Lusky Mill, 41 Lusky Road, Kilmood, Killinchy, Co Down, BT23 6RR

Lusky Mill

Derelict ruins of a two-storey, T-shaped corn mill constructed in 1823, with much of the building still standing and considerable internal machinery still in evidence. The site lies amidst largely wooded surrounds to the north-east of Lusky Road, approximately 1.5 miles west of Killinchy village.

The mill building is T-shaped, with its long front facade facing north and the upright of the T extending southward to the mill race. The structure is largely overgrown and badly dilapidated, but its rubble facade can still be glimpsed. Several window and door openings remain, featuring brick dressings. Some windows still retain fragments of their Georgian-paned sash frames. Above one doorway there is reportedly an inscribed date stone, though this was obscured by heavy plant growth at the time of survey. Above the doorway to the left, a small foot bridge leads to higher ground a few yards to the north. The rear portion of the mill is largely hidden by trees. The mill race to the south appears to have been blocked and recently altered, with breeze block construction in evidence. Remnants of the wheel itself appear to survive.

To the south of the corn mill, a scutch mill was constructed in 1864, of which little could be discerned except an ivy-covered chimney stack. To the north-west of the mill complex stands a small single-storey house, possibly an office, with a hipped roof, sheeted timber door, and two windows to the front. To the west of this is a modern house which spans the River Blackwater. The mill pond lies to the north.

Lusky Mill was constructed in 1823 by David Gordon, the owner of nearby Florida Manor, on the site of a much older mill. The mill is shown on the 1834 Ordnance Survey map, along with the house or office to the north-west. The 1837 Ordnance Survey Memoirs record it as then in possession of James McKeown, equipped with a breast wheel of 14 feet in diameter and 6 feet in breadth. The same arrangement is marked on the revised Ordnance Survey map of 1859-60. In 1864, a scutch mill was built to the west by the Shaw family, who appear to have acquired the whole complex by this date. Around 1910, the Shaws sold both mills to William George Harris of Maghera. Harris's family worked the scutch mill until it ceased operations in 1942 and the corn mill until its closure in 1950. The complex has been abandoned since that time, though a modern house now stands over the River Blackwater itself to the north.