Wednesday 15 April 2015

A story of steam and textiles beside the river underneath the viaduct

Now it is nice when a piece of research by my friends Graham and Neil coincides with a painting from Peter Topping who is also a friend and who I have collaborated with on many projects.

And so with nothing from me here is the story of that mill by the river under the railway viaduct at Stockport .

A collaborative effort which just left me the job of posting the story.

Now that is easy history.

“The first record of a mill on this site was when John Collier, a cotton manufacturer built a mill in 1790. It was water powered. 

The mill probably consisted of two multi-storey spinning mills and attached weaving sheds, one destroyed by fire in 1831 and the other rebuilt in 1884. 

Thomas Fernley bought the mill in 1824, and in 1831 needed to replace one mill with a new one that was of fireproof construction. 

This mill was eleven bays long and six storeys high. The floors were sprung on transverse brick arches supported on cast iron columns. 


It was driven by a beam engine in an internal engine house to the east of the mill. 

It was over this engine house that the Manchester and Birmingham Railway built the Stockport Viaduct in 1840, and again when it widened in 1880. 

The second mill was replaced in 1884, but not the original wheelhouse. 

It is a five-storey, 15-bay mill of fireproof construction with narrow longitudinal vaults springing from iron joints. 

The original weaving sheds have been replaced with two-storey structures, creating a complex site.”*

Wear Mill was listed as a Grade II building on November 4 1996**

Painting;  Wear Mill Stockport,  © 2013 Peter Topping
Web: www.paintingsfrompictures.co.uk
Facebook: Paintings from Pictures https://www.facebook.com/paintingsfrompictures

*Graham Gill

** Neil Simpson, http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-462275-wear-mill-#.VS5je9zF8jF

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