Former Gas Works, 59 Downpatrick Street, Rathfriland, Newry, Co Down, BT34 5LZ

Former Gas Works, 59 Downpatrick Street, Rathfriland

This is a vestige of the provincial gasworks that supplied Rathfriland with street lighting and gas services. The gasworks was established in 1855 by J.M. McClenehan of the Rathfriland Gas Light Company Ltd and first appears on the 1859 Ordnance Survey 6-inch map. The works originally contained three horizontal retorts for manufacturing gas from coal. A valuation book entry of 1928 notes the site was vacated by the company, indicating it ceased operation then or shortly before. The location at the lowest part of the town was significant as it minimised the need to pump gas to consumers, as coal gas is lighter than air and rises naturally.

Only three elements survive: the manager's house, a ruinous outbuilding, and traces of the gasholder pit. The retort house where coal gas was manufactured, and its associated chimney along the south boundary, have been demolished.

The manager's house is a one-storey building situated at the south-east corner of the site, accessed from the street. It has a hipped natural slate roof with a tiny cast-iron skylight to the front pitch. Smooth cement-rendered coped chimneys rise at each end of the ridge. Overhanging eaves have exposed rafter tails and half-round metal gutters, missing to the rear. The walls are random rubble with cement wash on all elevations except the rear. An advanced base course runs along the front and rear elevations, with corners raised in painted render.

The principal elevation faces north into the yard and is four openings wide, the left one possibly a later addition. At the left is a smaller half-top-hung casement set within a former doorway. The remaining three openings are grouped together: the central one is the entrance, comprising a four-panel painted timber door with a rectangular margin-paned transom over, flanked by two 6/6 sliding sash windows without horns. All openings have painted smooth render architraves; the windows also have painted stone cills. The left gable is abutted by a small lean-to timber shed, to the right of which is a 6/6 sash window matching the front elevation. The rear elevation is cement-lined rendered and blank except for a 1/1 sash at the extreme left and a small modern top-hung window to its right. The right elevation is abutted by a lower one-storey lean-to with a tarred slate roof and smooth cement-rendered walls, which has two doors and two windows to the yard elevation and one window to its exposed gable; its rear wall is blank.

At the north-west corner of the yard stand the ruinous remains of a random rubble building with pitched natural slate roof, mostly gone. It appears to have been originally open to its yard elevation but was subsequently infilled with rendered concrete blocks. This may once have been a dry coal store.

The yard retains a small metal weighbridge and traces of the dressed granite curb of the gasholder pit, which has been infilled and partly built over with corrugated-metal buildings forming the west perimeter. A granite-coped painted random rubble wall fronts the street, with a sliding metal vehicle gate between two large painted masonry pillars and a timber-sheeted pedestrian gate to the right.

The building is of local interest and industrial archaeological significance.