Blundell House

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Mid-terraced three-bay three-storey over basement redbrick townhouse, built c.1780. Rectangular on plan facing south with lean-to return.

Pitched natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles and shared brick chimneystacks to either end, redbrick to the west with clay pots, replacement brown brick to the east, c.1980. Cast-iron guttering on iron brackets to projecting brick eaves course, cast-iron downpipe. Handmade redbrick walling laid in Flemish bond with cement pointing to a painted render plinth course extended to basement level. Square-headed window openings with rubbered brick flat-arches, painted masonry sills and original timber sash windows with cylinder glass and no horns.

Three-bay three-storey over basement redbrick front elevation, showing evidence of a former central square-headed door opening, now replaced by a window, with a round-headed door opening to the left bay. Painted doorcase comprises: moulded pilasters rising from plinth blocks to impost mouldings, archivolt and keystone. Replacement timber panelled door, timber transom and replacement fanlight, door opening onto granite step to concrete paved platform extending to the central bay with five granite steps. Steps and basement area enclosed by decorative wrought-iron railing to the east.

West side elevation abutted by No.11 (HB19/05/039A).

Redbrick north rear elevation has an irregular arrangement of window openings with segmental-headed brick window openings and various timber sash windows. A lean-to return also carries a modern conservatory to the east.

East side elevation abutted by No.13 (HB19/05/039C).

Setting:
Part of a terrace of three similar houses lining the north side of The Square overlooking the former Market House and Hillsborough Castle(HB19/05076A). There is a landscaped rear garden to the north enclosed by rubblestone and brick walling and modern garage to north boundry at lane access off Main Street.

Roof Natural slate
Walling Redbrick
Windows Timber sash
Rainwater goods Cast-iron

Historical information

This house, named ‘Blundell House’ by Lord Arthur Hill in the nineteenth century, forms part of a terrace of three on the northern side of the Square dating from 1779. The house is shown as a plain rectangle on an estate map of 1788. In a letter to Lord Downshire from his agent, John Gardner, dated February 1779, it is stated that, “we are now clearing the ground for the four houses to be built in the square”. The fourth house referred to has its entrance on Main Street. (Brett, p.89; Barry, p.40)

An estate map of c.1800 shows the house as the residence of ‘Parker’ with an outbuilding at the end of the yard.

The house is listed in the Townland Valuation (1828-40) as the residence of Miss McLean and Miss Parker, a house, offices and yard valued at £10.10s. Dimensions are given.

In Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64) the house is occupied by Moses Buchanan and leased from Eliza Wilson. However the house is described as dilapidated and ‘an old house in bad order...This house is in very bad order, part of it scarcely habited [sic]’ Dimensions are given for the house and basement and it is valued at £10. The will of Moses Buchanan, who died in 1882, reveals that he was a sewing agent. Sewing agents, who were often Scottish, received cotton muslin from the west of Scotland and recruited women to sew the cloth. The agents were responsible for ensuring the quality of the final product and were either salaried or paid on commission. In the 1850s “no town in the north of Ireland from Derry to Dublin on the one hand and from Belfast to Sligo on the other was without its sewing agent”. (Kennedy and Ollerenshaw, p.68, quoting Bremner, David “Industries of Scotland”, 1869)

The valuation of the house had been reduced to £8 by 1864 and after Moses Buchanan’s death, the house was taken over by his widow, Margaret, the Marquess of Downshire becoming immediate lessor in 1889. By 1895 Sarah Sands was in residence and by 1903, James Sands. They are likely to have been relatives of William Sands, architect, who had lived in the neighbouring house until his death in 1881. Subsequent occupiers were George J McCreedy in 1908 and John H Harshaw in 1929.

Brett states that between 1969 and 1975 the house was occupied by Harvey Bicker, businessman and Fianna Fail politician and then by Robin Eyre-Maunsell, rally and racing driver. (Brett, p.89)

The house was listed in 1976 and in 1993 a conservatory was built to the rear. (NIEA file)

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/14/1 – First Edition OS Map 1833
2. PRONI OS/6/3/14/2 – Second Edition OS map 1858
3. PRONI OS/6/3/14/3 – Third Edition OS Map 1902-3
4. PRONI OS/6/3/14/4 – Fourth Edition OS Map 1919-20
5. PRONI VAL/1/A/3/14 – Townland Valuation Field Map (c.1830)
6. PRONI VAL/1/B/344A-B – Townland Valuation (1828-40)
7. PRONI VAL/1/D/3/5 – Townland Valuation Town Plan (c.1834)
8. PRONI VAL/2/B/3/45A-C – Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
9. PRONI VAL/12/B/20/14/A-E – Annual Revisions (1864-1930)
10. PRONI VAL/12/E/102/1/1-6 – Annual Revisions Town Plan ([c.1864]-1909)
11. PRONI Will of Moses Buchanan, died 23rd December 1882
12. PRONI Will of William Sands, died 7th December 1881
13. PRONI D671/M/8/2 – Map of Hillsborough, 1771
14. PRONI T3153/1 – Map of Hillsborough, 1788
15. PRONI D671/M/8/25 – Map of Hillsborough c.1800
16. PRONI D671/M/8/57 – Map of Hillsborough 1803
17. PRONI D671/M/8/45 - Plan of the park and demesne lands at Hillsborough with alterations, by John Webb, 1810
18. PRONI D607/B/64 – Letter from John Gardner to Lord Hillsborough, 20 February 1779
19. NIEA file – HB19/05/040

Secondary Sources

1. Barry, John “Hillsborough, A Parish in the Ulster Plantation” Belfast: William Mullan & Son Ltd, 1982
2. Brett, C.E.B. “Buildings of North County Down” Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 2002
3. Kennedy, L and Ollerenshaw, P. Eds. “An Economic History of Ulster, 1820-1939” Manchester University Press, 1985

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
V. Authorship

Evaluation

Terraced three-bay two-storey redbrick Georgian townhouse built as part of a terrace of three similar houses on the north side of The Square(HB19/05/039A-C?). Despite replacement of some original fabric internally the house retains most of its external features, including original timber sash windows with cylinder glass, the nineteenth-century doorcase and its original steps and ironmongery. Originally part of the Downshire Estate the house has an interesting history of notable occupants. With the overall composition intact and forming part of an impressive Georgian terrace, this house plays an important part in the setting to both the former Market House and Hillsborough Castle(HB19/05/076A).

General comments

Please note this record has been renumbered it was previously HB19/05/040