Swan Meadow works western mill number 2, Eckersley Mills, Douglas, Wigan

Summary

A cotton spinning mill (part of an integrated complex) of 1888 by AH Stott of Stott and Sons in an Italianate style of red brick with buff sandstone dressings, for ffarington Eckersley and Co, with later alterations.

Description

A cotton spinning mill (part of an integrated complex) of 1888 by AH Stott of Stott and Sons, for ffarington Eckersley and Co, with later alterations.

MATERIALS: red common brick with sandstone dressings and slate roofs, timber windows, cast-iron columns, steel beams, common-brick floor arches.

PLAN: aligned east-west and with a projecting entrance and stair turret on the north side, latrine turret on east side and south-west turret.

EXTERIOR: forming a south-western component of an important group of cotton mills and associated structures on this site, which are collectively a very striking feature comprising a substantial part of the Wigan Pier Conservation Area.

The mill is now three storeys tall and of 33 x 10 bays in an Italianate style, of brick in English Garden Wall bond with panelled corner pilasters, projecting plinth, ground-floor sill band and coped parapet (formerly the third-floor sill band).

The front faces north and is arranged asymmetrically with long spinning rooms to the left, a later four-bay service turret (the service turret is excluded from the listing) in the angle adjacent to a stair turret, and short preparation rooms to the right (20:4:1:8 windows respectively). The stair turret rises to four storeys and has a dentilled cornice and Flemish gable dated 1888, and basket-arched windows with prominent stone dressings, to both the front and side returns. The main ranges to left and right are very regularly fenestrated, with large windows on all floors, all with six-pane joinery and dark-brick segmental heads. The ground floor is partially painted and has (from the left) an inserted doorway in bays 1 to 3, blind bay 29 (with a first-floor loading door retaining an iron architrave and truncated teagle) and window with lowered sill to form a loading door in bay 31, with added roller shutter.

The east end has corner pilasters and a central, four-storey, two-bay latrine turret flanked by four windows to each side. Bays 1 and 2 of the ground floor have an inserted doorway, and bays 9 and 10 are obscured by a single-storey flat-roofed extension that is excluded from the listing. A fire escape rises to the parapet in bays 2 and 3. The six-pane windows have stone sills and segmental heads, with a ground-floor sill band. The latrine turret has a third-floor plat band and lintel band; each floor has paired, stacked lancets to each bay. The side returns have two lancets per floor; the SW corner of the turret has a Second-World War firewatcher post with small window.

The south elevation has detail matching the front and is arranged with seven and 22 windows to the left and right respectively of the rope drive slot which is opposite the entrance. Bay (from the right) 10 has a first- and second-floor loading slot with timber doors and projecting beam. Bays 14 to 20 are obscured by a single-storey extension that is excluded from the listing. The engine-house bay is flanked by partial stub walls of the engine house, and also has stubs of the massive brick engine bed, flanking the central rope-drive slot. The slot is arched, and flanked by slightly shorter, blind, arched recesses, all three with banded pilaster-jambs. At impost level the drive slot is also flanked by moulded stone corbels of the former roof structure. A polychrome glazed dado is broken by a doorway to the left of the drive slot, and a larger blocked doorway to the right. Above the engine-house gable line the surviving top floor of the rope-race retains two bays of the former third floor with cornice and moulded coping, and blind segmental windows with stone keystones and imposts. To the left the ground floor is largely blind with short windows above where the boiler house was formerly attached. In the south-west corner is a four-storey dust-flue turret with panelled corner pilasters, bands and dentilled moulded cornice topped by a coped parapet.

The turret returns on the west wall which has similar detailing to the other sides. The ground floor is blind in the centre two bays, with damaged decorative stone corbels to the former beaming and winding block; the wall above is also largely blind but with some blocked doorways and no upstand above the second-floor windows.

INTERIOR: cast-iron columns support steel cross-beams and longitudinal inverted-T joists, which each support an additional two cross-beams. These in turn support cross-wise plastered brick jack-arches (three arches between each row of columns), which are covered by concrete floors above. There are also some axial arches adjoining the rope race. Some columns retain seatings for fixing power-transmission equipment. Several power transfer boxes survive within the walls, some being crossed by the present floor levels. The rope race also retains gantries and access stairs. There is some survival of fire suppression pipework. Original timber doors to the engine house also survive on the first floor, along with a curved passage for the same purpose.

History

Swan Meadow western mill number 2 was built in 1888 as part of a westward expansion of the existing works of James Eckersley and Sons (established in 1823). In 1883 the firm established a separate company called ffarington Eckersley and Co Ltd (which merged with James Eckersley in 1900 to form Eckersleys Cotton Trust, known from 1918 as Eckersleys Ltd). The new enterprise built some of the earliest mills specifically for ring spinning, and additional weaving capacity, to the west of the existing mills. Prolific mill designers Stott and Sons were commissioned, and applied modern fireproof construction techniques (the site had suffered a disastrous fire to Old Mill in 1880, which was also rebuilt by Stotts).

Western mill number 2 included attached buildings comprising an engine house, boiler house and chimney to the south, and beaming and winding rooms to the west. This was the first application and is the best-surviving early example of its triple jack-arch construction (which was patented by the architects). Number 1 mill (National Heritage List for England – NHLE - entry 1384527) had been built in 1884 and number 3 mill (NHLE 1384529) was built in 1900, the three mills illustrating evolutions in mill construction technology.

An 1886 extension to an 1840s weaving shed also occupied the space between western mills 1 and 2. This was the only weaving mill serving all three western spinning blocks (as well as the site’s older mills) until a further weaving shed was added to the west of number 1 mill in 1905. In 1906 this was extended to the north with a two-storey ‘new’ reeling and winding block.

The complex was further expanded with an office block (1904, extended with a north-light winding room in 1912 – NHLE 1384531), and unusually, a purpose-built on-site workers’ welfare building (around 1918, NHLE 1384530) with dining rooms and entertainment hall.

The original 1840s weaving shed, Jenny Mill (1823), Old Mill and Large Mill (1842) were largely demolished in the 1960s as part of a rationalisation programme. A late-C20 industrial estate partly replaced, but incorporates some elements of, the 1886 weaving shed extension. A service turret was added to the north face of number 2 mill in the 1950s. The mill was listed in 1994. The roof and top floor of the mill were largely removed around 2010, and asphalt applied to the concrete floor of the top storey to form a new roof. The beaming and winding room was removed in 2019 and the engine house, boiler house and chimney were removed in 2020.

Eckersleys’ colossal works were, at the height of production in the 1920s, one of the largest integrated textile manufactories in the country, operating more than 250,000 spindles and 1,650 looms in 6 spinning and 2 weaving mills on a site of approximately 51,000 sqm, and employing over 3,000 people. The company were the largest ring-spinners in the country from 1888 to 1918, and operated here until 1968. Atypically, as well as the mills, from the late-C19 the site accommodated allotment gardens, and (after the First World War) bowling greens and other sports grounds, as well as the welfare building. James and Nathaniel Eckersley also built several streets of houses (now demolished) and the Church of SS James and Thomas (NHLE 1384468) in nearby Poolstock for their workers.

In framed ring spinning, the drawing and twisting of a roving, and winding the resultant yarn onto a spindle, are a continuous process. This is more efficient than spinning mules, which draw and twist with one stroke, and wind on a return stroke. Although largely rejected in Lancashire after its invention in the USA in 1929, it was reintroduced to the English industry in the 1870s by textile-machine maker Samuel Brooks of Gorton (Manchester). Over the next 30 years or so it largely replaced the similar throstle-frames which had developed here (and had been used, for example, at Wigan’s Gidlow works of 1868, NHLE 1384455).

Wigan’s early adoption of ring spinning reflects the availability of women in its workforce. With mule spinning largely done by men the C19 textile industry consistently employed around 60 per cent women overall, and in cotton weaving. However, in the decades before 1914, ring spinning was almost an exclusively female occupation. Also, fewer men were employed in weaving where other ‘men’s work’ was available – such as Wigan’s coal mining. Eckersleys’ workforce was remarkably female-dominated, with women making up around 95% of the total.

AH Stott and Sons of Oldham was a practice of engineering architects responsible for designing around 20% of all new cotton spinning mills in Lancashire between 1880 and 1914. The founder Abraham Henthorn Stott (1822 to 1904) was joined in partnership by sons Jesse (1853 to 1917) in 1875 and Abraham Henthorn Stott junior (1856 to 1931) in 1877. The two Abrahams in particular were responsible for a number of innovations in construction, notably employing various configurations of metal beams and brick arches for fire resistance. Their brother Philip Sidney Stott (1858 to 1937) was a partner from 1881 to 1884 (when Abraham senior also retired), and then set up a rival practice. The partners also became directors and shareholders in several mill-building companies (known as ‘the limiteds’) which in the later-C19 and early-C20 were the principal builders of new mills.

Reasons for Listing

Swan Meadow works western mill number 2, a cotton spinning mill (part of an integrated complex) of 1888, by AH Stott and Sons, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* it is an impressive example of cotton mill architecture, designed by prolific and innovative architect AH Stott junior, with notable Italianate detailing in particular enhancing the full-height entrance tower and corner turrets, and the junction with the former engine-house;

* its retained spaces housed all of its original processes, and together with other elements of the integrated mill complex (in particular the 1886 weaving shed extension and blocks for winding and reeling) its process flow remains legible;

* it is the first, and best-surviving early example, of its triple jack-arch construction (patented by the architects) and, together with mills 1 and 3 on this site, contributes to displaying important stages in the improvements to mill construction techniques during the late C19 ranging from iron framing with brick arches to steel framing with concrete floors.

Historic interest:

* Eckersleys’ workforce was remarkably female-dominated, with ring-spinning being an almost exclusively female occupation, and led to the site’s early adoption of this improved technology;

* together with the other surviving historic buildings on the site it expresses the firm’s substantial late-C19 and early-C20 investment and expansion that created one of the largest integrated textile production sites in the country.

Group value:

* it is a key component of Eckersleys’ Swan Meadow works and has strong visual, functional and contextual group value with mills 1 and 3, the workers’ welfare building and the gatehouse, office and winding block.

External Links

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