16 Main Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A two-storey four-bay mid-terrace townhouse pre-dating 1830. Rectangular plan form with a two-storey rear return. Located to the north of the village on the east side of Main Street.

Pitched natural slate roofing with clay ridge tiles; wet dash chimney; partially removed cast-iron rainwater goods. Wet dash; plain long-and-short quoins and smooth rendered plinth band. Plain raised reveals to windows and doors; plain string course at first floor cill level; masonry cills. Windows 6/6 vertically hung timber sliding sash.

The principal elevation faces west and is asymmetrically arranged. The door is located right of centre with two windows on either side. Diminished in height first floor windows located directly over the ground floor openings except for one right of centre.

The left gable adjoins adjoining building 14 Main Street (HB17/03/019).

No view to the rear elevation but windows appear to have been replaced with modern top hung casements, at least to the ground floor.

The right gable abutted by two-storey adjoining building 18 Main Street (HB17/03/021).

Setting

The building is in a continuous terrace running the full length of the east side of Main Street. Heavily vegetated embankment to the rear. Opposite the house is a modern information centre adjacent to the landscaped public area, beyond which runs the Newry Canal.

Roofing: Natural slate
Walling: wetdash
Windows: Timber
RWG: Cast iron

Historical information

A dwelling of late-eighteenth/early-nineteenth century date, originally lime-rendered and may be one of the later buildings to be constructed in Scarva. The building has evolved over time and although likely to have been built up around an earlier core, now presents an appearance typical of nineteenth century village tenements.

The village of Scarva was founded, beside the newly-opened Newry Canal, in 1746 by John Reilly of Scarva House and the earliest buildings in the town are likely to be those nearest the bridge, the town extending northwards from this point during the course of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The impetus for building the town came from the opening of the Newry Canal in 1742 to connect Carlingford Lough with Lough Neagh, principally as a means to bring coal from east Tyrone to Dublin speedily and inexpensively. (McCutcheon) John Reilly, the founder of the town, procured a patent for holding fairs and markets, in anticipation of building the town, and to build a small dock and quay. Taylor and Skinner’s 1777 map of Scarva shows that the early development of the town was concentrated around the bridge over the canal.

The 1797 Topographica Hibernica describes Scarva as a ‘small neat village’ with a large ‘salt work’. Fairs were held four times a year. Capper’s Topographical Dictionary gives the population of Scarva in 1829 as 170 living in 33 houses. By 1875 traffic along the Newry Canal was bringing cargoes of turf to Scarva, using the dock and quay for lighters but the market was no longer being held. (Knox) The population remained reasonably steady over the course of the nineteenth century and in 1910 was 157. (Street Directory)

A house is shown on the site on the first edition OS map of 1834 and it is listed in the Townland Valuation of 1828-40, together with a number of its neighbours as ‘six houses exempt’ from valuation because they were not of sufficiently high value to be taxable.

In Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64) the occupier is listed as William Robinson and the lessor as John Temple Reilly. The property is a house, office and small garden valued at £3 and later raised to £4. The rent was £3.10s yearly. Dimensions are given for a two-storey slated house ‘slightly decayed but in repair’ and a single-storey outbuilding. Subsequent tenants were Elizabeth Robinson (n.d.) Isabella Fadden (1878) John Robinson (1881) John Stevenson (1884), William Stevenson (1892) and John Fleck (1903). Fleck was a constable at the neighbouring police barracks, the current house providing a home for his Fermanagh wife and his four children who had all been born in County Donegal. A photograph of the house dating from c.1910 shows that the house was lime rendered and had only seven windows - an additional window had been inserted by the time the first survey photograph was taken in 1971.

The house remains in use as a dwelling.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/33/1 First Edition OS Map 1834
2. PRONI OS/6/3/33/2 Second Edition OS map 1860
3. PRONI OS/6/3/33/3 Third Edition OS Map 1903
4. PRONI OS/6/3/33/4 Fourth Edition OS Map 1903-18
5. PRONI VAL/2/B/3/55D Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
6. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/22A-D Annual Revisions (1864-1929)
7. Taylor and Skinner’s Map of the Roads of Ireland, 1777
8. Capper, B.P. “A Topographical Dictionary of England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland” London: Sir Richard Phillips and Co, 1829
9. Seward, W W “Topographica Hibernica” Dublin, 1797
10. Young, A F and Quail, D “Old Gilford, Scarva, Loughbrickland and Lawrencetown” Stenlake Publishing, 2002
11. Street Directory, 1910
12. Banbridge Chronicle 26th July 1978

Secondary Sources

1. Knox, Alexander, M.D. “A History of the County of Down” Dublin: Hodges, Foster & Co, 1875
2. McCutcheon, W.A. “The Industrial Archaeology of Northern Ireland,” London: HMSO, 1980.
3. Shaffrey, P and M “Buildings of Irish Towns – Treasures of Everyday Architecture” Dublin: O’Brien, 1983

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

A two-storey four-bay mid-terrace townhouse pre-dating 1830. its historic proportions and style have remained largely unaltered, although compromised with modern repairs and alterations. This house appears to have been built around an earlier core and much historic fabric survives. It represents the development of Scarva after the building of the canal.