Today's Object of the Week is a pair of surviving iron wheels, representing a rare link to a County Durham town's industrial past.
Beside County Bridge in Barnard Castle, on the Startforth side of the River Tees, two iron wheels remain from the machinery that once controlled the water channel serving a global business
A plaque identifies them as relics of the Ullathorne's flax mill, linking today's riverside scene to more than two centuries of industrial history.
A plaque on the Barnard Castle relic, explaining the link to Ullathorne's (Image: SARAH CALDECOTT)
The wheels were part of the sluice mechanism. By turning them, workers could raise or lower gates to regulate the flow of water into the mill race - an artificial channel built to divert flow from the river to the mill.
This controlled supply was essential to power the mill's turbines and machinery. Without such equipment, the factory could not have operated.
Surviving iron wheels in Barnard Castle, once part of the mechanism that controlled the mill race at Ullathorne's flax mill (Image: SARAH CALDECOTT)
The business was founded by Francis Ullathorne in 1760, with the large water‑powered mill built in about 1798.
Raw flax was imported from Belgium, Ireland, France, and Russia, then processed into ultra‑strong waxed shoe thread, twine, and rope.
These products were used by shoemakers and saddlers, and even for salmon nets.
Ullathorne's flax mill at Barnard Castle (Image: THE NORTHERN ECHO)
Ullathorne's exported across the British Empire, to Australia, Spain, and Turkey, and maintained a branch in Paris to serve local shoemakers there - known as cordonniers.
In its heyday during the 19th century, the company was one of the largest shoe‑thread manufacturers in the country and the biggest employer in Teesdale, with up to 250 men, women, and boys working there.
Evidence of the Barnard Castle firm's scale survives in its billheads, which advertised a global reach and displayed medals won at trade fairs in Philadelphia and Paris in 1876.
Ullathorne's billhead, noting that it was a truly global company (Image: THE NORTHERN ECHO)
The company also operated premises away from the riverbank, including a heckling shop in Queen Street where flax was split and straightened before spinning.
The mill's fortunes declined in the 20th century and cheap foreign competition led to closure in 1931.
During the Second World War, soldiers were stationed in the building, and in later years it was reused for stabling horses, mushroom growing, lemonade bottling, and poultry processing.
Partially demolished Ullathorne's mill, beside the River Tees, seen through one of the arches of the County Bridge (Image: THE NORTHERN ECHO)
By the 1970s, the structure had become unsafe, with slates blowing from its high roofs onto traffic crossing the bridge.
Demolition began in late 1975, with the landmark chimney brought down in February 1976. Its base is marked today by a plinth in the riverside picnic area.
Although the mill itself has gone, remnants of its water‑management system remain.
A relic of the mechanism that controlled the mill race at Ullathorne's flax mill in Barnard Castle (Image: SARAH CALDECOTT)
The surviving wheels are among the most visible, but other pieces of sluice machinery can still be found along the riverbank.
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Together, they illustrate the practical engineering that allowed Barnard Castle to harness the Tees for industrial power.
The wheels are not decorative objects but functional components of a system that sustained a global enterprise.
Their survival provides direct evidence of how water power was managed and connects present‑day visitors to the town's industrial past.