FORMER SCHOOL, GATES, RAILINGS AND WALLING

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Detached gabled multi-bay two-storey stone former school building, built c.1859. Irregular on plan facing east with double-height former school hall occupying the south end of the dwelling and set back slightly on the south side of High Street with its own landscaped grounds on an elevated site overlooking Cushendall.

Pitched natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles, lead valleys and a single tall rendered chimneystack with octagonal clay pots. Cast-iron guttering iron drive-through brackets to smooth rendered eaves course, cast-iron hoppers and downpipes. Gabled elevations to north and south have decorative timber bargeboards to sheeted overhanging eaves. Roughly coursed rough hewn red sandstone walling with chamfered tooled stone plinth course and cement pointing. Square-headed window openings set in stop-chamfered sandstone ashlar surrounds with some hood mouldings and replacement horizontally-glazed 2/2 sliding timber sash windows with ogee horns.

Front elevation (E) comprises a central two-storey advanced gable with single-bay section to the right, entrance bay to the left and extending to the left as a three-bay double-height section. The central gable has decorative timber bargeboard to sheeted overhanging eaves, replacement paired 2/2 sliding timber sash windows with a bowed bay to the re-entrant angle. The two-storey entrance bay is fronted by a lean-to entrance porch having a Tudor arched opening formed in stop-chamfered sandstone. Modern tiles to the entrance porch with an original vertically-sheeted timber door, brass door furniture and overpanel set within a further Tudor-arched opening. The former hall has horizontally-glazed 3/3 timber sliding sash windows.

Gabled south side elevation to former hall having raised coping to the gable surmounted by a stone finial. The gable contains a quatrefoil panel set above a flush sandstone relieving arch over a double-height square-headed door opening (formerly a window opening), having chamfered sandstone surround and replacement multi-pane timber French doors and tripartite overlight.

The north rear elevation is built close to a rubblestone retaining wall with a small passage obstructed to the east end by a lean-to projection having a round-headed door opening with replacement glazed doors to the west side.

Single-bay two-storey gabled east side elevation, detailed as per front gable.

Materials
Roof Natural Slate
RWG Cast-iron
Walling Rubble red sandstone
Windows Replacement horizontally-glazed timber sliding sash

Setting:
Set on an elevated site and set back on the south side of High Street having a pebble forecourt to the east and walkway to the south incorporating granite paving slabs. The site has rubblestone retaining walls to the east and west with a landscaped garden to the south. Site enclosed by matching red sandstone walls and piers supporting double-leaf iron gates and matching railings (possibly replacement).

Historical information

No. 14 High Street, a single-storey former schoolhouse possessing an attached single-storey cottage to its south-west side, was constructed in c. 1859. The building was constructed as a Free School and was the second major schoolhouse to be erected in the village. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs (1830-38) noted that ‘the introduction of schools into this parish is not of a recent date. The manner in which the schools (recently established) are conducted has led to a perceptible change for the better in the moral habits of the rising generation. There is a very great desire for information among the people and they are also anxious to have their children educated.’ The first schoolhouse in the village was located atop Court McMartin (SMR: 020/018), a rath fortification which lies between Mill Street and High Street. Wright’s Tours in Ireland records that the original schoolhouse was erected on the rath in c. 1823 by Francis Turnly. The contemporary Ordnance Survey Memoirs note that the establishment was a paying school which provided education, at a fee, to males and females scholars of both the Protestant and Catholic denominations. The Townland Valuation (1834) valued the school at £3 and 16 shillings and described it as a 1A- class building (that is a new or nearly new slated building) that measured 50ft by 26ft and stood 12.6ft in height (Tours in Ireland; Ordnance Survey Memoirs, p. 53).

The red sandstone schoolhouse at No. 14 High Street was built in c. 1859. In that year Griffith’s Valuation noted that the building was under construction on land that had been leased by the Turnly family (the principal landowners of the village). In 1864 the completed schoolhouse was first valued at £10 under the Annual Revisions. The valuer noted that the single-storey cottage, abutting the south-west side of the building, was also erected at this time as the teacher’s residence. The schoolhouse was administered under the National School System and there was little change to the building or the teacher’s residence between the 1860s and the turn of the 20th century. The school became predominantly associated with the Protestant denomination following the construction of a second National School on Mill Street in c. 1864. In 1899 the Annual Revisions revalued the school at £7 and separately valued the adjoining cottage at £3. The 1901 Census of Ireland recorded that the teacher’s residence was occupied by William Henry Devlin, a National Schoolteacher who resided at the site with his sister (also a teacher). The accompanying census building return described the teacher’s residence as a 2nd class dwelling that consisted of six rooms and possessed a turf house as its sole outbuilding. The schoolhouse and teacher’s residence were depicted along their current layout on the Ordnance Survey Town Plan of 1903.

The schoolhouse continued to be managed by the National School System until the partition of Ireland when the Trustees of Layde Parish Church (HB05/02/011) took over administration of the site. Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57) the school was known as the Cushendall Public Elementary School and had been increased in value to £15 and 10 shillings. The adjoining teacher’s residence was occupied by a Mr. or Mrs. E. Davis and was raised in value to £7 and 10 shillings during the same period. Ownership of the schoolhouse remained with the Turnly family until at least the 1970s, however the adjoining cottage was purchased outright by Layde Parish Church in 1964. By the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956-72) the total rateable value of the school stood at £21 with the teacher’s residence valued at £12 and 10 shillings.

In 1972 the UAHS publication for the Glens of Antrim described the schoolhouse as ‘a very pleasant red sandstone building, end on to the road, in a verdant garden, with Tudor dripstones and curly bargeboards’ (UAHS p. 34). The schoolhouse was included in the Cushendall Conservation Area in 1975, only the second conservation area in the province to have been designated at that time, ‘testimony itself to the special qualities of the village.’ In that year the village was also chosen as one of Northern Ireland’s four pilot schemes for conservation during the European Architectural Heritage Year. The schoolhouse and teacher’s residence at No. 14 High Street was listed in 1976. The NIEA HB Records note that the former schoolhouse was converted into a private dwelling in 1987-88. Conservation works included reslating, repointing and the repair of existing and installation of new window frames (NIEA HB Records; Cushendall Conservation Area Guide).

References

Primary Sources
1. PRONI OS/6/1/20/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1832)
2. PRONI OS/6/1/20/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1857)
3. PRONI OS/6/1/20/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1903)
4. PRONI OS/6/1/20/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1921)
5. PRONI OS/8/84/1 – Ordnance Survey Town Plan (1903)
6. PRONI VAL/1/B/148 – Townland Valuations (1834)
7. PRONI VAL/12/B/1/40B – Griffith’s Valuation (1859)
8. PRONI VAL/12/B/2/7A-F – Annual Revisions (1864-1923)
9. PRONI VAL/12/B/2/12A– Annual Revisions (1923-29)
10. PRONI VAL/3/C/1/14 – First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57)
11. PRONI VAL/4/B/1/10 – Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956-72)
12. Wright’s Tours in Ireland (1823)
13. Ordnance Survey Memoirs, Co. Antrim IV, Vol. 13 (1830-38)
14. Bassett’s County Antrim: A guide and directory (1888)
15. Ulster Town Directories (1880-1918)
16. Census of Ireland (1901; 1911)
17. First Survey Record – HB05/02/031 (1971)
18. NIEA HB Record – HB05/02/031

Secondary Sources
1. Brett, C. E. B., ‘List of historic buildings, groups of buildings and areas of architectural importance in the Glens of Antrim’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1972.
2. ‘Cushendall Village Conservation Area’ Belfast: Department of the Environment, 1975.
3. ‘Cushendall Conservation Area’ Belfast: Department of the Environment, 1993 – includes Ordnance Survey Town Plan of 1932.

Online Resources
1. Dictionary of Irish Architects - http:// www.dia.ie/

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
X. Local Interest
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
R. Age

Evaluation

Detached gabled two-storey red sandstone stone former school house and attached teachers’ residence, built c.1859. Located behind stone walls with iron railings on the south side of High Street within its own grounds on an elevated site to the immediate west of Cushendall village centre. The building was constructed as a Free School and was the second major schoolhouse to be erected in the village, the first located atop Court McMartin (SMR: 020/018), a rath fortification which lies between Mill Street and High Street. The schoolhouse continued to be managed by the National School System until the partition of Ireland when the Trustees of Layde Parish Church (HB05/02/011) took over administration of the site. There was little change to the school house or the teacher’s residence between the 1860s and the turn of the 20th century. Now a private dwelling, the building retains much of its original historic fabric and detailing, expressing Tudoresque motifs and diminutive proportions. It forms an important part of the social history of Cushendall and contributes greatly to the varied architectural styles of the historic village centre.