Details
603/0/10040
12-JAN-04
GNOSALL
OUTWOODS
Attached farmbuildings at Coley Farm, including stables, cart sheds, mill, malthouse and kiln
GV
II
Planned model farmstead, disused at the time of inspection (August, 2003). 1830s and 1840s, with minor later alterations. Red brick with slate roofs. Linked group of model farm buildings including stables, cart sheds, threshing barns, aisled cow shed (listed separately), malthouse, and water mill around a cobbled yard.
STABLE: Long range to road with canted corner, red brick in modified Flemish bond with dentil eaves course. King post timber trusses with raking struts, double purlins. Hipped slate roofs. Brick piers with concrete block infill. Corner range communicates with hipped roof structure to short return with arched opening with stone dressings, then attached boundary wall to additional stabling range with stable door to east and paired doors in gable facing cobbled yard to south. To left, several openings, all with segmental heads and stone banded dressings. Floored with heavy chamfered beams and joists, king post timber trusses with raking struts and double purlins. Perpendicular and to the west is cartshed.
CART SHED: Open to east onto cobbled yard, with 2 brick piers under flat stone capitals. 4 king post timber trusses with raking struts and double purlins. Hipped return to south connects with mill.
MILL: Tall covered roof structure with single king post timber truss, open below, connects small range to north (to rear of cart shed) that has paired wide openings under segmental heads, to main mill to south. This is entered by a full height narrow opening with segmental arched head and stone dressings. Within this, a tall room with similar king-post truss roof and blocked tall arched opening to opposite wall. To east and in parallel range to south, tall range with full height opening to yard, and high circular window to south wall. Floored with surviving line shafting, watermill machinery, and attic space with roof structure to accommodate central aisle. Water mill with metal blades survives. To east of this lower gabled range with paired openings to north. Parallel range to rear has circular opening to gable, and multiple ground and first floor openings to south side, including circular window, doors with segmental arched lintels and stone quoin, windows at first floor with stone cills.
MALTHOUSE and KILN: Attached to southwest corner of mill, 2-storey malthouse runs southward with slightly taller single bay kiln at end. Small paned square windows at ground and first floors with shallow segmental heads and stone cills. Malthouse floored with king post timber trusses.
HISTORY: The 1800-1840 period was one of increased mechanisation, using horse, water or steam power, and Coley Mill is a fine example of a well-equipped, early-C19 model farm with mechanised milling. Coley Mill is marked on the first O.S. map for Staffordshire, which was surveyed in 1833-34, and Coley Mill along with the rick yard, barn, hovel, house, garden, etc. are indicated on the 1839 Tythe Map of Gnosall. The present corn mill is apparently dated 1842, although there has been a water mill on this site since the C16.
SOURCES: VCH Staffs vol.4, pp.127-8.
An early-C19 model farmstead including water mill, malthouse with kiln, stables, barns, aisled cow shed (listed separately) and cart sheds, that survives mostly unaltered including internal machinery and which contributes to our understanding of these types of buildings nationally.
