Liddell's Mill, 43 Main Street, Donaghcloney

Liddell's Mill is a large linen mill complex on the southern side of Donaghcloney village, set on a former bleach green bounded on three sides by the River Lagan in an almost ox-bow formation, and accessed via a long drive off Main Street. Linen production on this site dates from around 1740, and the complex was once reputed to be one of the largest of its kind in the world. The listed portion of the complex comprises the former bleach mill (believed to date from 1813), Mill Building 2 (constructed between 1835 and 1858), the office block (built in two main phases, the mid-to-late 1860s and 1898), and the tall red brick chimney. The weaving sheds, which once formed the heart of the site, have since been demolished as part of an agreed contract prior to redevelopment, along with the mill pond. The architects Hobart and Heron are associated with some elements of the complex. The site has considerable historic interest, both in the story of linen production in Northern Ireland and in the development of Donaghcloney itself, which grew largely as a result of this industry. The complex also has group value with the adjacent Edwardian cricket pavilion and the nearby Liddell Memorial Primary School.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The area around Donaghcloney appears to have served as a crossing point on the River Lagan since at least the early 18th century, when a bridge known as Banoge Bridge was constructed there. The Dempster family held a large plot of land in the vicinity from 1708 (leased from the Gill Hall estate), and it is probable that linen was being produced here as early as 1742, when the property was in the hands of a linen draper named Marmaduke Dempster. The family name appears on Taylor's and Skinner's road map of 1777 as 'Donaghcloney — Dempster Esq.' The land remained in family hands until 1806, when David Dempster sold the lease to a John Currell of Moylurg; Currell relinquished it in 1808, and in 1812 Dempster sold it to John Brown (1770–1834), a linen draper of Waringstown. No buildings are indicated on the site on James Williamson's County Down map of 1810, but shortly after acquiring the land John Brown built the bleach mill that still stands at the northern end of the present complex. This building carries a date stone reading 'Jn. Brown A.D. 1813', though the stone itself appears to be a later addition of around 1900.

The mill is described in the Ordnance Survey Memoirs of October 1834 as 'a bleach green and mill the property of Mr John Brown, capable of finishing 10,000 pieces of linen per annum…[and giving] constant employment to about 16 men.' The first valuation of 1835 records the long bleach mill as containing beetling mills, a wash house and a drying loft, and measuring 137½ feet by 27 by 23 feet. It was water-driven, with three wheels each 15 feet in diameter, all in full working order at the time of survey. A further beetling mill, a boiling house, a dwelling house and an office were also recorded on the site.

After John Brown's death in 1837, the mill passed to his brother James and his 14-year-old son John Shaw Brown. Part of the property — the house and the bleach green — was sold to Robert G. Nicholson, owner of a bleachworks in the nearby Banoge townland. James Brown continued the business and by 1840 was employing 250 damask weavers. Upon James Brown's death in 1851, all of the land was sold to Nicholson. In 1855, William Liddell, a cousin of the Nicholsons, was given the option of acquiring the lease of both the Donaghcloney and Banoge mills. To finance this he entered into partnership with John Shaw Brown and a Mr Magee of Lurgan. Magee was apparently bought out in 1861, and Brown withdrew from the partnership in 1866 to found his own mill at Edenderry near Belfast, leaving the entire Donaghcloney concern in the hands of the reconstituted firm of William Liddell and Co.

The complex benefited greatly from the boom in the linen industry brought about by restrictions on cotton supplies during the American Civil War. The rateable value of the works doubled to £80 by 1864 and had leapt again to £290 by 1867, largely as a result of the construction of a new weaving factory built to hold 280 looms, a 30 horsepower steam engine, and a gasworks. This factory, built for the production of damask linen using power looms, was initially instigated by W. and G. Moorehead, brothers-in-law of the late Robert G. Nicholson, before being acquired by the newly formed William Liddell and Co. It comprised the square northern section of what became the large single-storey north-light roofed weaving sheds, the two-storey southern section of the office block, and the link between them.

In 1889 a new workshop consisting of two single-storey blocks was added, raising the rateable valuation to £300. By 1898 the three-storey northern half of the office block had been constructed at a cost of £650, bringing the valuation to £322. Minor additions followed in 1904 (£338), further extensions in 1908 (£360) and 1910 (£450), and a further addition spanning the full south side of the factory in 1915 — possibly to designs by Hobart and Heron — raising the valuation to £500. Further alterations were underway by 1925 and the complex was largely in its final form by the end of the 1920s, apart from some warehouse additions to the south in the 1970s and 1980s.

By the early 20th century, William Liddell and Co. had become one of the leading damask manufacturers in Ulster — at one point reportedly the largest in the world — and the firm notably supplied linen for the ill-fated Titanic. Like many other mill owners, the Liddells built workers' housing from the late 1800s, effectively giving rise to the village of Donaghcloney. The family also built a church in 1894, a schoolhouse in 1912 (later consecrated for use as a church around 1980), a cricket pitch and a cycle track. The cricket pavilion — an attractive red brick Domestic Revival building, possibly also by Hobart and Heron — was built in 1900–01 at a cost of £131. In 1973 the company merged with the Belfast firm of William Ewart and Sons to become Ewart Liddell, who were in turn acquired by the Baird McNutt Group in 2001. The Donaghcloney site remained in operation until around 2002 and has been largely idle since then. In recent years several buildings to the west of the old bleach mill have been demolished, and many openings throughout the surviving structures have been bricked up.

OFFICE BLOCK

The office block is a roughly T-shaped building constructed in at least two distinct phases: the two-storey southern half dates largely from the mid-to-late 1860s (with later alterations), and the three-storey northern front section from 1898. The northern half is essentially a three-storey gabled rectangular block, with a similar but lower block forming the bulk of the southern half. The southern half merges with a two-storey return that links eastwards to the main factory at a right angle. To the western side of the southern block there is a mainly single-storey lean-to extension that wraps around to the southern facade. The linking section to the east is made up of two conjoined structures: a two-storey section to the west, and a part-two and part-one-and-a-half-storey section to the east. The western part of this link rises to a gable; the two-storey portion of the eastern side has a hipped roof topped with a decorative timber-glazed rooflight structure. The one-and-a-half-storey section is gabled and also has a somewhat plainer timber-glazed rooflight; a single-storey lean-to is attached to its north face.

Throughout the complex the walls are a mixture of red clay facing brick and cement render (applied to the ground floor of the front north-facing gable and the lean-to), and window openings are mainly flat-headed, though segmental and semicircular-headed examples are also present. All windows are now blocked up.

The symmetrical north-facing front gable has the most architectural ambition of any part of the building. At ground floor level, a Renaissance-style entrance is flanked by fluted pilasters with paired colonnettes supporting an entablature and a tympanum; the tympanum contains scrolled decoration and a date stone inscribed '1898'. To either side of the entrance is a window with a similar, though not identical, surround. At first floor there is a flat-headed window with a blocked (Gibbs-style) surround on each side of a decorative roundel. At second floor level a semicircular-headed opening is flanked on each side by a flat-headed opening, with another roundel set within the gable above. The gable itself is framed with quoins and terminates in a raised parapet with skews. Window openings on the east and west sides of the front block are evenly arranged but plain. At first and second floor levels on the west side, openings have been enlarged to serve as fire escape doors, giving onto an open steel fire escape stair.

The ground floor of the main two-storey southern block is obscured by the clasping return. At first floor on the western facade, a number of evenly spaced windows are present, and the southern corner of the facade has quoins. The clasping return has paired timber sliding doors to a now-blocked coach arch, and two plain window openings. The roofs to all sections are gabled and finished with natural slate, except for the raised portion of the linking section to the east, which is hipped and capped with a decorative rooflight. A larger but plainer rooflight serves the lower portion of this same section. The eaves treatment varies across the building and includes corbelled, overhanging with exposed rafter tails, and closed without overhangs.

The building has suffered significantly from vandalism, and the present owners have bricked up all external openings and some internal doors in an attempt to prevent further damage. The three-storey section and the two-storey return were fully accessible at the time of survey, though only parts of the first floor of the linking block could be entered, and the roofless single-storey extension to the west was inaccessible. Many original window frames survive behind the blockwork; these are mainly painted timber mullion and transom style with top-hung top openers.

BLEACH MILL

The bleach mill, believed to date from 1813, is located at the northern end of the site, adjacent to a modern security gate and barrier, on the eastern side of the main driveway and immediately to the west of the mill pond. The uppermost section of its walls appears to have been rebuilt and the roof replaced at some point in the late 19th or early 20th century. This is consistent with historical evidence: valuers recorded the building as 23 feet high in 1835 and only 19 feet in 1908. Internally, all floors have been replaced, and the uppermost floor structure has been removed to create a double-height first-floor level, though this removal appears to have taken place after the walls were rebuilt. A catalogue illustration of 1896 depicts the building as three-storey; according to Charles Brett, who had access to an unpublished manuscript history of the business, it was indeed originally fully three-storey.

The building is a long, linear, unadorned rectangular structure, two storeys over a basement with a gabled roof, and a lower two-storey section to the south. Both sections have slated roofs, eaves without overhangs, and surviving rainwater goods in cast iron. The walls are finished with roughcast render. Window openings in the main section are evenly arranged, while those in the lower southern section are somewhat irregularly positioned. Basement and ground-floor openings are segmental-headed; first-floor openings are flat-headed. Openings to the left of the western front elevation are either boarded over or bricked up, and some ground-floor openings have been shortened by the addition of blockwork to their lower sections. On the western facade, between two first-floor openings, there is a date stone roundel of around 1900 with a moulded surround, inscribed 'Jn Brown 1813'. At first floor on the southern face, paired timber doors open onto a projecting loading platform, with a plain flat-headed fanlight above. At ground floor on the same elevation there is a central door opening flanked by a flat-headed window on each side. The eastern elevation is similar to the west, but most of its windows are not blocked; these have painted timber multi-light frames, some with steel hopper openers. The north face is symmetrical, with a blocked window opening at ground floor and a loft door at first floor; the loft door is timber sheeted.

THE 'BOAT HOUSE'

This small single-storey building sits at the north-western corner of the works, west of the main drive on a muddy bank of the river. A tail-race runs on each side, discharging water back to the river. The building was constructed at some point between 1835 and 1858. Although it is referred to locally as the Boat House, it was not used to berth a boat. It appears that part of its function was the maintenance of a pontoon used to clear weeds and debris from the tail-races and mill pond; the pontoon may also have been stored inside. Its primary function is therefore more accurately described as a store or workshop.

The walls are finished with unpainted roughcast render. The roof is gabled and finished with natural slate, with eaves without overhangs supporting uPVC rainwater goods. On the right side of the eastern facade there is a timber-sheeted sliding coach door mounted on an external rail. The north facade has three segmental-headed openings — a door to the centre and a window on each side; the door opening has been bricked up and a small high-level fixed light inserted. Modern timber window frames have been installed: one with a single fixed light, the other a two-light frame with a top opener. The remaining facades are now blank, with a single opening on each of the west and south elevations having been bricked up.

THE CHIMNEY

The chimney stands freely to the west of the office and administration building. It is a striking example of a traditional late 19th to early 20th century industrial chimney, standing approximately 28 metres high. The structure is octagonal in plan and tapers gently to a plain cap. At intervals of approximately one metre it is strengthened by a series of metal bands. The top ten metres show a noticeable lean towards the east. No evidence of a boiler house remains.

MILL BUILDING 2

This building, constructed at some point between 1835 and 1858, lies at right angles on sloping ground immediately to the north-east of the old bleach mill. Its original function is uncertain, though its chimneystack suggests it may have housed a works office. It is currently used as an office for the Donaghcloney Rural Needs Development Group and as a play school. It is an unassuming rectangular two-storey building with a full-width lean-to to the western gable that incorporates separate entrance lobbies to the ground and first floors. The walls are constructed in rubble fieldstone finished with roughcast render. Both the main roof and the lean-to roof are covered in natural slate. Eaves and verges are without overhangs, and rainwater goods are extruded aluminium. Centred on the western gable is a rendered chimneystack with a plain corbelled cap. Window openings are regular and flat-headed, with squat openings at the lower level and tall, narrow ones above. Window frames are generally uPVC, with some timber frames at ground floor; some ground-floor openings have been blocked. A door opening to the left side of the first-floor level of the north facade is accessed via a sloping bridge from the higher ground to that side, where there is now a playground.

MILL POND AND TAIL-RACES

At the eastern side of the site, adjacent to Donaghcloney Bridge, a short canal draws water from the River Lagan into the eastern side of the mill pond. Sluice gates — one at the southern end of the old bleach mill building and another in the eastern facade of the old mill — channelled the water. Tail-races to the north and south sides of the Boat House directed water back to the river.

SETTING AND GROUP VALUE

The complex sits on a former bleach green bounded on three sides by the River Lagan. Immediately to the west of the factory site lies a cricket pitch with a pavilion built by the mill owners in 1900–01. The surviving mill buildings, taken together, form an industrial group of considerable historic interest both for the history of linen production in Northern Ireland and for the village of Donaghcloney, which grew up largely as a result of the industry carried on here. The complex has group value with the adjacent Edwardian cricket pavilion and the nearby Liddell Memorial Primary School.