25 Slopes Road, Ballydugan, Portadown, Craigavon, Co Down, BT63 5NT

Site of a long single storey vernacular house at Ballydugan, roughly 5 kilometres south-west of Portadown, set on sloping ground at the end of a country lane. Parts of the building were of probable pre-1830 construction.

The asymmetric front elevation faced roughly north-east onto sloping ground. At roughly the centre was the front entrance, a relatively recent partly glazed door set within an equally recent-looking shallow flat roofed open porch of presumably concrete construction. To the left of the doorway were three roughly evenly spaced and roughly similar sized square windows. The window to the far left, marginally larger than the other two, had a recent top hung timber frame; the other two had Georgian-like six pane timber frames. To the right of the doorway were two square windows with similar recent top hung timber frames. Due to the sloping ground the left hand side of the elevation was considerably lower than the right hand side. The front elevation was finished in white-washed roughcast.

The south-east gable was blank with a central projecting chimney breast, finished in unpainted cement render. Originally this gable was not exposed as the building was once considerably longer. The north-west gable was blank and finished in white-washed roughcast. To the right hand side of this gable, part of the roughcast had fallen away revealing mud construction.

The rear elevation contained, from left to right: a square-ish window with top hung timber frame; a broader window with timber frame with top hung upper openers; a square window with top hung timber frame; and a small extension with a shallow pitched corrugated iron lean-to roof. The north-west face of the extension had a square window with recent two light frame. The south-west face had a larger window with recent three light frame. The south-east face had a plain timber sheeted door. The rear elevation was finished as the front.

The north-west half of the gabled roof was scallop thatched with coped parapets and a small rendered chimneystack to the south-east. The south-east half of the roof was set at a lower level and covered with corrugated iron with a rendered parapet to the south-east gable with small rendered chimneystack. Metal guttering was fitted to the south-west half. The south-east half of the house had considerably narrower walls, suggesting brick construction to this portion. All windows had painted concrete cills.

A building was shown on this site on the Ordnance Survey map of 1834, but it was noticeably longer than the building recorded in 2002. The property was not recorded in the contemporary valuation, but was recorded in that of 1860, when the building contained two dwellings: one to the north-west in the hands of Bernard O'Neill, with John Dines in possession of that to the south-east. It is likely that the 1860 structure is that shown on the 1834 map. Around 1880 the whole building was acquired by the McCosker (or McCusker) family, who remained there until at least the 1920s. Some time after this, possibly the 1930s-40s, the dwelling to the south-east was demolished. It is likely that the sitting room section to the end of the dwelling as recorded in 2002 (a section that appeared to be brick built) was added shortly after the demolition.

The building was lost following a fire on 20 July 2003. Sparks from a rubbish fire ignited the thatch, which began to burn in the wind. The Fire Brigade attended and pulled out sections of roof to allow the burn to finish. Roof timbers and chimney collapsed. Building Control insisted upon demolition of the remaining building due to safety concerns over access past the building. The building was demolished before the Environment and Heritage Service or Planning Service were consulted.