Walled Garden and Vine House

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A walled garden dating from c.1840 situated to the south of Holy Hill House (HB10/11/001A), a country house with demesne situated north-east of Strabane town.

The garden consists of a rectangular enclosure approximately 9-10 ft high, constructed of rubble stone set in lime mortar. North and west walls are lined with red brick. There are a number of later structures abutting the inner face of the walls, as follows:

Vine House
Single-storey lean-to glazed timber vine house to north, rectangular in plan, with red-brick plinth wall having glazed timber frame over a continuous concrete sill. Access is at east via a half-glazed timber door. Corrugated tin boiler house connected to vine house on north side of wall.

Sunken glass house
Single-storey glass house, rectangular in plan, aligned roughly north-south. Red brick foundation and plinth walls support glazed roof with cast-iron frame and painted angled ridge tiles; eaves are timber. Access at north end via a timber door; top panel glazed (four panes), lower panel timber sheeted.

Corrugated metal potting shed
Single storey corrugated metal, rectangular in plan, aligned north-south and located on western outside face of walled garden. Lean-to with painted timber single glazed casement windows. No access to interior.

Setting
The walled garden is set within the demesne of Holy Hill House (HB10/11/001A-L).

Walling: Rubble stone and red-brick
Glass houses: Red brick/timber/cast metal/glass
Potting shed: Corrugated metal

Historical information

The walled garden appears on the second edition map of 1856. The vine house is the only internal structure shown at this date, and the sunken glass house does not appear until the third edition map, making it a mid twentieth-century addition.

The Holy Hill estate is likely to have been cultivated and improved and the house enlarged in the 1730s and 1760s, by John Sinclair, owner from 1718 until 1770. During the ownership (1770-1804) of his son, George, who had been apprenticed as a linen merchant, the estate was cultivated and a mill was likely established after 1779. Under the ownership of his nephew James, J.P., from 1804-1865, the estate was greatly cultivated and many estate buildings were erected, including the walled garden. While James’ son William, a former High Sheriff in Co. Donegal in 1854 who became Deputy Lieutenant of Tyrone in 1876, also probably improved the estate until his death in 1896, it is highly likely that subsequent owners did not embark on any new projects.

The walled garden would appear to date from the latter part of the ownership of James (J.P.) Sinclair, who made many improvements and was described in the OS Memoirs as follows: “…the only resident proprietor [in the parish of Leckpatrick] and his “skill in every department of agriculture [which] enabled him to suggest the most effectual means of improvement, whilst his liberality induced him to supply in a great measure the means. The woods of Holyhill yielded timber for [his tenants’] houses and farming implements and its nurseries provided quicks and trees for their gardens and fences, to ask for which was as great a source of satisfaction to the donor as to receive it would have been to others”. (p.119).

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI T.1652 – Sir Josias Bodley’s plantation maps of all baronies in Co Tyrone
2. PRONI T/371/H – Civil Survey Barony of Strabane (1655-67)
3. PRONI D597/4/1 Petty’s Down Survey maps (c1655-75)
4. PRONI D1854/1/23 – Book of Survey and Distribution (c.1680)
5. PRONI D623/D/1/6 – Abercorn papers – map of Gortcrone c1720-1750
6. PRONI D623/A/15/441 – Abercorn Papers – Letter from Abercorn to Nisbitt (13 Jan 1756)
7. PRONI T2541/1A/1/4/89 – Letter from Sinclair to Abercorn (1757)
8. PRONI D623/A/43/147 – Abercorn papers – letter from Mrs Elizabeth Sinclair to Abercorn (1779)
9. PRONI D623/D/1/22 – Abercorn papers – map of manor of Cloghogle (Jan 1804)
10. PRONI OS/6/6/5/1-3 – Ordnance Survey Maps (1833, 1854, 1905)
12. PRONI VAL/1/A/6/5 – Townland Valuation Map(1828-40)
13. PRONI VAL/1/B/640 – Townland Valuation Records (1828-40)
14. PRONI VAL/2/A/6/5 – Griffith’s Valuation Map (1856-64)
15. PRONI VAL/2/B/6/43B – Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
16. PRONI VAL/12/B/42/22A-F – Annual Revision Records (1860-1925)

Secondary Sources

1. Bence-Jones, Mark. “A Guide to Irish Country Houses.” Second Revised Edition. London: Constable and Robinson, 1990.
2. Bradley, J, etc. “The Fair River Valley – Strabane Through the Ages.” Belfast: Ulster Historical Foundation, 2000
3. Day, A. and P. McWilliams, eds. “OS Memoirs of Ireland, Parishes of County Tyrone I, 1821, 1823, 1833-36, Vol . 5.” Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1990.
4. Day, A. and P. McWilliams, eds. “OS Memoirs of Ireland, Parishes of County Tyrone II, 1825, 1833-5, 1840, Vol. 20.” Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1990.
5. Diocesan Histories
6. Dooher, J. “Commit They Work to God: The History and Times of the Sinclairs of Hollyhill.” In Concordia (1995). Cited in “The Sinclairs of Holy Hill.” Chap. In “Bready Ancestry: Bready and District Ulster-Scots Development Association. Http://www/breadyancestry.com/index.ph?id=35. Accessed 17 March 2009.
7. Hutchinson, W. R. “Tyrone Precinct: A History of the Plantation Settlement of Dungannon and Mountjoy to Modern Times. Belfast: W. Erskine Mayne, Ltd., 1951.”
8. Lewis, Samuel. “A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland, Comprising the Several Counties, Cities, Boroughs, Corporate, Market, and Post Towns, Parishes, and Villages, With Historical and Statistical Descriptions; Embellished with Engravings of the Arms of the Cities, Bishopricks, Corporate Towns, and Boroughs; Of the Seals of the Several Municipal Corporations.” London: S. Lewis & Co., 1837
9. Reid, Thomas. Travels in Ireland in the Year 1822, Exhibiting Brief Sketches of Moral, Physical, and Political State of the Country: With Reflections of the Best Means of Improving Its Condition. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, 1823.
10. Roulston, William J. “The Parishes of Leckpatrick and Dunnalong: Their Place in History.” Strabane, Co. Tyrone: Self-published, 2000.
11. Rowan, Alistair. “North West Ulster: Londonderry, Donegal, Fermanagh, and Tyrone.” Buildings of Ireland Series. Dublin: Penguin Books, 1979.
12. Sinclair Monument, photo in Dillon, Charles and Henry A. Jefferies, ed. “Tyrone: History and Society.” Templeogue, Dublin: Geography Publications, 2000.
13. “The Sinclairs of Holy Hill.” Chap. In “Bready Ancestry: Bready and District Ulster-Scots Development Association. Http://www/breadyancestry.com/index.ph?id=35. Accessed 17 March 2009.
14. “Our Love Families.” Http://www.love-genealogy.com/love-genealogy-generation-07.htm. Accessed 2 March 2009.
15. Young, Robert Magill. “Belfast and the Province of Ulster in the Twentieth Century.” Pike's New Century Series, ed. W. T. Pike. Brighton: W. T. Pike, 1909.
16. “The Parish of Leckpatrick: A Brief History.” Undated packet.
17. “The Church,” “Monuments,” “The Parish,” In “The Area.” “Church of Ireland Church of St. Patrick, Parish of Leckpatrick.”

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

Z. Rarity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

An extensive walled garden of mid-nineteenth century date comprising rubble stone walls and forming a key part of the structures associated with the Holy Hill demesne (HB10/11/001A-L). The walling is well maintained and the enclosure retains later nineteenth century garden structures. The garden structures display good proprtions and are good examples of small Victorian glass houses, now increasingly rare. The interiors have heating systems for raised beds still intact. Together, the ancillary structures provide evidence of a once-thriving commercially independent estate and their survival is of considerable inportance within the context of Strabane. The structures have group value with the other listed structures on the Holy Hill estate. AT 28.06.2010

General comments

This record has been renumbered as part of a group - previously HB10/11/001L & M with walled garden