18 Hillsborough Road

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A detached three-storey former store aligned E-W at the E end of a farmyard. Formerly situated along the N side of a quay on a spur off the Lagan Canal which ran to its E but which is now infilled.
Pitched natural slate roof with cement verges. Limewashed random rubble walls. Replacement plastic rainwater goods.
South elevation (facing former quay) has two rows of segmental-headed openings with louvered timber shutters. Old photograph shows doorway at each end of ground floor, but these appear to have been infilled. .
Wide segmental-headed doorway to W gable, with square-headed loading doors to floors above.
North (rear) elevation not inspected.
E gable has a segmental-headed window to each of its upper floors.

Roof: Natural slate
Walling: Whitewashed random rubble
Windows: Timber louvers
RWG: Plastic

Historical information

This store was originally associated with the Lagan Canal, opened between Sprucefield and Lough Neagh in 1793.
The Lagan Navigation, between Belfast and Lisburn, was opened in 1763 but it was not until 1782 that the section from Sprucefield to Lough Neagh was commenced by the Company of Undertakers of the Lagan Navigation. Richard Owen, an English canal engineer, directed operations which began at the summit level and then extended downwards at each end. By 1792, the canal was open as far as Aghalee but it was not until the end of the following year that it reached Lough Neagh at Ellis’s Gut.
Harvey’s Quay, where the store is located, lies on the summit level and comprised a short spur off the main canal. It was undoubtedly constructed during the first phase of canal work in the 1780s. The store which adjoins it was probably erected around the same time.
Both store and quay are shown on the OS six-inch maps from 1833 onwards; the latter is captioned Harvey’s Quay.
John Harvey is noted as the occupant of the adjoining house in the mid-1830s First Valuation book. It subsequently passed out of the Harvey family and the 1864 Griffith Valuation records James Hammond as the tenant of the premises, under lease from Sir Thomas Bateson. The store's commercial importance is reflected in its relatively high rateable valuation at £13.
According to May Blair, Harvey’s Quay was primarily a depot for imported coal. This function would have ceased in 1954 when this section of canal was officially abandoned by the Lagan Navigation Company (which had assumed ownership of the canal in 1843).
The spur and associated stretch of canal were infilled in the 1960s during the construction of the M1 motorway (this follows the line of the canal between Sprucefield and Moira). The nearby road bridge over the canal (Boyle’s Bridge) and aqueduct over the River Lagan were also demolished at the same time.

References - Primary sources:
1. PRONI OS/6/3/13/1. First edition OS six-inch map, Co Down sheet 13 (1833).
2. PRONI VAL/1B/347. First valuation book (c.1834).
3. Griffith Valuation: Lurgan Poor Law Union, Co Down, p.6 (1864).

References – Secondary sources:
1. M. Blair, Once Upon the Lagan, p.39 (Belfast: Blackstaff Press, 1981).
2. R. Delany, Ireland’s Inland Waterways (Belfast: Appletree Press, 1986).
3. E.R.R. Green, The Industrial Archaeology of Co Down, pp 70-75 (Belfast: HMSO, 1963).
4. W.A. McCutcheon, The Canals of the North of Ireland, pp 40-61 (Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1965).
5. W.A. McCutcheon, The Industrial Archaeology of Northern Ireland, pp 57-58 (Belfast: HMSO, 1980).

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
Z. Rarity

Evaluation

A detached three-storey 1780s store associated with the former Lagan Canal. Its plain, regularly-fenestrated design reflects its former utilitarian use as a canal-side store. It is of local historical interest as a reminder of the former presence of the Lagan Canal alongside it. It is also a scarce example of a canal warehouse.