32 High Street

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Two storey vernacular house of pre 1834 origin, situated in the middle of a terrace on the SE side of High Street. The building is set on a slope rising NE to SW.

The front (NW) façade has a doorway to the left on the ground floor with timber panelled and glazed door encased with painted stone surround with keystone. To the right of the doorway is a double sash window, with glazing bars to top sashes (each window 4 panes over 1). To the right of this is an elliptical carriage entrance with double timber sheeted doors. To the first floor are two sash windows with Georgian panes (6 over 6), one above the ground floor window and the other above the coach arch.

To the right at the rear is small, single storey, return with a mono-pitched roof. The SW face of this has a doorway (similar to front but with a large single pane of glazing) to the centre, with a relatively small sash window to the left and to the right (both with horizontal glazing bars- 2 over 2). The SE face of the return is blank. To the immediate left of the return (on the main rear façade) is a sash window (as return). To the left of this is the rear of the carriage entrance. To the left on the first floor is a window as ground floor, with another two to the right.

The front façade is finished in plain render, the rear and return in rough cast. The entire façade is painted. The gabled roof is covered in natural slate, as is the return roof. Rendered chimney stacks to the centre and SW end of roof ridge. Aluminium rw goods.

Historical information

This site is shown occupied on the 1722 map of Comber. The present house is probably that (of the same dimensions) noted in the valuation of 1834 as the home of one Alexander Gibson. The valuers noted that the property (and the rest of this terrace) was of reasonable age at this stage, and may have dated from the 1790s or perhaps slightly later.

The whole terrace on this side is believed to have once housed workers of the near by brewery (later the Upper Distillery)- it may even have been purpose built. In 1920 the terrace was acquired by Andrews flax spinning mill (for use as employee housing), and in 1980 was vested in the Housing Executive. In 1984 the properties were acquired by Hearth Housing Association and renovated and restored two years later.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI D.654/M1B/2 Londonderry Papers- ‘Survey of the town, tenements and parks of Comber…1722’.
2 PRONI D.654/M54/2, 8, 9, 14- Londonderry Papers- Maps of Cow Lane 1793-1810. [High Street was known as Cow Lane in the 18th and early 19th centuries.]
3 PRONI VAL 1B/316A p.65 1st valuation, Comber, 1834.
4 PRONI OS/1/3/10 OS map, 1st ed. 1834, Down 10.
5 PRONI OS/6/3/10/3 OS map, 1st rev. 1858, Down 10.
6 PRONI 2nd valuation, Comber, 1861. [In print in PRONI search room and in the Linen Hall Library- the town plan to accompany this valuation is missing making identification of owners of properties largely impossible.]
7 PRONI OS/2/3/10 OS map, 2nd ed. 1901, Down 10.

Secondary sources
1 Hearth Housing Association- notes concerning the history of 28-50 High Street.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Two storey vernacular house of probable pre 1834 origin, set in a terrace all of which was sympathetically renovated in 1986.