Slaughter House

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Southwest facing, asymmetrically fronted, two bay, single storey outbuilding, constructed between 1861 (2nd edition OS map) and 1895 (large-scale OS map) on lands that formed part of the “model village”, Bessbrook, founded and owned by John G Richardson.

Pitched natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles having flush verge and flush mounted wooden soffit board, affixed to which is metal half round gutter with no evidence of down pipes. Lime washed rubble stone walls with large window aperture to left hand side, defined with lime washed brick quoins to sides, soldier course to top and having stone cill. Aperture sheeted with vertical corrugated sheet fronted with vertical grills, painted black. To right hand side full height arched opening with horizontal, painted “I” beam at base of arch and below which are hung a pair of hinged, vertically sheeted painted timber doors. Arch contains open fanlight style painted wrought iron ensemble recessed to align with doors below. Outer corners of front elevation defined with intermittent sections of limewashed brick quoins, interspersed with rubble cornerstones. No evidence of defined plinth base to wall.

Rear elevation consists of roof as described above with limewashed blank rubblestone wall and flush bleached timber soffit. No evidence of rainwater goods. Both gables having flush verges, limewashed rubble walls with each having single high level open ventilation slit near apex of roof, defined with flush stone heads and cill and with evidence of limewashed brick quoins to either side of opening.

Setting:
Having a plain but distinctive style, the slaughterhouse is positioned northwest of the Bessbrook River, in an isolated mature site within a network of fields, interspersed with stands of trees. Its remote location, devoid of both vehicular or pedestrian access, helps define and enhance the appeal of its rural agrarian
setting.

External Finishes
Roofing: Natural slate,
Walling: Limewashed rubble stone
Windows: Painted timber sheet doors and frame, wrought iron grilles
RWG: Metal, half round guttering to front elevation only. No downpipes.

Historical information

The current building was constructed between 1861 (2nd edition OS map) and 1895 (large-scale OS map) as a slaughterhouse on lands adjacent to the Bessbrook River and a short distance away from a mill pond formerly associated with the linen industry in Bessbrook. The former slaughterhouse was constructed at a distance from other buildings and is, unusually, not identified in valuation records. The building is located within village estates leased and then owned from the mid-19th century by John G Richardson, the founder of Bessbrook, who developed the settlement as a ‘model village’ centred around his linen enterprise.

A newspaper article of August 1894 suggests that the slaughterhouse was in general use by residents of the village as a location where they could bring cattle for slaughter. According to one of the current owners, the slaughterhouse has been owned for some years by the Black family and prior to that was the property of the King family, although the land on which it is located was leased from the Richardson family until recent times.

The occasional survival of such buildings within the outbuildings/farmyards of larger estates, suggests that a slaughterhouse may once have been a common feature of larger farms and demesnes in rural areas. However, very few are known to have survived, possibly because their identifying features have been lost or because they are vulnerable to adaptation for other purposes. A slaughterhouse (HB18/18/075) lying on the outskirts of the Castle Ward demesne among other estate buildings has been remodelled for visitor use and shows no recognisable features of its former function externally. Outbuildings at Castle Coole and Springhill also once included slaughterhouses.
Although the slaughter of animals in rural areas was likely informal and generally unregulated, slaughterhouses in urban areas were subject to greater scrutiny. Prior to the widespread establishment of public abbatoirs, urban slaughterhouses were often found in association with butcher’s shops, the animals being slaughtered in the yard or other buildings behind the shop, or alternatively were separate premises used by a number of customers, sometimes renting the building in common. However, slaughterhouses were historically considered to be sources of disease and liable to cause a ‘nuisance’ due to the smell and blood, offal and manure associated with them. From the mid-19th century, private slaughterhouses within town boundaries, came under increasingly tight legislative control under the Towns Improvement (Ireland) Act (1854) and successive Public Health Acts. Measures included the requirement for slaughterhouses to seek a licence and to submit to regular inspections. The introduction of this system was only partially successful and the unlicensed slaughter of animals continued in urban areas, alongside licensed slaughterhouses.

As Irish towns grew in size and population density the presence of slaughterhouses in central locations was seen as increasingly unacceptable and butchers in Armagh and Lurgan began to slaughter in the country beyond the regulatory reach of town authorities, bringing the carcasses back into town to be sold. By the 1880s, public abbatoirs (the term generally used for larger-scale public slaughterhouses) had begun to be constructed in Scotland and England in order to bring animal slaughter under tighter control, and similar establishments were being proposed in the market towns of county Armagh. As well as the desire to prevent unfit meat from being sold for human consumption, concerns had also begun to build about the welfare of animals and the need for humane slaughter. Despite general agreement that public abbatoirs were required, little progress was made towards building them outside Belfast and Londonderry. Newry was the first town in the Armagh/South Down area to have a public abbatoir, located in a converted railway goods shed on the outskirts of the town and completed in 1896, but Lurgan and Armagh do not appear to have had public abbatoirs until c1940 and Portadown Council did not agree to build a public abbatoir until 1953. Private slaughterhouses therefore remained predominant in the north of Ireland during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The current slaughterhouse is freestanding (i.e. not associated with other structures) and is located in a secluded area, away from the main residential areas of Bessbrook village. There is also immediate access to a freshwater supply from the nearby river, which would have facilitated cleaning out of the premises. Ventilation is provided by the open fanlight with metal bars, the barred window and the openings in the gables. Otter’s research on the development of abbatoirs in Britain, demonstrates that barn doors with open transom lights fitted with metal bars were characteristic features of some private slaughterhouses in the late Victorian/Edwardian period, suggesting that ventilation was a concern for this type of building. The current building also features two substantial non-structural beams at the SE end for hanging carcasses and a stall, trough, drainage channel and tiled floor. A blocked up doorway on the SE elevation may have provided a means of escape from restless cattle.

The slaughterhouse may have been a facility provided for general use by the Richardsons and may also have been used by the Richardson’s dairy business which had been established by the late 1860s and was centred on the farmyard buildings located in Fountain Street less than half a mile away. J G Richardson established a dairy farm in order to provide his workers with milk to drink, motivated by his temperance principles and also by a desire to provide more employment for men, women being the main workers in the mill. Although slaughterhouses would often have been included within the yard of a farm or estate, the isolated location of the current building may indicate a concern, of the Richardson family, or others to keep the noise, ‘nuisance’ and potential disease away from the heart of the village.
The fact that the building does not appear in 19th and early 20th century valuation records may indicate that the slaughterhouse had escaped official scrutiny, including the sanitary inspectors of Newry No 2 Rural Council, but the absence from the lists could equally be as the result of human error. The slaughterhouse has not been used as such since around the mid-20th century.

The present slaughterhouse is a rare survival, retaining recognisable features internally and externally relating to its former function, of a vernacular building type that was likely once much more common in both rural and urban areas.

Primary Sources
1. PRONI OS/6/2/26/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1834-35)
2. PRONI OS/6/2/26/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1861)
3. Newry Telegraph, 9th August 1894
4. Lurgan Times, 7th July 1900
5. Lurgan Mail, 8th September 1900
6. PRONI OS/6/2/26/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1906)
7. PRONI OS/6/2/26/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1956)
8. PRONI VAL/12/B/15/22A-F – Annual Revisions (1866-1929)
9. Large scale Ordnance Survey maps 1895, 1896, 1906, 1956, 1971, 1989, 1992 (www.centremapslive.co.uk)

Secondary Sources:

1. Bessbrook: The Model Village 1845-1995 (Anniversary Publication)
2. Harrison, R. S. (2008) The Richardsons of Bessbrook: Ulster Quakers in the Linen Industry (1845-1921) Dublin: Original Writing
3. Otter, C (2008) Civilizing Slaughter: The development of the British public abattoir, 1850-1910 in Lee, Paula Young ed. Meat, modernity and the rise of the slaughterhouse. New Hampshire: University of New Hampshire Press
4. Owner information
5. Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesne of Special Historic Interest in Northern Ireland (Revised Nov 2020, HED)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

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

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
Z. Rarity
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

The slaughterhouse may have been a facility provided for general use by the Richardson family then synonymous with the development of the model village of Bessbrook and may also have been used by the Richardson’s dairy business which had been established by the late 1860s and was centred on the farmyard buildings located in Fountain Street less than half a mile away. J G Richardson established a dairy farm in order to provide his workers with milk to drink, motivated by his temperance principles and also by a desire to provide more employment for men, women being the main workers in the mill. Although slaughterhouses would often have been included within the yard of a farm or estate, the isolated location of the current building may indicate a concern, of the Richardson family, or others to keep the noise, ‘nuisance’ and potential disease away from the heart of the village.

The present slaughterhouse is a rare survival in an isolated rural setting, retaining recognisable features internally and externally relating to its former function, of a vernacular building type that was likely once much more common in both rural and urban areas.The diminutive building in plain but distinct style is enhanced by its mature rural agrarian setting. The building is relict of a bygone activity that once made a major contribution to the social and economic wellbeing of the local community.