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Brora, Woollen Mill

Engineering Works (19th Century) (1875)-(1890), Mill (Late 19th Century)-(1998)

Site Name Brora, Woollen Mill

Classification Engineering Works (19th Century) (1875)-(1890), Mill (Late 19th Century)-(1998)

Alternative Name(s) Duke Of Sutherland's Engineering Works; Hunters Of Brora, Old Mill; Sutherland Woollen Mill

Canmore ID 6980

Site Number NC90SW 9

NGR NC 9052 0415

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/6980

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
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Administrative Areas

  • Council Highland
  • Parish Clyne
  • Former Region Highland
  • Former District Sutherland
  • Former County Sutherland

Archaeology Notes

NC90SW 9 9052 0415

For associated workers' housing (NC 9058 0411), shop (NC 9061 0411) and (successor) 'new' mill (NC 901 035), see NC90SW 10, NC90SW 27, NC90SW 29 respectively.

Architecture Notes

NC90SW 9 9052 0415

(Location cited as NC 905 042). Woollen mill, built 1874 as the Duke of Sutherland's Engineering Works. A red-brick building (of local bricks) with one tall bay and one smaller bay, subsequently extended.

J R Hume 1977.

The Sutherland Woollen Mill was built originally as the Engineering Workshops for the Duke of Sutherland's Railway in 1875. The works comprise a large group of predominantly red-brick (the brick coming from the Brora Brickworks nearby) slate-covered buildings, the central block of which contained taller bays within which there were erecting and repair shops. The railway works closed in 1890, and were taken over soon afterwards by T M Hunter, who converted them into the Sutherland Woollen Mill.

The mill acquired electric power in 1913 when Hunter installed a steam-powered electricity generator, the surplus capacity of which was used to provide an early example of electric street lighting, earning Brora the title of 'The Electric City'. Hunter's subsequent demand for coal resulted in the takeover of the neighbouring coal mine in 1914.

Hunters of Brora operated the mill up until 1998, but the layout and fabric of the old engineering works proved increasingly inadequate for its evolving business, which, being a vertically integrated woollen mill, must accommodate production processes ranging from dyeing, carding, teazing, spinning, twisting, and winding yarn through to weaving and finishing a wide variety of cloths for both domestic and international markets. The company therefore decided to move to a new factory on the south side of Brora from August 1998.

Visited by RCAHMS (MKO), 25 June 1998.

J R Hume 1977.

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