9 College Place North, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 6BE

No. 9 College Place North is an end-of-terrace two-storey red brick house built around 1840, forming one of a group of four similar houses arranged on the northwest side of College Place North, a cul-de-sac situated to the north of College Square North in Belfast city centre. The building is rectangular on plan, faces southeast, and has a side elevation that fronts onto a truncated cul-de-sac to the west. Together with the adjoining Nos. 3–7 and Nos. 11–13, it represents one of the very few surviving examples of late-Georgian and early-Victorian terraced housing of this scale remaining in Belfast city centre, and the whole group forms a coherent 19th-century terrace of considerable local interest.

The roof is covered in natural slate with black clay ridge tiles, a lead hip ridge, and cast-iron guttering on iron brackets to a brick eaves course, with a cast-iron downpipe. There is a profiled brick chimneystack with terracotta pots on the north party wall and a further brick chimneystack on the west party wall. The walls are of red brick laid in Flemish bond with cement pointing, with painted rusticated quoins to the outer corner. Window openings are formed with gauged brick flat arches and have painted sandstone sills, rendered surrounds, and replacement 6/6 timber sash windows.

The front elevation is two windows wide. To the right is a square-headed door opening fitted with a replacement panelled timber door and a rectangular overlight, flanked by large plain console brackets that support a hood cornice. The door opens onto two concrete steps to the front pavement. A sandstone plinth wall and replacement steel railing enclose a small front area. The south side elevation is two windows wide, with a smaller window to the west end that may form part of No. 11. The rear elevation is abutted by No. 11, and the north side elevation is abutted by No. 7.

No. 9 is the corner building and is considerably larger than Nos. 3–7, a fact reflected in its slightly higher rateable value throughout its recorded history. The terrace does not appear on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1832–33, which shows the area as vacant, but is present by the time of the second edition in 1858. Its construction coincided with the westward expansion of Belfast's residential development following the opening of the Royal Belfast Academical Institution in 1814 and the growth in population during the Victorian period. The terrace is believed to have been erected as mews houses for servants working in the larger houses fronting onto College Square, and was constructed as part of the development of the fashionable residential area surrounding the Institution. At the time of its construction the terrace was reportedly blocked off at the Killen Street end by a brick wall, while an opposing terrace once stood on the south-west side, now demolished. The terrace remains in the shadow of Neill's factory, which was originally built during the Famine period and remodelled in the 1880s by James Neill.

Griffith's Valuation of 1860 records that Nos. 3–13 College Place North were owned by Thomas McCammon, a tanner, leather merchant, and flour miller who operated from a tannery on King Street directly to the north, and who was also the lessor of a number of other dwellings in the area. In 1860, No. 9 was occupied by Caroline Cunningham and valued at £10, slightly above the £9 attributed to the other houses on the terrace. By 1868 a Ms. Lloyd had taken possession. Robert Beattie, a mechanic, was recorded as tenant in 1877 and 1880, and also occupied the adjoining No. 7 in 1880. By 1881 John Ballagh was in residence, remaining until some point before the Belfast Revaluation of 1900, by which time ownership of the terrace had passed to Samuel Gibson, a druggist and general merchant with properties on King Street. The 1900 Revaluation described No. 9 as a two-storey dwelling approximately fifty years old, fitted with gas installations, and possessing five inhabited rooms including sitting rooms and bedrooms but excluding the kitchen. Its value was slightly increased to £10 10s, and the occupant at that time was Samuel James, who paid an annual rent of £17. The 1901 Census records Samuel James (aged 50, Church of Ireland) as a Sergeant in the Royal Irish Constabulary, living at the address with his wife Evangeline (aged 40) and their seven children. The census building return described the dwelling as a second-class house consisting of six rooms with no out offices. By 1910, John Dermot was recorded as occupant; the 1911 Census records Dermot (aged 42, Roman Catholic) as a constable in the Royal Irish Constabulary, residing there with his wife Annie (aged 32) and their four infant children, with no alteration noted to the property's description. Despite James having vacated around 1910, he continued to be recorded in the Annual Revisions until their cancellation in 1930. At least one other occupant, Maud McMahon, was recorded at the address from 1918 and was still in residence at the time of the First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland in 1935, when the property was revalued at £13 10s. McMahon had vacated by the Second General Revaluation, and by 1956 the property was occupied by a Mr. or Mrs. B. Kelly. The value stood at £14 by the end of that revaluation in 1972.

The terrace was listed in 1977 on the grounds that it represented a rare surviving example of two-storey early 19th-century housing in the area. In the period following its listing, the group fell into disrepair through neglect and vandalism, and by the 1990s over half of the houses on the terrace lay vacant, though No. 9 was among those maintained in generally good condition. James Neill's original Victorian mill was demolished in 1986–87 and replaced with the current structure. In 1992, Neill's Mill requested the delisting of College Place North with the intention of demolishing the terrace and incorporating the site into the factory. The request was rejected, and a renovation project was subsequently carried out on Nos. 3–13, restoring the original character of the terrace.

Charles Brett, writing in 1985, described Nos. 3–13 College Place North as "enchanting little two-storey mid-Georgian houses" and praised the intact glazing bars, though he attributed the terrace to a period earlier than the evidence supports; the terrace most certainly post-dates the 1832–33 Ordnance Survey map and was most likely built around 1840–50. Patton, writing in 1993 at the time of the restoration, described Nos. 3–9 as an "obtuse-angled terrace of two-storey red-brick houses with some surviving three-lobe fanlights over four-panel doors in simple doorcases." The original fanlight at No. 9 is the only example among the terrace to have survived, and the glazing bars noted by Brett have also been maintained.