Disused Flax mill, Ballycoshone Rd, Rathfriland, Newry, Co Down

Disused Flax Mill, Ballycoshone Road, Rathfriland

This is a 1940s water and diesel-powered flax scutching complex with surviving elements of an 18th-century mill, situated on the right bank of the River Bann immediately south of Ballycoshone bridge. The complex comprises two main units: a small house to the north and the mill proper to the south.

The house is a single-storey, two-bay building aligned north-south with a pitched natural slate roof with cement-rendered skews and no rainwater goods. A small brick chimney sits on the south gable. The walls are of random rubble fieldstones, rendered and whitewashed. The west elevation facing the river is blank except for a window opening at the right. The north gable is blank. The east elevation has an entrance door at the right of the left bay, now sheeted over, and to its left a blocked window opening. The right bay contains a 2/2 top-hung metal-framed window. All windows lack cills. The south gable is cement-rendered with a blocked doorway at the left.

The mill building comprises four principal elements. The flax store at the north is a large single-storey, single-bay unit with a pitched corrugated asbestos roof fitted with three skylights on both slopes, supported by metal-truss frames. Asbestos rainwater goods are present. All walls are smooth cement-rendered over concrete blocks. The east elevation has a large sliding door sheeted in corrugated metal. The south gable, abutted by the lower scutch mill, is blank above the junction. All other elevations are without openings.

The scutch mill adjoins to the south and is detailed similarly. It has two skylights on each roof pitch. The east elevation features, at the left, an opening for the headrace intake to the internal waterwheel. An external concrete staircase rises at the left to a small footbridge over this headrace, which is clearly evident as a deep channel contoured along the roadside bank. To the right of this opening are six further openings: a door, two 5-paned windows, a 3×5 window, a 2×5 window, a door, and a 3×5 window. All windows have metal frames, casements, top-hung transoms and concrete cills. Both gables are abutted by adjoining units. The west elevation has an engine room at the left and a single sliding door to the right. The right end is open, revealing the waterwheel clearly, with an open tailrace to the river.

The engine room has a monopitched roof with two skylights. Its materials and finishes match the main block. The west face carries a 3×3-paned metal casement window. The right (south) cheek is blank but has a concrete platform built up against it which formerly supported two water tanks (now removed) for engine cooling; a rainwater pipe drained into one. The left cheek has an entry door sheeted in corrugated metal.

South of the waterwheel is a two-storey, one-bay rubble stone building, cut into the west-sloping bank and accessed at first-floor level from the east and ground-floor level from the west. It has a pitched natural slate roof without rainwater goods and walls of random rubble fieldstones. The east elevation is smooth cement-rendered with a door at first-floor level. The south gable is unrendered and blank save for a small abutting rendered shed at ground level to the left. This shed has a monopitch asbestos roof, cement-rendered walls and a door to the west. The west elevation of the main building has a doorway at ground-floor right and a window opening to its left; the first floor is blank. A ragged wall end at the left suggests the former presence of a building now removed.