Lodge

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

One-and-a-half-storey, three-bay random-coursed rock-faced stone walling with stepped red brick dressings to jambs, East facing with “L” plan form and located behind low level rubble garden wall to the West of access laneway to Friends Meeting House, which is located within the Derrymore Demense.

Front elevation facing East with pitched natural slate roof with roll top black clay ridge tiles. Rectangular-section mid-ridge red brick chimney to front with 3no. clay chimney pots. Walls finished with random-coursed rock-faced local Newry Granodiorite stone and having stepped red brick dressings to jambs, red brick quoins, slightly curved-headed gauged-brick window openings and stone cills. Painted top hung windows, (top third ratio). Generally, RWGs are cast iron with half-round guttering discharging to circular section downpipes.

Both gable elevations have, at first floor, one over one top hung, painted timber windows with red brick dressing to jambs. This is replicated at ground level with large, centrally positioned window with three over three top hung painted timber windows.

No access to rear of property but a similar fenestration can be observed from the public road. Cat slid roof to south of rear return with all finishes to match that as already described above.

The lodge is set within Derrymore Demesne (Historic Parks, Gardens and Demesnes ref A-013/024. A small gable fronted garage defines the southern boundary of the property and nestles into the rocky outcrop behind. The heavily wooded environment which surrounds the dwelling enhances the attractiveness and inherent appeal of the
setting.

Roofing: Natural slate.
Walling: Random rubblestone.
Windows: Timber frame.
RWG: Metal

Historical information

The current gate lodge was constructed c1885 as a lodge to the Friends’ Meeting House at Bessbrook and is first shown on the large-scale OS map of 1895.

The gate lodge enters valuation records in 1885, suggesting that it was constructed at around this date (there was sometimes a delay in entering new buildings into valuation records). It is possible that the lodge was built around the same time that John Grubb Richardson, the founder of Bessbrook as a model village, extended his nearby home ‘The Woodhouse’. The extension work to the Woodhouse is thought to have taken place in the late 1870s and may have included the addition of decorative timberwork to the gables of the house, in an Arts and Crafts idiom. The architect of the gate lodge and the Woodhouse and/or its improvements is unknown.

The entry for the lodge in 1885 records the resident as stonemason, James Jackson, followed in 1892 by Herbert Harrison, Secretary of the Bessbrook and Newry Tramway Company (the tramway had opened in 1885 and Harrison had been among the party that were first to travel on the line). The house was valued at £7, a relatively high valuation for a building of this type and was leased from John G Richardson.

At the time of the 1911 census the resident was Thomas Baillie, a master millwright from County Tyrone, who lived with his wife and adult son who was a clerk in the iron foundry. All the family members were Quakers and, as with other gate lodges on the Derrymore estate in the early 20th century, they were likely employees of the Richardson’s various businesses, rather than estate workers, as would have been usual for gate lodges. The building return records the house as having seven rooms.

The First General Revaluation of the 1930s records the resident as Thomas Gray, Secretary and Treasurer to several Newry associations and manager of an accountancy firm who had served in WW1 in the Royal Irish Fusiliers. The accommodation within the house is listed as a reception, kitchen and scullery to the ground floor and a further reception, two bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs with hot and cold water. The valuer notes the ‘very good repair and finish’ and that the lodge is an ‘attractive house’. A plan and dimensions are given for the lodge depicting it much as first built with an attached shed to the rear and a detached brick and slate coal shed (now gone?). A detached motor house of corrugated iron is shown to the S of the lodge that had been added after 1906, but has since been reconstructed in more permanent materials.

W R Bell, former clerk to Newry No 2 Rural District Council, became resident in 1943.

References:
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. PRONI OS/6/2/26/3 – Third Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1906)
4. PRONI OS/6/2/26/4 – Fourth Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1956)
5. Belfast Newsletter, 14th June 1904
6. Northern Whig, 7th January 1927
7. PRONI VAL/12/B/15/1A-K – Annual Revisions (1866-1929)
8. Belfast Newsletter, 4th September 1950
9. PRONI VAL/3/C/2/15 – First General Revaluation NI (1936-1957)
10. PRONI VAL/3/D/2/6/L/3– Valuer’s Binder (1933-1957)
11. Large scale Ordnance Survey maps 1895, 1896, 1906, 1956, 1971, 1988, 1993 (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. Newham, Alan T (1979) The Bessbrook & Newry Tramway. Oakwood Press.
4. Reeves-Smyth, T. Derrymore House and The Wood House (undated research notes held by HED)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

The current gate lodge was constructed c1885 as a lodge to the Friends’ Meeting House at Bessbrook and is first shown on the large-scale OS map of 1895. It is possible that the lodge was built around the same time that John Grubb Richardson, the founder of Bessbrook as a model village, extended his nearby home ‘The Woodhouse’. The extension work to the Woodhouse is thought to have taken place in the late 1870s and may have included the addition of decorative timberwork to the gables of the house, in an Arts and Crafts idiom. The architect of the gate lodge and the Woodhouse and/or its improvements is unknown. The gate lodge is set within a mature landscape setting and bounded by an attractive boundary wall executed in local stone. The gate lodge has been refurbished including replacement of historic windows.