78 Castle Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Plain, rendered, narrow three storey terrace house (now a taxi office) of possible mid to later 18th century construction and at one time part of the larger property to east, now with modern ‘shop’ front and plain sash window frames. The property is set on the N side of Castle Street, close to Ballycastle town centre.

The asymmetrical front elevation faces S. To the ground floor is a plain ‘shop’ front with partly glazed door and large single pane fixed light window. To the first floor are two windows with plain sash frame, with two more similar but smaller windows to the second floor. The front elevation is finished in painted render.

The writers did not gain access to the rear, but internal evidence shows that there is a two storey return to right (W) with a relatively small fixed light window with margin panes and coloured glass (all typically late Victorian) to the ground floor of the N face, and a small plain sash window to the first floor. To the rear façade of the main building there is a plain sash window to first floor with another (more squat example) to the second floor.

The gabled roof is slated (to front at least). Rendered chimney stack to E (shared with no.80). Metal rw goods to front.

Historical information

The first valuation of December 1834* records that a large old (grade ‘1C+’) house of similar dimensions to the (combined) present nos.78 and 80, on the site of this and its neighbour to the east, then occupied by an Alexander McDonald and a John McCambridge. As the later valuations do not record any major structural changes to the property we can assume that western portion of the former large dwelling of 1834 is that we see today. The (combined) property may have been one of the nine three storey houses mentioned in the OS Memoirs of 1835 (though it may have been classed as 2½ storey), and like much of the structures within Castle Street may date from c.1740-70, when the town assumed much of its present form under improving landlord Hugh Boyd.

By 1859 the large house had been split into two properties, with the present no.78 occupied by an Alexander McHenry and containing a ‘shop and small room off, 2 rooms over and garret’. After 1859 the building went through a long list of tenants including Alexander McCollum Jnr (?c.1870-73), Archibald Coyle (1873-79), James Kenny (1879-80), William Nelson (?1880-93), Joseph Moore (1893), Eliza Cameron (?1893-1903), James McFarland (1903-13), Robert McWilliams (1913-?21), James Hutchinson (1921-27), Charles McKay (1927-?32), Ellen McKay (c.1932-57+).

The property presently serves as a taxi office but is for sale (May 2003).

[*Note on primary sources- Though Ballycastle has its full compliment of valuation books dating back to 1834, the earliest extant valuation plan of the town (indeed the earliest large scale plan) is that dating from 1898. This means that though the first and second valuations -of 1834 and 1859 respectively- present the usual detailed accounts of properties throughout the town, bereft of their contemporary plans it is almost impossible to discover exactly to which buildings the valuers are referring. The writer has circumvented this problem however by adopting the somewhat involved method of reading the records backwards- i.e. taking the more recent (mid 20th century) valuations and tracing each building back from these, using the 1898 map as a marker along the way.]

References- Primary sources
1 ‘Pigot & Co’s City of Dublin and Hibernian Commercial Directory (Manchester 1824)
2 OS Memoirs, Parish of Ramoan, 1831-39, reprinted in ‘Ordnance Survey memoirs of Ireland…’ ed Angelique Day, Patrick McWilliams and Noirin Dobson (Belfast, QUB, 1994), p.92 etc
3 PRONI OS/6/1/8/1 OS map, Co Antrim, sh 8, 1832
4 PRONI VAL/1B/135 First valuation, Ramoan parish, 1834
5 Samuel Lewis, ‘Topographical history of Ireland’ (London, 1837)
6 ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland (Manchester, 1846)
7 ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland (Manchester, 1856)
8 PRONI OS/6/1/8/2 OS map, Co Antrim, sh 8, 1856
9 PRONI VAL/2B/1/28c Second valuation, Ramoan parish, 1859
10 PRONI VAL/12B/2/3a-g Annual valuation revision books, Ballycastle ED, 1864-1921
11 ‘Slater’s Royal National Commercial Directory of Ireland (Manchester, 1870)
12 PRONI VAL/12E/8/1/1-3 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, 1898-c.1935
13 PRONI VAL/12E/8/2/1 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, c.1905
14 PRONI VAL/12B/2/5a-c Annual valuation revision books, Ballycastle UD, 1921-31
15 PRONI VAL/3G/6/1/1-3 Valuation plan of Ballycastle, 1934-50
16 PRONI VAL/3B/1/5 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Ballycastle UD, 1935
17 PRONI VAL/3C/1/6 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, 1936-57

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
H-. Alterations detracting from building

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Plain, rendered, narrow three storey terrace house (now a taxi office) of possible mid to later 18th century construction and at one time part of the larger property to east, now with simple modern ‘shop’ front and plain sash window frames.