9 College Square North, Belfast, Co Antrim, BT1 6AS

9 College Square North, Belfast

This is a four-storey, three-bay rendered terraced townhouse, built around 1830 as one of a terrace of five similar houses forming part of what has been described as the best surviving example of an 1830s terrace in Belfast. The building faces south onto College Square North and is rectangular on plan. It was restored from dereliction by Hearth Housing Association in 1998–99 and converted into modern flats, restoring the terrace's original Georgian character. The extent of listing covers the house and its railings.

Exterior

The pitched roof is not visible from the street and sits behind a parapet wall with a moulded eaves cornice. There is a profiled rendered chimney stack to the east party wall with clay pots. The walling is painted rendered, ruled and lined, with a moulded plinth course. Cast-iron guttering on iron brackets runs to a red brick eaves course at the rear, with cast-iron downpipes.

The south front elevation is three windows wide. Window openings are square-headed with sandstone sills and replacement timber sash windows without horns. To the left of the front elevation is an entrance portico: a square-headed door opening contains a replacement flat-panelled timber door with a rectangular overlight having margin lights, flanked by plain rendered pilasters and responding fluted Ionic columns supporting a hood with a full entablature. Notably, this is the only house in the terrace to have a doorcase with a flat entablature supported on fluted Ionic columns; the others have triangular pediments. The door opens onto a replacement paved platform reached by five replacement nosed stone steps, enclosed by replacement iron railings that return to enclose the front railed area.

The north rear elevation is two windows wide, built in red brick laid in stretcher bond with gauged brick window heads and two round-headed window openings to the half-landings. The east side elevation abuts the adjoining No. 8, and the west side elevation abuts the adjoining No. 10.

Roof covering is slate; rainwater goods are cast iron; walling is rendered; windows are timber.

Setting

The building forms part of a terrace of five similar houses lining the north side of College Square North, facing the former Municipal Technical Institute. There is a common parking area to the rear, enclosed by rendered walls and opening onto College Place. The terrace, including the adjoining Nos. 10–12 College Square North, the Old Museum, and Nos. 1–6 College Square North, sits within a conservation area and shares group value with similar surviving Georgian houses such as those at 7–11 Wellington Place. A replica building at No. 8, also constructed by Hearth, closes the gap left when the original No. 8 was demolished by a bomb in 1977.

History

The terrace of College Square North was not present on the 1822 map included in George Benn's The History of the Town of Belfast, which recorded that the Royal Belfast Academical Institution lay at the western limit of the town, still not surrounded by many buildings. The terrace had been completed by the time of the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1832–33. According to C. E. B. Brett's Georgian Belfast: 1750–1850, the imposing Regency terrace was developed for John McCammond, who held the original lease for Nos. 1–12, while the remainder of the terrace was erected for Zachariah Leaf Orrett.

Shortly after its construction, the Townland Valuation of around 1830 recorded No. 9 as valued at £52 and occupied by Mr Samuel Graeme Fenton, a local magistrate and partner in Saddler, Fenton & Co., a linen merchant firm based in the White Linen Hall. Fenton remained at No. 9 until at least the mid-1850s; in 1852 he was elected Mayor of Belfast, the second mayor of the town to reside in the fashionable College Square area. The first was William G. Johnston, mayor in 1849, who resided at the adjoining No. 12.

By the time of Griffith's Valuation in 1860, Samuel Fenton had vacated and the property was occupied by Mr Charles Duffin, a local flax spinner and manufacturer who administered the Clarence Street Mill. Duffin leased the property from a Ms. Jane Irvine, and the dwelling had slightly increased in value to £57. Duffin also served as a local magistrate and remained at No. 9 until around 1877, when he was succeeded by Dr Henry Burden, the first of several medical professionals to reside at the address.

In 1885, Dr Peter Reilly O'Connell came into possession of the property. That year the house was decreased in value to £50 and was partially occupied by the offices of the Young Women's Christian Aid Organisation, which vacated by 1889. By the Belfast Revaluation of 1900, the dwelling was revalued at £47; the valuer noted that the building was fitted with gas installations and possessed a stable block to the rear. The 1901 Census records that Dr O'Connell, aged 39, Roman Catholic, was also a local alderman for County Antrim. He lived alone at No. 9 with a single domestic servant; the census building return described the property as a first-class dwelling of ten rooms with the rear stable block as its sole outbuilding.

College Square had been one of the most desirable residential areas in Belfast during the mid-to-late 19th century, attracting doctors and other professionals. However, the construction of the Belfast Municipal Technical Institute between 1900 and 1907, which occupied the corner of the square and cut off the pleasant view of the Royal Belfast Academical Institution's lawns, led many professional residents to relocate to the new terraced squares in South Belfast, such as University Square near Queen's University. Dr O'Connell left College Square North by 1910, at which point the house lay vacant.

By 1911, No. 9 was occupied by Mr Thomas Getgood, aged 48 and a member of the Church of Ireland, a merchant tailor who lived there with his wife Matilda, aged 44, and their four sons. By 1918, the house had passed out of residential use and was converted into a Gaelic Language College administered by Seán MacMaoláin (1886–1973), an Irish language poet and playwright who won first prize for his Oireachtas Ode and published numerous works including Éan Corr and Finnscéal agus Fírinne.

By 1923 the building had changed hands again and became the meeting place of the Prince of Wales Masonic Club. When the club first took possession, the building was converted into office space, increasing its value to £80, at which it remained until the end of the Annual Revisions in 1930. The First General Revaluation of Northern Ireland in 1935 revalued the property at £115 and noted that it continued to be leased by the Irvine estate. The occupants at this time were recorded as the Trustees of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Antrim, who continued to operate from the site until at least the 1970s. During the Second World War the occupant's name was changed to 'Masonic Charities', and the Belfast Street Directory for 1943 notes that a Mr Edward Callaghan was the steward of the organisation.

College Square North survived the heavy bombing of Belfast's city centre during the Blitz of 1941. The Second General Revaluation, which commenced in 1956, increased the value of No. 9 to £184, at which it remained by the end of the project in 1972.

During the turbulent period of the 1970s, College Square and the surrounding Smithfield area suffered frequent bomb and vandalism attacks. In 1977, the adjoining No. 8 was demolished by a bomb, and over the following decades most of the remaining terrace lay vacant and fell into disrepair, with only No. 12 continuing to be occupied. No. 9 was listed along with the rest of the terrace in 1979. Nos. 9–11 were subsequently restored by Hearth Housing Association in 1998–99 and converted into modern flats, restoring the terrace's original character. Despite the loss of much original fabric during the intervening period of neglect, the plain Georgian character of the terrace survives, and the building retains significant historic interest as a surviving element of Georgian Belfast.