Former schoolhouse

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Small single storey hipped roof house, originally built in c.1818 as a schoolhouse, but much extended and modernised in the 1990s. The building is set on the E side of Drumaness Road, close to the intersection with Crabtree Road, on the SE outskirts of Ballynahinch.

The front façade faces NW and is asymmetrical. To the right of centre is a small gabled porch with timber sheeted door to SW face and a small window to the NW face. This window has a modern frame, as do all the others. To the left of the porch (on main façade), are two windows, with another to the right.

To the centre of the NE façade is a recessed timber sheeted door with a single window to either side of this. To the left this façade merges with the front of a flat roofed garage.

The SW façade is shorter had has one central window.

To the left on the rear façade there is a window. To the right of this is a projecting flat roofed extension with French doors to its SW face. To the SE face is a small window. To the right of the extension is attached to a ‘return’ which has a small window to its exposed SW face. To the SE this return is attached to the flat roofed garage.

The façade is finished in unpainted rough cast. The hipped roof has an overhang and is covered in artificial slate. Single central rendered chimney stack. PVC rw goods.

Historical information

This building was originally a small schoolhouse, believed to have been built in c.1818, probably at the behest of Rev Charles Boyd the Vicar of Magheradroll parish (and whose glebe house stood close by to the south- now the Millbrook Lodge Hotel). The school, which is recorded for most of the 19th century as belonging to the Parochial and Church Education Society, remained in existence until the early 1900s, after which the building became a private dwelling. It remained relatively untouched externally until the 1990s when it was extended to the north-west side and to the rear.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI D.1255 Title deeds, legal and testamentary papers, correspondence and Irish Land Commissioners Papers re the Ballynahinch Estate, 1630-1940
2 PRONI OS/6/3/29/1 OS map, Down sh 29, 1834
3 PRONI VAL/1B/388A-B Valuation records, Magherdrool, 1834-1838
4 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1846), p.442
5 PRONI and Linen Hall Library ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster Directory’ Vols.1-21, 1852-1900, (Belfast, Henderson [1852-65], Belfast News-Letter [1865- ])
6 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1856), p.408
7 PRONI OS/6/3/292 OS map, Down sh 29, 1858
8 PRONI and Linen Hall Library Second (Griffith’s) valuation, Magherdrool, c.1863 [in print]
9 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1870), pp.42-43
10 George Henry Bassett ‘Co Down guide and directory’ (Dublin 1886), pp.369-79
11 PRONI OS/6/3/29/3 OS map, Down sh 29, c.1901

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Small single storey hipped roof house, originally built in 1818 as a school, but much extended and modernised in the 1990s.