Coldharbour Mill Working Wool Museum facts for kids
Coldharbour Mill is a very old textile mill in Devon, England. It's near the village of Uffculme. This mill has been making wool products non-stop since 1797. That makes it one of the oldest working wool mills in the world! It was once owned by a company called Fox Brothers. Today, it is a special historic building, protected by English Heritage.
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Where is Coldharbour Mill?
Coldharbour Mill is easy to find, just off the M5 motorway. It's close to Uffculme village and the border with Somerset. The mill needed a lot of water to work. So, Thomas Fox, who bought the mill, chose this spot because of the nearby River Culm. In 1797, he wrote that the stream was "good."
Back then, roads were very bad. Finished cloth had to be carried by horses to ports like Topsham and Exeter. Or it went by cart to bigger cities like Bristol and London. A trip to London could take twelve days!
A Glimpse into History
People think there has been a mill here since Saxon times. The Domesday Book, a very old record, mentions two mills in the Uffculme area.
At its busiest, Fox Brothers employed about 5,000 people. They owned nine mills and factories across England. One famous mill they bought in 1920 was Bliss Mill in Chipping Norton. It was built in 1872 after a fire. Bliss Mill was one of the grandest mills in England. It even had a reading room, a chapel, and homes for workers.
The main Fox Brothers site was in Wellington. It was huge, covering 10 acres. This mill was special because it made both worsted and woollen products. It controlled the whole process, from raw wool to finished cloth, all in one place.
The Fox Family: Mill Founders
The Fox family, who owned the mill, were early members of the Religious Society of Friends. This religious group is also known as Quakers. The family had been involved in making cloth for a long time.
In 1772, Thomas Fox joined the Were and Company business. He was 25 years old. The Were family were successful cloth makers. Thomas and his wife, Sarah Smith, built Tone Dale House in 1801. A Fox family member still lives there today! In 1826, when Thomas's sons became partners, the business changed its name to Fox Brothers.
The Fox family was important in local life. They invested money in the Grand Western Canal. This canal helped transport goods.
Banking and Business
In 1787, Were and Company needed more money. So, they started printing their own "promises to pay" notes. These were like early bank notes. Local businesses liked them. In 1797, during a time of worry, Thomas Fox printed even more notes. This helped his business keep growing.
The bank started by the Fox family, Fox, Fowler and Company, grew very big. It had over fifty branches. It could even print its own bank notes until 1921. Then, a larger bank, Lloyds Bank, took it over. You can see one of the original notes at Tone Dale House.
What Textiles Were Made?
In the past, Exeter was a major center for wool trade in England. Cloth was sent to countries like France, Holland, and Germany. A strong cloth called kersey was popular. Later, serge became the main product. The Were family were big suppliers of serge to Holland.
A writer named Celia Fiennes described the Exeter cloth market in the late 1600s. She said an "incredible quantity" of serges were made and sold. The whole area, for 20 miles around, was busy with spinning, weaving, and finishing serges. She noted that £10,000 to £15,000 was paid out in cash every week!
However, wars in Europe in the late 1700s caused problems for cloth merchants. The market for English cloth shrank. Some merchants moved to London. The Weres started making "long ells," a fine white serge, for the East India Company.
When the East India Company's special trading rights ended in 1833, the demand for long ells dropped. Thomas Fox then started making flannel. This was sold in England and America. Because of his Quaker beliefs, Thomas Fox refused to sell flannel to the East India Company when he learned it would be used for making cartridges.
In 1881, the British Army needed new uniforms. They wanted khaki cloth. Fox Brothers decided to try for the contract. They thought making 5,000 puttees (strips of cloth wrapped around the leg) would save lives and create jobs. Fox Brothers became the main maker of puttees. They made about 850 miles of the cloth during World War I!
To help with flannel production, Coldharbour Mill started making worsted yarn in 1865. This needed more power for new combing machines. Worsted yarn is made from long wool fibers that are combed to lie parallel.
Today, Coldharbour Mill is a "working wool museum." It uses its old machines to show how wool products were made. You can even buy the items they make, like worsted yarn, tartan cloth, and rugs. The mill has four official tartans, including Devon Original and Somerset.
Mill Architecture and Design
Experts from English Heritage say Coldharbour Mill is "one of the best-preserved textile mill complexes in the country." It still has all the buildings and power systems from the 1800s, plus much of its 20th-century machinery.
Coldharbour Mill mainly made wool yarn for the weaving machines at the Wellington mill. The original mill was likely a three-story building. A map from 1834 shows the water channels are still in the same place today.
The main mill building started in 1799. It was very large for its time, 39 feet wide and 123 feet long. Thomas Fox described how the new mill would work. It would have three floors, each with machines for preparing and spinning wool. An inventory from 1802 shows that hand-powered spinning jennies were used. A waterwheel powered the carding machines. By 1816, the mill had worsted spinning machines. A new, more powerful waterwheel was installed in 1822.
The main mill building was made bigger over time. A two-story addition was built, along with a fireproof stone staircase. A fourth floor was added, and a combing shed was built over the water channel.
Steam power was added in three stages. In 1865, a building for a beam engine and a boiler house were built. In the 1890s, a second beam engine arrived. Then, in 1910, the current horizontal engine was installed. The boiler house was made even bigger.
The mill site also has many other buildings. These include stables, a gas house, a carpenter's workshop, and workers' cottages. There's even an air raid shelter from World War II. The water that leaves the waterwheel flows under the combing shed in a wide tunnel.
How the Mill Was Powered
Coldharbour Mill is special because it used both water and steam power for a very long time. Water power was even used for the night shift until 1978.
Water Power
The mill's large waterwheel is still there. It's 18 feet tall and 14 feet wide. This wheel is a rare example of how water and steam power worked together. It kept being used even after a steam engine was added in 1910. The waterwheel still turns most days!
Steam Power
Thomas Fox's brother, Edward, knew about new steam engine technology. He told Thomas about James Watt's engines. In 1782, James Watt was invited to Wellington. Thomas missed the meeting but wrote to Watt. He wondered if steam could power fulling mills when water was low.
However, steam engines were very expensive to run because coal was costly. Also, people were worried about machines taking jobs. This led to the Luddite Movement later on. Thomas wrote in 1785 that manufacturers were "fearful of introducing new machines" because of "popular violence."
So, the first wool spinning machines at the mill, bought in 1791, were powered by horses. This brought the Industrial Revolution to the West Country. Thomas wished he had cheap coal, like areas connected by canals.
Coldharbour Mill didn't get a steam engine until 1865. By then, the railway brought cheap coal. The mill has two large Lancashire boilers. Only one still works. First, a 25 horsepower beam engine was installed. A second one arrived in the 1890s. In 1910, a powerful 300 horsepower engine took over. This engine, along with the waterwheel, ran until the mill closed in 1981.
Today, the large steam engine still works! It runs regularly on "steam up" weekends. It powers the machines on all five floors of the mill using a system of ropes. In 1993, an old beam engine from 1867 was restored and installed at the mill.
The mill also has other steam-powered machines. These include a working fire pump and a very rare old wagon boiler.
Electrical Power
Coldharbour Mill also had a small water turbine to make electricity. It used the 14-foot drop in water level between the upper and lower water channels. It probably only made a small amount of power, maybe for lighting.
Two generators were later installed in the beam engine house. They were powered by the main steam engine. This was likely used for lighting the mill, not for running the machines.
Gas Production
Coldharbour Mill even made its own coal gas on site! This gas was used for lighting the mill, allowing work to happen all night. The building where the gas was made is still standing. Experts say this gas-making facility is "a very rare survival."
Textile Machinery
When Coldharbour Mill closed in 1981, its textile machines were still in place. Most of these machines have been saved. Some weaving machines from the Tonedale site were also brought here.
The lowest part of the mill, the combing shed, was where the raw wool was first cleaned and combed. This involved many steps and special machines. "Opening gill machines" opened up the wool fleeces. Then, the wool was washed in a large machine with steam-heated rollers. After washing, "gill boxes" combed the fibers more and more. A "Noble combing machine" separated the long, good fibers from the short, poor ones.
Today, these old machines are not used for production. Instead, the mill buys British wool that is already prepared and dyed. Up to ten strands of this wool are fed into a modern "Intersecting Gill Box." This machine starts to stretch out the fibers. It can also blend colors to create new ones. The output is called a sliver. This machine makes sure the sliver's weight is constant, which is important for making yarn of the right thickness.
The next step is to stretch the slivers even more. They are also given a small twist to make them stronger. This twisted fiber, called slubbing, is then wound onto a bobbin. At Coldharbour Mill, this is shown on a "draw box." The bobbins then go to another draw box, an older machine from 1898. Here, the thread is stretched even thinner and given a light twist. If this is for Aran yarn, it's called a roving and goes to the spinning machine. For other types of yarn, it goes through another reduction step.
Coldharbour Mill Today
Coldharbour Mill is now a museum run by a charity. It offers educational programs for schools. These programs cover topics like Victorian life, materials, and Britain during wartime.
The mill also has other interesting exhibits:
- A World War II display.
- Shows about how puttees were made.
- An archive about historic buses and transport in the West Country.
- Special visiting exhibitions.
