Cottage and Outbuildings at

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

This is an exceptional survival of a group of vernacular farm buildings, complete and without modern additions, in a particularly remote rural
setting on the Tyrone/Fermanagh border in a large clearing near forestry land. The nearest town is Fivemiletown.

The house is approached down a long, single-tracked lane and is screened from the approach by a single storey stone byre. In front of this is a large timber and corrugated iron turf house. To the rear is another stone-built byre with attached mud-walled shed. Also to the rear is a pig crew built from stone with a tiny open stone yard attached, with a good wrot iron gate in sufficiently good condition to restore. Further to the rear is a timber and corrugated iron hay shed.

The house is single story, 3-bay, direct entry, stepping down the side of a hill. There is only one small window to the front elevation, giving a view of the approach, and three to the rear. There is an attic storey to the lower end. The house is finished in lime render. The windows are timber sliding sash and the roof like all the roofs to the entire group, is corrugated iron.

All doors to all buildings are vertically sheeted tounged, grooved and V'd. The house's only external door is a traditional half-door.

There is a cobbled drain to the lower side of the front of the house, presumably a handy way to carry slops away from the front door.

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Historical information

The house, the outbuilding to the immediate south, and a smaller structure further to the north are shown on the OS map of 1834, but not recorded in the contemporary valuation. On the revised map of 1857 the same arrangement is shown, but with a small structure to the immediate west of the outbuilding, and the building further north no longer extant. The dwelling alone is recorded in the second valuation of 1858 as 'a herd's house' with a rateable value of 10 shillings. William Buchanan is noted as the immediate lessor (the freehold belonging to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners), but the tenant's name is not given. In 1864 a William Primrose is listed as the occupant, with a James Primrose succeeding him in 1888, and a David Primrose in 1901. The latter was still in residence in 1929. The turf house is shown on the OS map of 1905-07, but this was not of sufficient import to make any change to the rateable value, which remained at its 10 shilling level until the 1930s at least.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL/1A/6/68 OS map, Co. Tyrone sheet 68, with valuation
references, 1834-c.38
2 PRONI VAL/2A/6/68A OS map, Co Tyrone sheet 68, with valuation references, 1858
3 PRONI VAL/2B/6/2F Second valuation, Clogher ED, 1861
4 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14A Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1860-63
5 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14B Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1864-78
6 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14C Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1880-88
7 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14D Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1889-95
8 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14E Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1895-1915
9 PRONI OS/6/6/68/3 OS map, Co. Tyrone sheet 68, 1905-07
10 PRONI VAL/12B/36/14F Annual valuation revision book, Fivemiletown ED, 1915-29

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
D. Plan Form
E. Spatial Organisation
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Z. Rarity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

This is a rare survival of an intact group of the buildings of a subsistence-level small farm, set in very remote and attractive landscape. It tells the story of a way of life that has all but disappeared. The spatial relationship of the buildings is very attractive. The integrity of the plain simple style of all the buildings is special.
The survival of the mud-floored interior of the house is also rare.