Kilmacrew House 70 Kilmacrew Road Banbridge

Kilmacrew House is a plainly detailed, symmetrical two-storey three-bay late Victorian farmhouse situated in the townland of Kilmacrew, north-east of Banbridge. It was remodelled around 1890 from an earlier mid-19th-century single-storey farmhouse, and the current two-storey form was under construction in 1897, completed and first valued at £32 in 1898. The house is of considerable historic interest as the later home of Helen Waddell (1889–1965), the noted Irish medieval scholar and writer, and retains a high proportion of original fabric across its various phases of development.

Architectural Description

The house is T-shaped on plan, with a full-height rear return that was later extended, and a single-storey addition to the south-west. The roof is pitched natural slate with bargeboards to the gables, projected eaves with ogee-section cast-iron rainwater goods, and four brick chimneystacks with moulded caps and multiple pots. Walling throughout is roughcast rendered. Windows are timber sash in plain rendered reveals with projecting granite sills; the principal and rear elevation windows are 1-over-1, while the remainder are generally 2-over-2 and horizontally divided. The timber entrance door comprises four bolection-moulded panels with a plain glazed transom above; a cast-iron knocker is present, though the knob has been removed. The threshold and step are granite.

The principal elevation faces south-east and is symmetrically arranged, with a central entrance and four equally spaced windows on each floor. A blue plaque installed by the Ulster History Circle is fixed to the centre of this elevation, inscribed: "HELEN / WADDELL / 1889–1965 / Scholar / and writer / lived here."

The south-west gable is abutted at ground floor level by a single-storey addition with a hipped slate roof and leaded hips. Its walling is ruled and lined cement render. It is lit to the south-east and south-west by a 2-over-2 window. The exposed first floor above has one window to the left.

The rear elevation is abutted on its left side by the full-height return. A lean-to entrance porch sits in the re-entrant angle, with a metal-framed conservatory abutting to its right. The porch has a timber door with plinth blocks and two 6-over-6 sash windows. Two windows are visible at first-floor level to the right on the exposed rear elevation. The return is detailed in the same manner as the main house, with a hipped roof; its south-west elevation has three irregularly spaced windows on each floor, and its north-west end has a single first-floor window.

The north-east elevation of the return is abutted at its centre by a lean-to brick addition with a corrugated metal roof, which has a window over it, and at its left by a flat-roofed two-storey sanitary extension with a window to each floor. The exposed right end has a single window. The lean-to is lit by two windows made up of a variety of sash and fixed panes. The north-east gable of the main house extends slightly to the right beneath a catslide roof and is lit by two windows on each floor, all 1-over-1 with the exception of the bottom-right window, which is 2-over-2 and vertically divided.

Access and Setting

The site is entered from Kilmacrew Road via a long tree-lined farm lane to the south, without gates at the road. The house itself is reached by a secondary drive leading to a gravel forecourt and small garden with a central paved path aligned on axis with the entrance. A pair of wrought-iron gates on monolithic granite piers gives access to the woodland garden, which is enclosed by rubble stone walls with soldier coping. Double wrought-iron gates leading from the front of the house to the farmyard are supported on rubble stone piers with rubble coping and pebble finials.

The house sits within a working farmyard setting, with substantial outbuilding ranges to the north-west and woodland gardens to the south and west. The original extensive woodland setting survives. A variety of early 19th-century farm buildings dating from the original property also survive on site.

Historical Background

The site first appeared on the first edition Ordnance Survey maps in 1833, when a Mr John Boyd was recorded as resident in the Townland Valuation of around 1830. His farm was then valued at £5 10s and consisted of a dwelling and three outoffices of low value. A historic map in the possession of the current owner, entitled 'A Survey and Map of Messr's John and David Boyd, House and Lands' and dated 1845, depicts the house as a T-shaped single-storey structure four openings wide with the door second from the left, with a substantial return and a single linear two-storey outbuilding to the north.

Between 1833 and 1860 a new dwelling was erected on the site of the current house, T-shaped and with approximately the same layout as the present building, including a large return to the rear. The two-storey outbuilding range to the north-west had also been constructed by the time of the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1860. By Griffith's Valuation of 1861, the farm had passed from John Boyd to a Mr Charles Martin, a local farmer who leased the site from a Mr James Quinn; with the new dwelling and outbuildings in place, the valuation had risen to £10.

Charles Martin resided at Kilmacrew until his death in 1894. His will, referring to the property as 'The Home Farm', left it to his nephews the Reverend John Martin of Magherally Presbyterian Church and Charles Martin, though only the Reverend John Martin took possession. He promptly commissioned the construction of the current two-storey late-Victorian house, completed in 1898. The L-shaped single-storey outbuilding to the south-west of the house was likely also constructed at this time, first appearing on the third edition Ordnance Survey maps of 1903–18, with no further change to the valuation recorded between 1898 and the close of the Annual Revisions in 1929.

The 1901 Census described Kilmacrew House as a first-class dwelling of 13 rooms, occupied by the Reverend Martin along with two agricultural labourers and a domestic servant. Around 1907 the Reverend Martin married Margaret Waddell, sister of the medieval scholar Helen Waddell. By the 1911 Census, the household had grown to include Martin, his wife (aged 27, Presbyterian), three children, and a number of domestic servants and farm labourers. The farm at that time comprised a stable, two cow houses, a piggery, fowl house, boiling house, and barn.

The Reverend John Martin continued to live at Kilmacrew House until his death in 1946, after which his widow Margaret took possession. Following her husband's death, Margaret invited her sister Helen Waddell to come and live with her. Helen and Margaret had been born in Tokyo, daughters of the Reverend Hugh Waddell, a missionary to the Far East, returning to Ireland in 1900. Helen Waddell studied English Literature at Victoria College and Queen's University Belfast, and went on to establish herself as one of the foremost medieval scholars and translators of her generation. Her most celebrated works include The Wandering Scholars (1927) and Peter Abelard (1933), both widely praised for making the medieval world accessible to a modern audience. In the 1950s Helen Waddell began to suffer from mental illness and came to live at Kilmacrew House with her sister, where she remained until her death in 1965. She is buried in the graveyard of Magherally Old Church, and is commemorated by the Ulster History Circle blue plaque on the principal elevation of the house.

A number of large modern corrugated-iron barns were erected to the north-west of the farm in the mid-20th century, prior to the current edition of the Ordnance Survey map of 1973. Kilmacrew House continues to be occupied by a relative of the Reverend John Martin and has maintained its general character, with the house and its adjoining outbuildings kept in good condition by the present owner.