[79111] Armley Mills

Leeds Industrial Museum, Armley Mills.

Grade ll* listed.

 

The site of Armley Mills dates from the C16 as a corn and fulling mill. In 1788 Colonel Thomas Lloyd bought the mill and rebuilt it as the largest woollen mills in the world with 18 fulling stocks and 50 looms, managed by Israel Burrows and Christopher Hill. The foundations of the main range are probably of this date; the corn mill was rebuilt at the same time but burnt down in 1797, the rebuild of that date survives.

 

Benjamin Gott rented the mills from Lloyd while Bean Ing mill was being rebuilt after a fire in 1799, in 1804 he agreed to buy the buildings but a major fire destroyed Lloyd's new structure. Gott's new Armley Mills was built on the same site, powered by two water wheels approx 18 feet in diameter and approx 28½ feet long and fitted with gearing which enabled them to exceed the output of steam engines until c1840. The mill contained fulling stocks extending down the centre of the ground floor, scribbling and carding machines on the 2nd and 3rd floors and mechanics workshops on the top floor. Corn milling ceased c1810 and the building was adapted to textile use. The beam engine house was added c1850 by Gott's sons John and William, and the mill extensively reordered at that time.

 

By the 1880s the premises were used by a variety of textile

manufacturers and in 1969 Leeds City purchased the buildings for an industrial museum after a period of neglect.

Done