19 Old Lurgan Road, Bocombra, Portadown, Co. Armagh, BT63 5SG

19 Old Lurcan Road, Bocombra, Portadown, Co. Armagh

This was a single storey, five bay, lobby entry thatched house constructed between 1820 and 1839. It faced north-east at the end of a short driveway off the Old Lurgan Road, just over a mile from Portadown centre.

The house featured a projecting cube porch with roughcast external finish to match the main walls. Dressings were of smooth cement. The porch roof was covered with corrugated iron and finished with a three tier concrete cornice including a ball finial at the north-west corner. The entrance was a four-panelled door with five pane sidelights opening on the north-west side of the porch.

The front porch contained the remains of a 2/4 vertically sliding window with curved sash stops and a deep sill. To the left of the porch was one 6/6 vertically sliding window, and to the right three 6/6 vertically sliding windows, all with chamfered sash stops, smooth cement dressings and sills of traditional depths. The rear of the house had four windows: starting from the north-west corner, a 6/6 vertically sliding window with moulded sash stops and no sill, followed by two 6/3 vertically sliding windows with moulded sash stops (the first without a sill, the second with one), and finally a 6/6 vertically sliding window with curved sash stops and a sill.

The roof contained the remains of thatch within concrete parapet gables. Two chimneystacks, one rising from the right hand (north-west) gable and the other serving the kitchen hearth, had collapsed.

A short lead-covered link on the south-west corner gave access to a one and a half storey kitchen extension. This extension had a pitched slate roof, a corbelled brick chimney, a timber-framed, ledged, braced and sheeted door on the south-east side, and windows on all four sides with those on the north-west and south-east sides at upper level.

The building is documented on the Ordnance Survey map of 1834-35, though it did not appear in the contemporary valuation. It was recorded in the second valuation of 1862 as a relatively old single-storey thatched house 13 yards in length, occupied by Jane Best leasing from Jonathan Richardson, with a rateable value of £2-5-0. Jane Best was succeeded by Richard Best in 1884, who purchased the freehold in 1909. Richard Best remained in residence until 1929, and his descendants continued to occupy the property until relatively recently.

Following a period of neglect, the house was re-thatched in 1985. A planning application for a replacement bungalow was made in 1989. The Lands Division of the Department of the Environment agreed to sell the building to the sitting tenant in 1990. Further planning applications for housing development, which included the boundary of this building, were made in 1997 and 2003.

By August 2003, the roof had largely fallen in, though the exterior appeared relatively sound. The building was recognised as a rare example of a historic house type that had once been common and was considered capable of restoration.

By August 2014, the building had deteriorated significantly. The roof and walls had collapsed to the extent that the original form and appearance were no longer apparent, and the structure no longer met the test of being a building of special interest. The site became surrounded by a 2-metre-high timber fence, and what remained of the former house was largely collapsed with vegetation covering it, making the floor plan and individual elements difficult to discern. The building was subsequently demolished and delisted in January 2015.