16 Great James Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Three-storey three-bay Georgian-style mottled brown brick terraced townhouse, built c.1853. Rectangular on plan with principal elevation facing South onto Great James Street with two-storey rear return. Built as part of a terrace of three similarly scaled houses to the North side of the street and one of the earliest in terms of domestic architecture within the Clarendon Conservation Area.

Entrance to South elevation facing onto Great James Street of Flemish bond brick; re-pointing carried out c.1987. Replacement windows throughout (c.1987) with 6/6 painted timber sliding sash windows to ground floor and first floors and 6/3 sliding sash windows to second floor, all with rendered reveals and square headed openings to south elevation. Pitched slate roof with two metal conservation rooflights to S slope, black clay ridge with large redbrick chimney-stack rising from west-end of No.16, centred on ridge with 7 clay pots; header-course brick corbel to eaves.

South (principal) elevation faces onto Great James Street with a recessed entrance in an elliptical-arched opening flanked by Doric columns with four-panelled painted timber door case, accessed via a single step.

North elevation of irregular fenestration consisting of 6/6, 6/3 and 3/3 timber casement windows overlooking rear yard with lean-to slate roof to rear return. Walls are rendered.

East and West elevations are abutted by adjoining buildings, No.14 Great James Street and No.18 Great James Street (HB01/21/035B).

Setting:
On the pavement, mid terrace, facing south on Great James Street, with enclosed yard, accessed from Patrick street at rear, within the Clarendon Conservation Area.

Materials:
Roof : Natural Slate
RWG: Aluminium (S) uPVC (N)
Walling: Brick (S) Render: smooth, unpainted (N)
Windows: Timber Sliding Sash (S), replacement -1st survey slide shows 1/1 panes to windows. Timber Multipaned Casement (N)
Door: Original panelled

Historical information

Great James Street was originally laid out in c. 1833, with the first buildings constructed along the street by at least 1835-37; the earliest building on the street, Londonderry Third Presbyterian Church (HB01/21/009), was erected during those years. The laying out of Great James Street, as well as the adjoining Queen Street and Clarendon Street, was neccesitated by a period of growth in the economy and population of Londonderry that occurred in the mid-nineteenth century. John Hume notes that during the period 1825-1850 ‘reconstruction of the city’s buildings [within the city walls] took place alongside the development for the first time of housing outside the walls at Bogside and Edenballymore’ (Hume, p. 147).

Great James Street was the first major new street in the area (Queen Street was laid out in c. 1847 and Clarendon Street in c. 1853). The first edition of the Ordnance Survey maps (1830) for the townland of Edenballymore records that the Great James 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 Clarendon Street Conservation Area that predates the early-Victorian development is Foyle Cottage (HB01/21/006), a Regency house that was constructed c. 1815.

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 three-storey townhouses, a new affluent area was established that swiftly became the preferred 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 1613-19.

No. 16 Great James Street was constructed between 1847 and 1853. O’Hagan’s contemporary plan of Londonderry records that Great James Street had been partially developed by 1847, however the map did not depict any buildings on the current site at that time; however, by the second edition Ordnance Survey map (1853) a small terrace of buildings had been built on the north side of the street. The terrace originally comprised four identical Georgian-style buildings, nos 16-22 Great James Street, each of which possessed a rear return and a single outbuilding; No. 22 was rebuilt in 1903 and is now significantly different to the adjoining terrace.

Griffith’s Valuation (1856) records that nos 16-22 Great James Street were constructed for Andrew Thompson, a local surgeon who operated a apothecary on the Strand Road (Ulster Town Directory); No. 16 was originally valued at £27 in 1856. Andrew Thompson continued to own the terrace on Great James Street until his death in c. 1870 when his widow Margaret Thompson took over possession of row. Throughout its history the occupants of the Clarendon Street area were of the city’s merchant and professional classes; the first occupant, a Mr. William Holmes, was a grocer with business premises on Shipquay Place whilst in 1911 the building was the dwelling of William Patterson, a local dentist and anaesthetist. The census building return of that year described Patterson’s home as a 1st class dwelling that consisted of eight rooms and possesed no outbuildings (suggesting that the outbuilding depicted on the 1853 map had been demolished by that time). Patterson continued to reside at the site by the cancellation of the Annual Revisions; the revisions noted that the value of No. 16 stood at £21 in 1931. In 1907 ownership of No. 16 Great James Street had passed to a Mrs. McKee, however by the First Revaluation of 1935 a Mrs. Carnwath had taken over ownership of the building; in that year the value was increased to £27. By 1956 Carnwath had converted the former dwelling into a private medical surgery; the value of the building stood at £36 by the end of the Second Revaluation in 1972.

In 1978 the Department of the Environment designated the mid-nineteenth century streets and terraces as 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). Nos 16-18 Great James Street were subsequently listed in 1979.

The NIEA HB Records note that a restoration of the building c.1987 included the reslating of the roof, the repointing of the brickwork and the replacement of the sash windows. A further refurbishment of the front facade was undertaken in 2010 when the interior floorplan was reorganised to provide additional office accomodation. In 2013 Calley described nos 16-20 Great James Street as a ‘fine small terrace of three mottled brown brick houses now mostly in commercial use. They are three-storey, three-bay with rendered reveals.’ No. 20 Great James Street was not listed along with the adjoining terrace due to the rendering of the ground floor and the incorporation of uPVC glazing (Calley, p. 220). Few of the Georgian-style townhouses along Great James Street are now occupied as residential dwellings; the majority of the three-storey buildings were converted into offices for local dentist, solicitors and accountancy firms in the late-20th century. No. 16 Great James Street continues to be utilised as office space.

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 Property in Northern Ireland (1935)
7. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13-14 – Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956-72)
8. Robert Simpson’s ‘Annals of Derry’ (1847)
9. O’Hagan’s plan of Londonderry (1847)
10. Ulster Town Directories (1843-1918)
11. Census of Ireland (1901; 1911)
12. First Survey Record – HB01/21/005HH (1970)
13. First Survey Image – HB01/21/005HH (No Date)
14. NIEA HB Records – HB01/21/005HH

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
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Three-storey three-bay brown brick Georgian-style townhouse, built as part of a terrace of three to the north side of Great James Street within the period 1847-53 (early Victorian). Despite replacement windows to the rear and commercial signage to the front, much of the exterior character, style and historic fabric have been retained as well as the original plan form. Together with No.18 Great James Street (HB01/21/0035B) with which it shares group value, No. 16 is an important example of early domestic architecture witin the Clarendon Conservation Area and it is also historically significant as part of the city's expansion northwards beyond the city walls.

General comments

This record was re-numbered previously recorded as HB01/21/005HH.