40 Peacock Road

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

The group of buildings occupies a site a short distance along the right hand (south-east) side of a secondary road leading north-eastwards from the road from Sion Mills to Clady about a mile from the former town. The dwelling faces north-east and is gabled to the road behind a Nissan hut and extending into the yard as outbuildings with corrugated iron roofs. A modern bungalow has been erected oppositee, to the north-east.

A direct entry, two structural bay single storey thatched house of stone and brick construction with a lime-washed finish. The roof, now protected by heavy duty black plastic sheeting , is thatched between cement skews. Each gable rises to a whitened brick chimneystack, plain at the left (south-east) corbelled at the right (north-west) and including a plain pot. The timber sheeted entrance door is flanked on either side by a 2x3 metal-framed window, that on the left is of increased width. The openings are dressed with plain surrounds and the sills are narrow. At the rear there are three metal-framed windows of varying size, they are without surrounds but the sills are of traditional depths at the leading faces. An opening lighting a bedroom in the part with the corrugated iron roof retains the remains of a timber-sashed window.

Historical information

A longer building is shown on this site on the OS map of 1832-33. This building may in part correspond with the house we see today, however it is difficult to confirm this as the property is not recorded in the contemporary valuation.

The revised OS map of 1858 shows a building of similar size to the present. According to the (near) contemporary second valuation, this house was then divided into two properties, each with the modest rateable value of 10/-. The occupants of 1858 are listed as Denis McIlwee and John McIlwee, with Rev. Benjamin B. Gough recorded as the immediate lessor.

A request for listing was received from the then owner on 21 August 1991 and statutory listing took place on 5 June 1992. In the same year the condition of the roof was noted as ‘fair’.

Proposals for restoration of the building were submitted by Michael J. Mullin, Chartered Architect, on 22 December 1993. The following year the roof had deteriorated to ‘poor’ and re-thatching was required.

The current owner (October 2001) intends to re-thatch the house but has had the roof temporarily protected as noted in the Exterior Description.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL/1A/6/9 OS map, County Tyrone sheet 9, with valuation
references, (1832 / 33)
2 PRONI VAL/2A/6/9A Revised OS map, County Tyrone sheet 9, with valuation references, (1858-c.59)
3 PRONI VAL/2B/6/41 Second valuation, Urney (1859)

Secondary sources
1 EHS files
2 EHS Monitoring of Thatched Buildings, report by Michele McFaul, 2 June 1994 [At this time flax grown by the owner was reading to be applied to the roof.]
3 EHS Report by Colin Hatrick to EHS, 3 September 2001

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
D. Plan Form
F. Structural System
I. Quality and survival of Interior

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Z. Rarity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

A direct entry, two structural bay, single storey thatched house. The appearance of the building is very poor but deterioration has been arrested by the fixing of a plastic covering over the thatch. The plan form is unaltered apart from the addition of a partition to form an internal porch at the entrance. The elements of the early roof structure that remain could be incorporated during the course of a repair scheme