Woodgreen Blanket Factory

Photograph of Fulling operation at Early’s Mill
Photograph of Fulling operation at Early’s Mill

This three-storey Cotswold stone structure was probably built around 1830. The building has uniform rows of stone arch-headed windows and loading doors on each floor. A map of 1840 shows a long range of buildings here including weaving shops, outbuildings, a house, yard and gardens.

Owned and occupied by the Early blanket making family, this factory was probably intended largely for handloom weaving, with storage and warehousing on upper floors. It was not a mill in the full sense as only certain parts of the blanket making process seem to have been carried out here: having no water source meant that fulling must have been carried out at other locations in the town. The factory here ended its working life as a joinery and has since been converted into housing.

John Wesley preached to the workers on Woodgreen in 1761. Thereafter this became an annual event, until his death in 1789. It is recorded that in bad weather he would hold his meetings indoors.