Water pump, Outside 5 Tavnaghan Terrace, Tromra Road, Cushendall, Ballymena, Co. Antrim, BT44 0SZ

A disused roadside water pump located outside 5 Tavnaghan Terrace on the west side of the main road between Cushendall and Cushendun. The pump is a typical cow-tail manually-operated example, probably erected by Ballycastle Rural District Council around 1915 to serve three agricultural labourers' houses built by the Council in 1913 under the Labourers' Acts 1883-1911. The legislation empowered local authorities to purchase land and build houses for agricultural workers. The contract for these houses was awarded to Hugh Taggart of Capecastle in April 1913, comprising two houses at £133 each and a third at £145, all to be finished by May 1914. The houses are first cited in the 1915 Valuation revision book and the 1921 Ordnance Survey map. These original dwellings were replaced with six pairs of semi-detached houses in the 1990s.

The pump is mounted on a square concrete plinth over a concrete-capped well, which is apparently fed from a nearby spring. It is constructed of cast iron with a spiral-fluted column and vertically-fluted bulbous top. The cap features a fluted rim and acorn finial. A wrought-iron cow-tail pump mechanism is positioned at one side, with a quarter-turn spout and lug for a bucket handle to the front. The diagonal fluting around the column is said to mimic the sackcloth insulation wrapped around it in winter to prevent freezing. Despite now being disused, its internal mechanism remains intact and its relationship with the well is clearly evident, allowing its operation to be deciphered. The pump is enclosed to the west and north by a low rendered concrete block wall. Apart from a possible replacement cap, the pump is substantially as originally erected.

Although the pump was never depicted on the 1921 or 1973 Ordnance Survey maps, likely because it was too small a feature to be mapped, local residents recall it was never a great success, with people preferring to use a nearby well. This roadside pump is of local significance, having served the community for many years prior to the advent of mains water to rural houses. Such pumps were once relatively common but are now quite rare, particularly in Moyle, and this example is of considerable industrial archaeological interest.