Lower Bank Bottom Mill

This mill is marked on the 1801 Township Map. An auction catalogue of c1820 describes the mill as being -

“A Fulling and Scribbling Mill, three Stories high besides the Attic, 46 Feet 6 Inches in length, and 31 Feet 6 Inches in breadth, with a Fall of 17 Feet 11 Inches on the Wessenden River, together with Fulling Stocks, Water Wheel, Going Gear, and, Weirs, and Water-courses, and also the Blacksmith and Carpenter's Shop."

Also included in the sale were sundry cottages, outbuildings, dwelling house, barns a stable and 30 acres of grass and woodland. Since 1801 this mill together with Ottiwells Mill were the property of Abraham and John Horsfall.

Lower Bank Bottom Mill is shown on the 1854 O.S. map with Bank Bottom Bridge crossing the river to provide access for traffic to and from the mill and a track leading down to Binn Road. An auction of the mill was advertised in the Leeds Mercury on 29th October, 1851 with a full description of the property.

“The Mill is worked by a powerful wheel, 20 feet in diameter by 6 feet wide, with a never-failing supply of water, and about 14 horses power. The premises embrace scribbling and slubbing, weaving and spinning rooms, dye houses, wool and tenter stoves with the needful boiler houses and boilers, warehouses and counting houses, gas works, sheds and various outbuildings.”

During the thirty years or so prior to this last description many developments had taken place driven by the advance of industrialisation in the textile industry. This mill now included all the processes necessary for the production of cloth ready to go to market. The advertisement also emphasised that the mill was 'well roaded and near to the canal. The property was in a complete state of repair. Unfortunately this was not to last.

On 29th March, 1858 the Leeds Mercury reported that the mill had had a fire. Whitehead, in 'Bygone Marsden', relates that 'one length of the mill was burnt down creating something of a record among mill fires'. The mill was rebuilt with considerable extensions.

Joseph, William and Elon Crowther, trading as John Crowther and Sons, rented Lower Bank Bottom Mill in 1867 until 1901 when Huddersfield Corporation purchased the mill as part of the Butterley Reservoir project referred to above and used the main building as a storehouse. On completion of the reservoir the mill remained empty and was finally demolished in 1913 to make way for the Butterley spillway.