Textile mill - building of stone and brick, slate roof, 4 storeys, 22 bays long. The River Maun is ponded and most of the water passes through the sluice into the mill where the wheel was situated. The original mill is still standing but many extensions of different periods are built onto it. The mill is rectangular. Stone walled mill and other parts now used for storage by Clumber Brick Co. Machinery removed (04/06/1963). (1)
Shown on (2).
Hermitage Mill in Hermitage Lane, three and four-storey stone with a later brick extension but with its mill-dam preserved. (3)
A large mill probably built before the end of the eighteenth century … There are a number of later extensions of no great interest. (4)
This was one of five water-powered cotton mills on the River Maun financed by the Duke of Portland. (5)
Former water-powered textile mill. Late C18, with early, mid and late C19 and C20 alterations and additions. For the fourth Duke of Portland. (6)
If this is L18, then it could not have been 'for the fouth Duke' as he did not succeed to this title until 1809, at the age of 41. (7)
Earliest reference to a mill on this site is 1302 when the owner was Thomas Beck, Bishop of St David's, and his tenant was the Prior of Lenton, who used it as a summer house…. The wheelhouse is centrally placed but all traces of machinery have long gone. The mill pond remains and bypass sluice. A lease of 1835 mentions Hermitage Cotton Mill including cottages, stores, dam, waterwheels, fan wheels, cast iron upright and tumbling shafts and cast iron wheels. It was built in the late C18 and leased from the Duke of Portland. (8)
The boom in mill building occurred between 1780 and 1788, by the latter year there were at least 208 mills in operation in England (Trinder 1990, 58). Hermitage Mill is a good example of a cotton mill from this period with much original fabric surviving, though the original machinery has all been removed. It is of note that the layout of the wheel pit and the location of the gearing mechanism at Hermitage Mill is the same as that recorded in 1843 at Field Mill, also located on the River Maun. The mill continued to be developed into the early twentieth century and many of these building phases are present though unfortunately the majority of the original fixtures and fittings, including the steam engine, are absent. Of interest is the chimney which is probably associated with a type of hot air system pioneered by William Strutt. Hot air heating systems were prevalent across the Midlands during the later eighteenth and early nineteenth century as it was safer than having open fires within a fibre filled environment of a cotton mill, where a small spark could easily ignite he ready supply of fuel which the raw cotton and yarn provided. The technology was pioneered by William Strutt in his Derby mills, most notably North Mill, which was rebuilt after a fire in the 1790s.(9)

Data Held (Document). SNT2647.

Sketch, IS card

Data Held: Ground Photograph (Ground photograph). SNT2646.

3 BW print, SMR

Listed buildings slides, 2 slides (Photograph). SNT2648.

<1> CBA, Industrial Survey (Published document). SNT184.

Other Refs: IA4 50/8

<2> Sanderson G, 1835, 20 miles around Mansfield - 2 in (Map). SNT48.

<3> Pevsner N, 1979, The Buildings of England: Nottinghamshire 2nd ed., p 174 (Monograph). SNT4.

<4> Smith DM, 1965, The Industrial Archaeology of the East Midlands, p 259 (Published document). SNT1304.

<5> Palmer M & Neaverson P, 1992, Industrial Landscapes of the East Midlands, p 109 (Monograph). SNT5.

<6> DOE, Listed Building Description (Published document). SNT228.

<7> White J, 2004, Pers Comm (Personal comment). SNT1728.

<8> Morley D, 1997, Corn and Cotton - Waterpower in Notts (draft), p 19 (Unpublished document). SNT1693.

<9> Trent & Peak Archaeology, 2015, Hermitage Mill, Hermitage Lane, Mansfield Level 3 Building Report (Unpublished document). SNT5635.