Race View

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Picturesquely set, two-storey early nineteenth-century house. The house has three symmetrically arranged breakfronts to the front (south west) façade. The breakfronts appear to have been added in the late nineteenth-century. A single-storey rear extension was added in the 1980s.

The front entrance is set in the middle of the central two-storey gabled breakfront. The door opening is flat-headed with half-height sidelights. This has a c.1950 timber panelled door is flanked with leaded lights. Window openings are flat-headed and have cut stone sills. Original two-over-two sash frames have been retained internally with top-hung uPVC frames added externally. Openings are arranged symmetrically. To the left there are two openings to the ground floor, one in the recess and one in the breakfront. The first floor openings are somewhat shorter. There is one each to the breakfronts and one to each recessed area. At ground floor, to the right side of the front door there are two further windows, one in the recess and one in the breakfront.

The north west gable is blank.

To the centre of the north east rear there is a central two-storey gabled return. To the right side of the return there is a single-storey lean-to addition; This may have been added in the late nineteenth-century. To the right side of the return, on the first floor of the main façade there are two evenly spaced windows. Windows are as before with uPVC over timber sash. Windows to the lean-to are flat-headed and have top-hung timber frames.

Windows to the return are flat headed. Some are arranged in bi-partite fashion but all are uPVC frames.

To the left of the return there is a hipped roof c.1980 sunroom. This has a chamfered plan shape with uPVC French doors opening on to a small paved patio. To the left of the sunroom there is a window as before (sash internal – uPVC external); directly above, at first floor, there is a similar window, to the right side of this is a similar window opening but with a uPVC frame only (no sash window internally).

The south east gable is blank but for one central first floor window (all as before).

The roof is pitched and slated and the breakfronts are all gabled. Rainwater goods are cast-iron. Walls are finished with ruled and lined render and rest on a slightly recessed plinth.

The house is set with on a mature garden, at the head of a short driveway tarmac driveway.

To the rear there is a large tarmac yard. Close to the north east rear façade there is a two storey former outbuilding. This appears to have been built to serve the house but was recently converted to commercial use and now houses two separate two-storey business units.

The house is set to the north east of the town center. Adjacent to the house on the southern side of the road there is a large G.A.A. pitch; this is enclosed with a tall roughcast rendered wall. To the north there is Race Course Lough. To the eastern side there is a now a derelict factory building. To the west there is a modern cinema and associated car par

Historical information

Historical Information:

Race View House stands to the west of a lake once known as ‘Race Course Lough’, so called because of the presence of a horse racing course along part of its perimeter up until 1823. It is not certain when the house was built. It is not indicated on a maps dating from the 1770s and 1818 reproduced in W. Copeland Trimble’s third volume of his ‘History of Enniskillen’, however it is shown on the first edition OS map of 1835. The valuation of November of the same year records the dwelling as the home of a Mr Harrington (or Hannington), with dimensions noted as 35½ft x 19 x 16 (2 storeys) for the main section, 7½ x 6 x 7 for a porch, ‘additions’ of 20 x 17 x 16 (2 storeys) and 17 x 6 x 7, and a byre of 51½ x 21 x 10. The footprint of the building at this stage was slightly different to that we see today, but is clear that the main portion of the structure (as defined by the central two 2-storey sections) was already present. The valuers class the building ‘1B’, which denotes a slated structure in good condition, possibly 20 years old or more, however, as stated above, it is probable that the building was constructed post 1818.

On the revised OS map of 1857 the house is marked ‘Race View’. In the second valuation of c.1860 its dimensions are recorded much as in 1835, but with larger outbuildings. By this date the lease of the property had been acquired by Andrew Teevan (b.1793), who is believed to have been a local merchant. Andrew died in 1865 and Race View was occupied by his widow Mary, who from 1867 sub-let the outbuildings to a Francis Fawcett. They were to remain in separate hands until 1883.

Mary Teevan died in 1869 and Race View passed to her son, Thomas. Thomas was a doctor in army service who had witnessed action in the Crimean War and had served in China, rising to the rank of Surgeon-Major. He did not retire from active service until 1875, and in the interim the property was in the hands of his sister, Eliza. In 1874, doubtless under Thomas’s instructions, the house was -in the words of the valuers- ‘improved’. The original valuation noted the width of the house as 35 ½ feet; the current width of the front is c.55 feet. Unfortunately they do record the extent of the work carried out, but from the present appearance of the building, (in particular the gables with their decorative bargeboards), combined with the additional width and the changes in floor levels it is highly probable that the bays to the front were added at this stage, with some enlargements to the rear. Whatever the case, the size of the house does not seem to have been greatly increased as the rateable value only rose £2 from the previous £14.

Dr. Thomas Teevan acquired the freehold of Race View from the Archdall estate in 1876, and resided there until his death (on a visit to Dublin) in c.1898. The property’s next owner was James Cooper [?a solicitor], who remained there until 1914 when it was acquired by Thomas Rutherford. Mr Rutherford sold part of the land associated with the house to the newly-established Enniskillen Rugby Club in 1925, where the club was to play until the effects of poor drainage forced them to abandon the site in the early 1930s.

Mr Rutherford died in 1940 or 1941, and his wife in 1954. The house passed to their daughter Violet McNeery [or McNeary]. The McNeary family lived at Race View until the 1970s. The House was extensively renovated internally c.1980. It was acquired by the present owners c.1991.

References- Primary Sources
1 Map of Enniskillen, c.1776, reproduced in ‘History of Enniskillen vol.3’
by W. Copeland Trimble (Enniskillen, Impartial Reporter, 1921)
2 Map of Enniskillen, 1818, reproduced in ‘History of Enniskillen vol.3’ by W. Copeland Trimble
(Enniskillen, Impartial Reporter, 1921)
3 PRONI VAL/1A/4/22 OS map, Co Fermanagh sheet 22 with valuation
references,
1835(-c.1838)
4 PRONI VAL/1B/437A-B First valuation, Trory parish, 1835
5 PRONI VAL/2A/4/22C OS map, Co Fermanagh sheet 22 with valuation references,
1857(-c.1860)
6 PRONI VAL/2B/4/26 Second valuation, Trory parish, c.1860
7 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17A Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1864-68
8 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17B Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1869-75
9 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17C Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1876-81
10 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17D Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1876-81
11 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17E Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1882-89
12 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17F Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1882-89
13 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17G Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1890-95
14 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17H Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1890-95
15 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17J Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen ED, 1896-1914
16 PRONI VAL/12B/26/17K Annual valuation revision book, Enniskillen RD, 1915-29
17 PRONI VAL/12E/140/2/2 Valuation plan of Enniskillen, sheet 4, 1897(-1909)
18 PRONI VAL/3C/5/2 First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland, Enniskillen RD,
1936-56
19 PRONI VAL/3G/105/2/1-2 Valuation plan of Enniskillen, 1939-53
20 PRONI VAL/4B/4/5 Second General Revaluation of Northern Ireland, Enniskillen RD,
1956-72

Secondary sources
1 W Copeland Trimble, ‘History of Enniskillen vol.3’, (Enniskillen, Impartial Reporter, 1921),
p.1038

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Although dating from the early part of the nineteenth-century, this picturesque house was altered in the late nineteenth-century and again in the late twentieth century. As a result the interior is entirely modern and the exterior has lost its original character. The original country / lakeside setting has been adversely affected by the adjacent cinema complex, commercial units and associated car parking.