40 Great James Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Mid-Victorian end-of-terrace two-bay three-storey smooth rendered Georgian-style house. Built 1871-72. Rectangular on plan with a pitched slate roof and tall chimney stack rising to east, rebuilt in modern red brick. Principal elevation faces south accessed directly from street level, one step up. Built as part of a terrace grouping with No's 36 & 38 Great James Street (HB01/21/035 F&G) among similar houses of this type on the north side of Great James Street.

Principal elevation (south) is of smooth painted rendered walls with smooth plaster band quoins either side to first and second floor levels; window openings are square-headed on painted masonry sills, continuous painted sill to first floor level, with 6/6 timber sliding sashes to ground, first and second floors, bays on ground floor are aligned with window bays on floors above. Entrance doorcase with timber panelled pilasters on plinth blocks with plaster console brackets with acanthus leaf detail to either side of recessed four-panel raised and fielded timber door with moulded timber cornice below plain elliptical glazed fanlight. Cast iron half round guttering on rise and fall brackets terminating at swan neck cast iron circular downpipe to right, with red brick chimney stack to east side with 6 terracotta clay pots (with 1 pot missing).

North elevation to the rear is of three-storeys, smooth render painted, with smooth render painted finish to two storey rear return with rough cast unpainted render to north elevation, built at half landing height to main house, and a slated pitched roof with three velux rooflights. Square-headed window openings on painted masonry sills. The fenestration pattern is irregular with both timber sliding sash to the rear and replacement timber casement windows to the rear return. Large red brick chimney stack to north elevation of return with three terracotta clay pots. Small single storey lean-to shed to rear return with slate roof and cast iron rooflight. Another small shed abuts the lean-to with painted pebble dash, corrugated metal sheet roof and timber door to rear. Large garden beyond with schist and red brick boundary wall to west, masonry wall to east, and timber sheeted gates to rear.

East side is adjoined to neighbouring property No.38 Great James Street (HB01/21/035G).

West elevation of smooth render painted with no fenestration above an adjoining gated vehicle entrance to No. 42.

Pitched slate roof with clay ridge tiles and a rebuilt 'rustic' red brick chimney stack with six terracotta clay pots rising from the east side. Cast iron half round guttering on rise and fall brackets terminating at a cast iron circular downpipe to front elevation, uPVC rainwater goods to rear.

Materials:
Roof Natural Slate
RWG Cast Iron/ uPVC
Walling Render
Windows Timber Sliding Sash/ Timber Casement

Setting:
Set within a terraced row of houses lining the north side of Great James Street, a steep hill which runs between St. Eugene’s Cathedral (HB01/21/001) at the west side and Strand Road on the east. Large rear garden enclosed by red brick and schist wall with timber gates to north boundary. Building is located within the Clarendon Street Conservation Area.

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-style 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 1613-19.

No. 40 Great James Street, a three-storey two-bay Georgian-style dwelling, was constructed in 1871-72 along with the adjoining nos 36-38. The buildings were first recorded in the Annual Revisions which noted that the row were leased by George Skipton (a local landowner of Beechill House who owned many of the plots on the north side of Great James Street). In the 1870s the building, which was valued at £26, was occupied by James Riddell, a local butter merchant. No. 40 Great James Street was recorded on the c. 1873-1910 Annual Revisions Town Plan which depicted the building along its current layout possessing its three-storey rear return and outbuilding. Riddell continued to reside at No. 40 Great James Street until 1888 when the building was occupied by Peter McKinney, a poulterer. By 1901 the house was occupied by George Davin, a box maker, and in that year the census building return described the building as a 1st class building that consisted of ten rooms and possessed a stable and coal house as its out offices. The occupant of No. 40 Great James Street continued to change with great frequency over the following decades. The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57) records that a Ms. Alice Cunningham purchased the building outright in the 1930s. At that time the building was valued at £33 but by the end of the Second Revaluation (1956-72) the total rateable value of the house had been increased to £39.

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).

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 Ordnance Survey Map (1853)
3. PRONI VAL/12/E/157/1/7 – Annual Revisions Town Plan (c. 1873-1910)
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/C/6/10 – First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57))
7. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13 – Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956-72)
8. Ulster Town Directories (1843-1918)
9. Census of Ireland (1901; 1911)

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: Coleraine 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
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

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

Evaluation

Mid-Victorian three-storey with basement end-terrace painted render dwelling built 1871-72, situated on the north side of Great James Street, a steep hill which runs between St. Eugene’s Cathedral (HB01/21/001) at the west side and Strand Road on the east. No. 40 was built at the same time as its neighbours, No’s 36 & 38 (HB01/21/035 F&G). Internally much of the original plan form and much original joinery remains. Despite the installation of some replacement casement windows to the rear, externally No.40 retains much historic fabric and detailing such as the fine entrance doorcase with its acanthus leaf plaster console brackets. This house has group value with its neighbours and the rest of the dwellings built in this era along Great James Street and together they are important buildings within Clarendon Street Conservation Area.