7 Kingsgate Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A two-bay three-storey terraced former dwelling, now commercial premises with modern shopfront; pre-dating 1830 and located to the south side of Kingsgate Street in Coleraine town centre. Square on plan with two-storey return to rear.

Pitched artificial slate roof with angled ridge tiles and red-brick chimneystack. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods on projecting eaves. Walling is painted smooth render. Modern timber windows throughout with plate glass to ground floor shopfront.

The principal elevation faces north and has replacement window opening to right at upper floors; modern shopfront at ground floor has plate glass windows and a modern metal door surmounted by modern metal fascia.

The east elevation is abutted by adjoining building (HB03/17/001E).

The south (rear) elevation was not viewed.

The west elevation is abutted by adjoining building (HB03/17/001C).

Setting:
Street-fronted and forming part of a terrace of commercial units to the south side of Kingsgate Street in Coleraine town centre. Neighbouring building to west has been rebuilt. Enclosed yard to rear.

Roof: Artificial slate
Walling: Painted smooth render
Windows: Modern timber replacements
RWG: Cast-iron

Historical information

Number 7 Kingsgate Street is of uncertain date, but is likely to have been built at the same time as numbers 1, 3 and 5 (now gone) and would have originally been constructed when the former town ramparts were levelled sometime before the first edition OS map of 1830.

Kingsgate Street marks the position of a former gateway to the fortified town of Coleraine, earthern ramparts surrounded by a ditch having been constructed at the time of plantation in 1611 (Mullin). By 1622 what was formerly known as the ‘East Gate’ of the town had been fitted with a small gate and drawbridge 12 feet wide ‘having a small timber room over...slated’ (Mullin). By 1710, however the town gates had been dismantled, although the ramparts remained in the Kingsgate area for some years. In 1738 a holding of 17 perches in the Kingsgate area was appropriated for a school funded by the Irish Society. The holding is described as bounded on the west by the rampart and according to Mullin was situated at the point where the road widens in Kingsgate Street, equivalent today to numbers 9 to 11. (Mullin) By the first edition OS map of 1830 no rampart was evident on the south side of Kingsgate Street and the former line of the rampart had been built over by numbers 1, 3, 5 and 7.

Number 7 is shown on the first edition OS map of 1830 and the townland valuation (1828-40) records house and offices occupied by James Duncan and valued at £11.4s. The valuation fieldbook gives measurements showing that numbers 1, 3, 5 and 7 were of identical height and depth but varied in the width of their street frontage. All four buildings had cellar kitchens and to the rear of number seven was an outbuilding.

At the time of Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64), number five was a grocery concern occupied by William Lynn and valued at £13 with an annual rent paid of £14. The building was described as a ‘neat shop in good repair’. Measurements recorded in the fieldbook suggest that this building had remained unaltered from the previous survey in the 1830s.

Subsequent occupiers were I Darragh (1873) William Abraham, tea merchant, general supplier, JP and Methodist circuit steward (1875) (Dictionary of Irish Biography) Martin Wilson (1879) Jane Darragh (1883) Martin Wilson and James Neill (1884) and John Sinclair (1926) who remained resident until at least the 1950s. James Johnston Abraham, son of William Abraham and a surgeon and writer was born in the house on 16th August 1876. J J Abraham qualified as a doctor and settled in London where he published two works, The Surgeon’s Log (1911) drawing on his experiences on a banana boat and The Night Nurse(1913), which was made into a film in 1935. His later historical, biographical and autobiographical writings were collected under the pseudonym ‘James Harpole’ and republished between 1937 and 1953. Abraham was also a broadcaster during the second world war, and remained a consulting surgeon at Princess Beatrice Hospital after an ulcer ended his operating career. He died in 1963. (Dictionary of Irish Biography)

Valuer’s notes of the 1930s give the ground floor accommodation as a shop and two store rooms with a reception and kitchen on the first floor and two bedrooms on the second floor. The associated plan shows a substantial rear return which was rebuilt in the 1950s to give a store on the ground floor and an additional bedroom, scullery, bath and WC on the first floor.

The building was listed in 1977 and by this time the fenestration to the front elevation had been altered to give a large window on the first and second floors and a replacement shopfront. Repairs and renovations were undertaken in 1979 and in 1882 a kitchen extension was constructed followed by the roofing over of the rear yard in the late 1980s (HB file). The premises is currently in use as a shop and offices.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/5/7/1 First Edition OS Map 1830
2. PRONI OS/6/5/7/2 Second Edition OS map 1849-50
3. PRONI OS/6/5/7/3 Third Edition OS Map 1904
4. PRONI OS/6/5/7/4 Fourth Edition OS Map 1923
5. PRONI OS/6/5/7/5 Fifth Edition OS Map 1949
6. PRONI VAL/1/B/542A-D Townland Valuation (1828-40)
7. PRONI VAL/2/B/5/3/D Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
8. PRONI VAL/12/B/30/9A-N Annual Revisions (1864-1929)
9. PRONI VAL/3/C/6/4 First General Revaluation 1933-57
10. PRONI VAL/3/D/6/2/A/12 First General Revaluation 1933-57
11. HB file – 03/17/001D

Secondary Sources

1. Girvan, W D “Historic Buildings, Groups of Buildings, Areas of Architectural Importance in Coleraine and Portstewart” Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1971-2
2. McGuire, J and Quinn, J, eds “Dictionary of Irish Biography” Cambridge: Cambridge University Press and Royal Irish Academy, 2009
3. Mullin, Rev T H “Coleraine in by-gone centuries” Belfast: Century Services Ltd, 1976
4. Mullin, Rev T H “Coleraine in Georgian Times” Belfast: Century Services Ltd, 1977

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

A modified two-bay three-storey terraced former dwelling, pre-dating 1830 - now commercial premises located to the south side of Kingsgate Street in Coleraine town centre. Substantially refurbished, with replacement window openings and a modern shopfront, little historic detailing or character has survived. Group value has been decreased by the demolition of 1 - 3 Kingsgate Street.