Rath House, 40-42 Prince's Street, Dromore, Co Down, BT25 1AY

Rath House is a terraced Georgian dwelling built around 1830, located on the south side of Princes Street in Dromore, County Down. It comprises a two-storey-over-basement main house of three bays (No. 40) with an adjoining single-storey-over-basement three-bay house (No. 42). Both properties have been restored in recent years, with architectural detailing largely intact and original proportions well preserved. Together with the adjoining former stable block, boundary wall, and gate piers to the south, the group makes a characterful and cohesive streetscape.

The building is rectangular on plan, with the basements exposed to the rear owing to the topography of the site.

No. 40 has a pitched natural slate roof with blue-black angled ridge tiles and rendered chimneystacks to the gables, topped with tall terracotta pots. Rainwater goods are cast-iron half-round gutters with cast-iron hoppers and downpipes. The walls are finished in ruled-and-lined render with raised quoins and a smooth rendered plinth. Windows are timber-framed sliding sash — three-over-six panes to the first floor and six-over-six to the ground floor — with no horns and projecting painted sills. The principal elevation faces northwest and is symmetrically arranged with three openings on each floor. At ground floor centre is a bolection-moulded four-panelled timber door with sidelights, timber aprons on stone plinths, and a segmental-headed transom light above. The northeast gable is abutted by the single-storey No. 42. The southeast elevation has irregularly arranged windows, and the exposed basement is lit to half-landing level with original fenestration intact. The southwest gable is blank.

No. 42 has a pitched natural slate roof with blue-black angled ridge tiles and a rendered chimneystack with terracotta pots. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods sit on projecting eaves. The walls are rough-cast render with raised quoins to the north corner and a smooth rendered plinth. Windows are six-over-six timber-framed sliding sash with projecting sills. The principal northwest-facing elevation is symmetrically arranged, with two six-over-six sash windows flanking a timber-sheeted entrance door set in a smooth rendered surround. The northeast elevation is abutted by the adjoining former stable block, now in use as a shop. The southeast elevation has three windows to the ground floor; at basement level there is a timber-sheeted door to the left and a set of segmental-headed timber coach doors to the right.

The properties are street-fronted with a rear yard that sits lower than street level. The yard is accessed from Mossvale Road to the east through a pair of painted roughcast rendered gate piers with pointed caps supporting timber gates. The boundary to the road is formed by a painted rubble stone wall with random stone coping.

The building first appears on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1833, shown as an oblong structure. Contemporary Townland Valuations recorded it as valued at £6 and occupied by a Mr Adam Agnew, who was shortly afterwards replaced by a Mr Stewart. The valuations also noted a stable and store among the outbuildings, though it is unclear whether No. 42 had been added at that time. By the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1859, No. 42 is clearly depicted and little else had changed on the site. Griffith's Valuation of 1861 recorded that a Mr Hugh Stewart leased the property from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, by which time its value had risen to £15 — possibly reflecting the addition of No. 42 in the intervening years.

Hugh Stewart, employed as a Stamp Distributor, died in 1869, after which his widow Ellen Stewart continued to reside at Rath House until 1879, when Dr Samuel Hawthorn, a local surgeon, took occupation. From that point the house served as the residence of a succession of local surgeons and doctors. By 1892 a Dr Francis McKee had taken possession. The 1901 Census described the site as a first-class dwelling comprising 12 rooms, with outbuildings in the rear courtyard including two stables, a cow house, piggery, fowl house, turf house, and store. McKee married his wife Thomasina around 1902 and likely constructed the adjoining stable block by 1909, when the rateable value of the property increased to £22 10s. He remained at Rath House until his death around 1919, after which his widow held the property until 1922, when John Wilson, also a surgeon, took possession and remained through to 1930, when the Annual Revisions record ends. An Annual Revisions town plan dated between 1906 and around 1935 shows several small outbuildings to the rear, all of which have since been demolished.

In 1969, the architectural historian C. E. B. Brett described Rath House as a "nice two-storey stucco house with quoins and glazing bars," noting it was then occupied by a Mr W. Cleighton. The house was listed in 1977, and its layout has not changed since the 1973 Ordnance Survey map. It remains in use as a private dwelling and has also been used as an antiques showroom.

Although named Rath House, the Ordnance Survey maps make clear that the building was not erected on the site of an ancient rath fort. The name may instead reflect the property's situation almost exactly between two of Dromore's largest ancient monuments: the Norman Motte and Bailey Castle approximately 300 metres to the southeast of Princes Street, and an ancient Irish rath fort approximately 300 metres to the northwest — the latter formerly used as a mass station by the Roman Catholic community of the parish during the Penal period.