31 Main Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Two storey gabled house on the SE side of Main Street, Carrowdore.

Front NW facade has left of centre sheeted timber door with plain render ‘shouldered’ surround. Two windows to right of door now with modern timber frames and similar surround to doorway. Window to left of doorway, as previous, with four similar (but marginally shorter), windows to the first floor.

Both gables are blank.

At the centre of the ground floor of the rear facade is a small kitchen extension with sheeted door and small modern window. To the left of this extension is a (possibly recently enlarged) window, with modern frame. Similar window to the right of extension. There are no first floor windows to the rear. To the far left at the rear is a fairly recently constructed breeze block ‘support’ for a water tank.

The entire facade is finished in rough cast.

The roof is pitched and has ‘Tullycavey’ slates, which have been tarred at the rear. The roof has begun to cave in slightly. Three rendered chimney stacks. Cast iron rw goods.

There is a small date plaque between the second and third windows on the front facade with the date 1943, the year in which the front facade was re-rendered with smooth rendered surrounds to openings added.

This house is one of the oldest (if not the oldest) dwellings in the small village of Carrowdore, and recent window frames and window surrounds not withstanding, it has remained largely untouched.

Historical information

Locally, this house is said to be the oldest in Carrowdore. A building is shown on this site on the OS Maps of 1833/4 and 1858-60, and the current owner has recent deeds which make reference to documentation dating back to at least 1800. Thus, it appears likely that this building dates from the beginning of the nineteenth century, and if local folk memory is reliable, may well be eighteenth century.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL 1B/32 Valuation records for the townland of Ballyrawer (Parish of Donaghadee) 1830s.
2 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps 1st Edition 1833/4. Down 6.
3 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps 1st Revision 1858-60. Down 6.
4 PRONI ‘Griffith’s’ valuation for the townland of Drumawhy (Parish of Donaghadee) 1863.
5 UFTM W.A. Green Collection WAG 1067 Photograph of Main Street, Carrowdore c.1910.
6 Grace Seymour 'Echoes of Millisle and district' (Rathfriland ?c.1983), p.88 [Photograph of Main St. Carrowdore ?c.1910.]

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Two storey house of probable eighteenth century origin which remains largely unaltered both internally and externally and whose front façade, recent window surrounds not withstanding, still retains a vernacular simplicity.