for weaving etc. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys; the (north) left-hand range of 6-window range has a Ham Hill stone Tuscan doorcase with an open pediment, ornamental fanlight and 2 raised and fielded panels of a former 6-panel door; all the windows have gauged segmental stone arches; cast-iron frames of 5 rows of 7 panes to the ground floor, C20 casements to the first floor. The engine house, attached to the right of 2-storeys, one-window range, with C20 high sliding double doors with fixed 8/8 window immediately above. To the right of the engine house is a 5-window range; 4 similar cast-iron windows and some C20 to first and ground floor. The next late C19 range is single-storey; 6-window range with segmental brick arches under wooden lintels and cast-iron frames similar to the first range. C20 doors, one to the far right, and the inside right window is raised above a door. To the right is a cottage with a datestone of 1793, probably repositioned, in the right gable end below a brick stack; the facade and eaves level is continuous with the range to the left but the roof is separate and more steeply pitched over 2 storeys; one-window range. The window to the right-of-centre of the first floor is a 3-light casement at eaves level, the 3-light casement below is under a wide gauged segmental arch, the doorway to the left, now a window, has a flat arch. A mid C19 range to the far right, with a pantile roof, is 7-window range with 4 large plates to tie-bars between the floors, double doors to both floors to left-of-centre and a lower, pantiled-roofed loading bay to the left. INTERIOR: the engine house has a 2-storey arched recess to a former flywheel in the left-hand wall and an early C19 queen post roof structure; heavy beams to floors supported by later C19 cast-iron columns. HISTORY: an early watermill existed near this site before the present structure which became the centre of a cottage industry and community producing webbing for girths, etc. The production of webbing, sailcloth, hair seating and later shirts was the dominant industry in Crewkerne, girth-web weaving being documented from 1698. This factory was set up in 1789 by Samuel Spark (d.1827) a Crewkerne solicitor, and Bartholemew Gidley (d.1812). (Victoria County History: Somerset: Oxford: 1978-: P.21).

Listing NGR: ST4487609155