Eden Cottage,

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Eden Cottage is a one and a half storey, half-hipped roof house of c.1840-50, set on the E side of the Ballyalloly Road, just over 2 miles SW of Comber.

The front (SW) fade has a central PVC gabled entrance porch/conservatory. To the left and to the right of this is a window with moulded surround and PVC frame (as do most of the windows). Relatively high above both windows is label moulding. At the centre near the eaves is a small attic window with similar surround as ground floor.

The SE façade has two windows to the ground floor and two to the upper level, all differing marginally in size and asymmetrically positioned.

The NW façade has a window to the left on the ground floor and a central upper level window. This façade merges (to the left) with the NW face of a rear return which has two windows. The SE face of the return has two windows (close together) to the left and a PVC door to the left. The gable of the return has a window to the left and an attached lean to shed to the right.

The rear façade of the main house has an unusual octagonal fixed light window to the centre of the upper level.

The entire façade is finished in rough cast and ‘Tyrolean’ render and unpainted. The quoins to the front have been covered in ‘Tyrolean’ render also. The main roof is half-hipped with Bangor blue slates. The gabled roof of the return has similar slates. The main roof has two central rendered chimney stacks. Tall rendered chimney stack to return. Mixture of PVC and cast iron rw goods.

Outbuildings to N and E, one of which has been recently converted to a dwelling (holiday home).

Historical information

Buildings are shown on this general site on the OS map of 1834, but none matches the shape or positioning of the present house. The house is shown on the revised map of where it is marked ‘Eden Cottage’, a house which the valuation returns of 1863 tell us was possession of a David Orr.

The current owner has a (loose) date stone with the inscription ‘Built by John Orr A.D. 1785’. This John is presumably an ancestor of the David of 1863, but the stone itself must refer to the earlier dwelling indicated on the 1834 map. The owner believes that Eden Cottage served as the manse for Moneyreagh Non-subscribing Presbyterian church for a time and that the roof was raised at some point, but the writers have as yet been unable to confirm either of these suggestions, however, the presence of what appears to be a mid 19th century staircase would appear to indicate the property was either always this height or was built up early in its lifetime.

The current owner’s grandfather-in-law acquired Eden Cottage in c.1900 and either he or his son inserted the upper level window to the front.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI OS map 1st ed. 1834, Down 10.
2 PRONI VAL1B/316C, p.64 1st valuation Comber parish 1834.
3 ‘Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland Vol.7: Parishes of County Down II’, ed. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams (QUB 1991), pp.35.
4 PRONI OS map 1st rev. 1858-60, Down 10.
5 PRONI 2nd valuation Comber parish c.1863.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Small-ish one and a half storey half-hipped roof farmhouse of c.1850, with PVC porch/conservatory to front and PVC window frames throughout. The small upper level window to the front façade was inserted in the early 1900s.