Buildings at former quarry site, Castle Espie Wetlands & Wildfowl Trust Conservation Centre, 78 Ballydrain Road, Castle Espie, Comber, Co. Down, BT23 6EA

These are the largely derelict remains of structures associated with the former Castle Espie quarry and brickworks, built between 1860 and 1879, situated on the shore of Strangford Lough to the east of Ballydrain Road, approximately two miles south-east of Comber in County Down. The whole site, together with a neighbouring former farm, now forms a wildfowl conservation centre run by the Wetland Trust, and is of industrial archaeological interest.

The northern and western parts of the site are centred around the former Quarry Farm, just east of Ballydrain Road. The former quarry pits have been converted into freshwater ponds, and the area has been heavily landscaped and is now thickly wooded. The Quarry Farm buildings serve as a visitor centre and coffee shop. A large, recently constructed two-storey building on the west side of the farmyard, built generally in the style of a traditional farmhouse with Georgian-paned sash windows, contains offices; it stands on the footprint of the original single-storey farmhouse. A single-storey outbuilding on the north side of the yard, now used as a shop, has been extended and completely modernised internally.

The southern and eastern parts of the former quarry site have not, in the main, been landscaped, and a number of remnants of the original industrial structures survive, though most of the quarry and brickworks buildings have been demolished.

The most prominent surviving feature is a long, narrow pier stretching finger-like into Strangford Lough. It is now largely overgrown and uncared for. The very end of the pier formerly extended further, but a timber section was removed in relatively recent times.

To the south of the pier are the remnants of former tennis courts, now largely overgrown, and a runway for light aircraft. Both were constructed in the late 1960s, at which time the former lime and brick kilns and a terrace of former quarry workers' houses known as 'The Red Row' were demolished to make way for them.

Further to the south of the runway is a fairly large, rectangular courtyard enclosed by high walls of rubble and brick construction. On the inner faces of these walls are the remains of small lean-to structures, probably once used as stores or workshops. The main entrance to the yard is on the north side. Adjacent to it, to the west, is a section of walling that was apparently once a small bell tower, though its remains are now covered in thick plant growth.

A short distance to the west of the courtyard stands a small, octagonal former pump house, built in brick. This structure is now largely smothered in thick plant growth. It has several small openings in a number of its sides; these are crudely formed and are probably not original features. One tall, narrow opening on the north side does appear to be original, though it has been partly filled with a perspex window. Inside the pump house the Wetland Trust has placed a cone-shaped time capsule.

The history of the site is a long one. Limestone quarrying for agricultural and building use had been carried out here on a small scale since at least the 17th century. By 1740 it was reported that activity had largely ceased as there was little demand for the stone, but by 1834 the Ordnance Survey Memoirs recorded extensive limestone quarries on the site, the stone of which was principally sent to the various towns on the shores of Strangford Lough. Three years later, in 1837, Samuel Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of Ireland reported that the quarries were extensively worked.

At this period much of the land at Castle Espie belonged to the See of Down, which in 1802 had leased it to a Mr Henry Waring Knox. Waring Knox appears to have sub-let the quarry lands to a local farmer named McKee. Around 1850 most of Waring Knox's lands in the area were purchased by Samuel Murland, a prominent linen merchant from Castlewellan, though the actual quarry land remained the subject of a suit in the Court of Chancery until 1864. Once that suit was settled, the land was acquired by Samuel's son Robert, who commenced large-scale production of lime for agricultural purposes in 1865, installing new kilns and building the present pier. To make use of the large quantities of clay extracted during quarrying, Robert also installed new Hoffman kilns imported from Germany, capable of both burning lime and firing brick. Robert Murland died in 1867, aged only thirty, before the business was fully established. The Castle Espie works were then taken over by his father, who ran them together with his nephew Charles Murland and his son-in-law John Fenton. They purchased two vessels, the Jessie Ray and the Woodland (possibly the Woodlawn), and began shipping burnt lime and bricks throughout the Strangford area.

A description of the Castle Espie site in 1874 noted that what had previously been a bare beach had been transformed into a hive of industry with nearly two hundred people employed. In addition to lime burning and the production of 100,000 bricks per year, the works also produced tiles, and unglazed and half-glazed crockery including bowls, jugs, teapots and flower pots. A small quantity of fully glazed ornamental wares was also made. Houses were built on the site to accommodate some of the workforce.

Despite its apparent prosperity, the production techniques were costly and Samuel Murland appears to have heavily subsidised the entire operation from his own resources. When he died in 1878 the main driving force behind the enterprise died with him, and the works closed in 1879. Though offered for sale in 1885, the works were never reopened, save for a small quantity of lime burned by a local man named Petticrew. The 1885 sale particulars indicated that the plant was capable of producing 12,000 tons of lime per annum and 24,000 bricks daily, suggesting that brick production had risen sharply since 1874.

In 1885 the site was purchased by the Craig family, who sold it in 1912 to William Dickson, a local man whose family had owned the neighbouring Quarry Farm since at least 1724. Dickson used the land for grazing and the buildings for housing livestock and farm produce. In 1966 the Quarry Farm and the former works lands were sold by Mr Dickson's daughter-in-law to a Mr McCleery, who built the light aircraft runway, clearing the kilns and workers' houses in the process. McCleery sold the lands in 1978 to Paddy Mackie, who landscaped the former quarry pits into freshwater lakes and introduced waterfowl. Through Mr Mackie's efforts, Castle Espie has developed into a thriving conservation centre providing habitat for over eighty species of wildfowl.