51 CLARENDON ST.

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Victorian end-of-terrace two-bay three-storey redbrick Georgian-style townhouse, built c.1862. Rectangular on plan with large projecting modern rear return. Principal elevation faces North onto Clarendon Street set behind a low cement rendered wall with concrete coping and painted wrought-iron railings above. Built as part of a terrace row of similar houses of this type lining the north and south side of Clarendon Street. Slated pitched roof with single dormer to the front and rear.

Principal elevation is set in Flemish brick bond on painted rendered plinth base; square-headed window openings set within painted concrete reveals and painted sills; all windows are 6/6 timber sliding sash with two windows to the ground, first and second floor levels; elliptical arched opening to entrance doorway with moulded cornice supported by scrolled corbel brackets on moulded pilasters either side of a painted double-panelled timber door and plain fanlight above; a coupled 1/1 timber sliding sash to dormer window. Timber gate to the right hand side of the front elevation (west) closes off the access to the side and rear of the property.

East side is abutted by adjoining building No.49 Clarendon Street (HB01/21/00W).

West elevation is blank, cement rendered with projecting chimney stack.

South elevation is three-storeys of cement rendered unpainted finished with a two-storey unpainted cement rendered rear return built at half-landing height, abutted by a large two-storey modern extension spanning the width of both properties to the rear of No.49 & 51 with four modern velux roof lights to each side of a slated pitched roof. The fenestration pattern is irregular, with a single 6/6 sliding sash window to ground, first and second floors, and 6/3 sliding sash to attic level and a coupled 1/1 sliding sash to dormer window.

Pitched slated roof has black clay ridge tiles to main roof, rear return and both dormers. Large redbrick chimney stack rising from the East side and a large cement rendered chimney stack rising from the West gable, centred on ridge with seven circular clay pots to each. Cast-iron guttering and circular downpipe to front.

Setting:
Built as part of a row of twelve mid-Victorian townhouses which line the south side of Clarendon Street. Located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, the front of the property faces north and is set behind a low cement rendered wall with concrete coping and painted wrought-iron railings above.

Materials:
Roof Natural Slate
RWG Cast Iron
Walling Flemish Brick Bond
Windows Timber Sliding Sash

Historical information

Clarendon Street, characterised by its long terraces of Georgian-style townhouses, was laid out in the early-Victorian period with the construction of the first dwellings commencing in c. 1853. The laying out of similar terraced dwellings on Great James Street and Queen Street was necessitated by a period of growth in the economy and population of Londonderry that occurred in the mid-19th century. John Hume notes that during the period 1825-1850 ‘reconstruction of the city’s buildings [within the walls] took place alongside the development, for the first time, of housing outside the walls at Bogside and Edenballymore’ (Hume, p. 147).

The first edition of the Ordnance Survey maps (1830) for the townland of Edenballymore records that the Clarendon Street area was originally rural hinterland with few significant structures. In 1830 the development of the city’s streets had extended no further than Waterloo Place, Abbey Street and William Street. In the first decades of the 19th century the only major construction north of the walls had been isolated buildings such as the Londonderry Infirmary, the Lunatic Asylum and Foyle College (HB01/22/016) with little or no domestic architecture being erected in the same period. The only building in the area that predates the early-Victorian development is Foyle Cottage (HB01/21/006), a Regency house constructed c. 1815 and which, according to Calley, is ‘a pleasing composition which offers a gentle rebuke to some of the exuberance of later nearby buildings … one of it’s pleasant features is that it opens a gap in the long terraces’ (Calley, p. 116).

In The Annals of Derry, a survey of the city compiled by Robert Simpson and published in 1847, Simpson recorded that ‘all the district now covered by Great James’s Street, William Street, Little James Street … and the numerous lanes in that vicinity [originally comprised] meadow ground without a house’ (Simpson, p. 213). The initial development of housing in this area began in the late-Georgian period and continued into the Victorian era. With the construction of uniform rows of neat and charming three-storey townhouses, a new affluent area was established that swiftly became the residence of the city’s merchant and professional classes. The laying out of Clarendon Street, Great James Street and Queen Street followed a geometric street pattern which was characteristic of Georgian street development; the development signified the most ambitious project of town planning carried out in Londonderry since the construction of the walled city in the years 1613-19.

The contemporary 1847 plan of Londonderry, which depicted the proposed layout of Clarendon Street at least a decade before it was actually completed, recorded that the street was originally known as Ponsonby Street. The street was named after the Rt. Rev. Richard Ponsonby (1772-1853), Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, however by the 1850s the street had been renamed Clarendon Street in honour of the Fourth Earl of Clarendon, George Villiers (1800-1870), Lord Lieutentant of Ireland between 1847 and 1852. The second edtion of the Ordnance Survey map records that Ponsoby Street had been renamed Clarendon Street by at least 1853. Although the 1847 plan of Londonderry depicted that Clarendon Street extended from the quay up to Francis Street, only the bottom section of Clarendon Street (between the Strand Road and Queen Street) had been laid out by 1853.

The development of Clarendon Street progressed slowly throughout the 1850s. Mullin records that development of the remainder of the street did not recommence until the mid-1850s. In 1851 Skipton & Miller had advertised building ground on Clarendon Street, Queen Street and Patrick Street to be let in perpetuity. Griffith’s Valuation recorded that only nine dwellings had been constructed along the entire length of the street by 1856. In that year additional leases were advertised for building ground on the northern side of Clarendon Street (Mullin, p. 117).

Nos 29-51 Clarendon Street were constructed in 1862 as part of the second phase in the laying out of Clarendon Street. No. 51 (along with the adjoining nos 41-49) was constructed for James Corscaden, a grain merchant who held business premises on Shipquay Place (Ulster Town Directories). The building was originally valued at £28 in 1862. Throughout its history the occupants of Clarendon Street were of the city’s merchant and professional classes. In 1901 No. 51 Clarendon Street was occupied by David Boal, a merchant and grocer who held business premises on the Strand Road and Bishop Street. The census building return of that year described his house as a 1st class dwelling that consisted of ten rooms. Corscaden continued to own nos 45-51 Clarendon Street until 1913 when Dr. David J. Browne, the chief medical officer at Londonderry’s workhouse, purchased the row. In 1935 the First Revaluation recorded that No. 51 had increased in value to £37. By the Second Revaluation (1956-72) No. 51 and the adjoining No. 49 had been combined into a single property that was used by the Northern Ireland Hospitals Authority as a nurses home and training school. In 1964 the former nurses home was converted into a boarding house which was valued at £108 by the end of the Second Revaluation.

In 1978 the Department of the Environment designated Clarendon Street (and the surrounding streets) a Conservation Area ‘being an area of special architectural or historic interest, the character of which it is desirable to preserve or enhance’ (Londonderry Clarendon Street Conservation Area Booklet). No. 51 Clarendon Street was subsequently listed in 1979. The NIEA HB Records note that nos 49-51 Clarendon Street underwent extensive renovation work in 1984-85 which included the reconstruction of one chimney stack, the reslating of their roofs in natural slate and the overhaul of the sliding sash glazing. In 2002-2004 nos 49-51 Clarendon Street was changed from residential use to office premises. The conversion included the installation of the railings and the repointing of the brickwork to the front façade. The two-storey extension to the rear of building was also constructed at this time (NIEA HB Records).

In 2013 Calley described nos 41-51 as ‘three-and-a-half-storey, two-bay terrace houses [which] unlike those opposite have an extra window bay on the ground floor. The principle difference is that they have roof dormers facing the street and instead of doorway Doric columns the entablatures are supported by scrolled brackets’ (Calley, p. 116). Few of the mid-Victorian townhouses along Clarendon Street are now occupied as residential dwellings. The majority of the three-storey buildings were converted into offices for local dentists, solicitors and accountancy firms in the late-20th century. During the Second Survey No. 51 Clarendon Street was utilised as office space for a local architect’s firm and was no longer connected to the adjoining No. 49.

References

Primary Sources
1. PRONI OS/6/5/20/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1830)
2. PRONI OS/6/5/20/2 – Second Edition Ordnanec Survey Map (1853)
3. PRONI VAL/2/B/5/16G – Griffith’s Valuation (1856)
4. PRONI VAL/12/B/32/11B-ZA – Annual Revisions (1862-1897)
5. PRONI VAL/12/B/33/2C-2F – Annual Revisions (1898-1931)
6. PRONI VAL/3/B/6/4 – First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland (1935)
7. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13 – Second General Revaluation of Northern Ireland (1956-72)
8. Robert Simpson’s ‘Annals of Derry’ (1847)
9. O’Hagan’s plan of Londonderry (1847)
10. Census of Ireland (1901; 1911)
11. Ulster Town Directories (1843-1918)
12. First Survey Record – HB01/21/005 (1970)
13. First Survey Image – HB01/21/005 (No Date)
14. NIEA HB Record – HB01/21/005X

Secondary Sources
1. Calley, D., ‘City of Derry: An historical gazetteer to the buildings of Londonderry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 2013.
2. Ferguson, W. S; Rowan, A. J; Tracey, J. J., ‘List of historic buildings, groups of buildings, areas of architectural importance in and near the city of Derry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1970.
3. Hume, J., ‘Derry beyond the walls: Social and economic aspects of the growth of Derry 1825-1850’ Belfast: Ulster Historical Foundation, 2002.
4. Mullin, T. H., Ulster’s Historic City: Derry – Londonderry’ Coleraine: Coleriane Bookshop, 1986.
5. Rowan, A. J., ‘The Buildings of Ireland: North West Ulster’ London: Yale University Press, 2003.
6. ‘Londonderry Clarendon Street Conservation Area Booklet’ Department of the Environment, 1978.
7. ‘Design Guide for Clarendon Street Conservation Area’ Department of the Environment, 2012.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
X. Local Interest
R. Age

Evaluation

End-of-terrace two-bay three-storey with attic red brick Georgian-style townhouse, built in 1862 along with Nos. 29-49 Clarendon Street (HB01/21/005M-W). It has group value with Nos. 5-49 and 55-73 which were built over a twenty-one year period and line the south side of the street. No.51 is a fine example retaining much of its external historic character, consistent for its time and style and the house forms an integral part of the terrace as a whole. Located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area, the well preserved setting adds to its interest. The terrace represents the mid 19th century development of the city of Derry and the house is a noteworthy example of the type of property built during this period of growth in the economy and population of the city.