1 Kingsgate Street, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT52 1LB

This building was demolished around 1998 following planning approval for its replacement. It formed part of a terrace of three-storey brick or rendered buildings with modern shopfronts. The upper windows, some triple-light, were either modern, Georgian-paned, or plain sashed. Roofs were slated and chimneys were of brick or finished in render.

Historical Context

Kingsgate Street marks the position of a former gateway to the fortified town of Coleraine. Earthen ramparts surrounded by a ditch were constructed at the time of plantation in 1611. By 1622, what was formerly known as the East Gate had been fitted with a small gate and drawbridge, 12 feet wide, with a small timber room above, slated. By 1710, however, the town gates had been dismantled, although the ramparts remained in the Kingsgate area for some years. By 1738, a holding of 17 perches in the Kingsgate area had been appropriated for a school funded by the Irish Society, situated at the point where the road widens in Kingsgate Street. By the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830, no rampart was evident on the south side of Kingsgate Street, and the former line of the rampart had been built over by this building and others on the site.

Building History

Number 1 was formerly a separate house, shown on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830. At that time it was a house and offices occupied by Dan Taylor and valued at £13.12 shillings. The valuation fieldbook recorded measurements showing that the building had a cellar kitchen. To the rear was a slated shed, a thatched byre, and a stable and store. The building had identical height and depth to neighbouring properties but varied in width of street frontage.

At the time of Griffith's Valuation (1856–64), number one was occupied by Rachel Andrews and valued at £18 with an annual rent of £20. The building was described as being in a good business situation and all in good repair. Measurements in the fieldbook suggest the building remained unaltered from the 1830s survey.

Subsequent occupiers included John Moore, James Mooney (1875), John McLaughlin (1876), Edward C McLaughlin (1898), Michael McLaughlin (1903), and David Fleming (1912). The building is listed in the 1911 census as a public house with six rooms and four windows to the front facade. David Fleming, a Presbyterian spirit merchant in his twenties, lived at the house with his Scottish wife, two young children, his wife's mother, sister, and young brother.

Fleming was followed by Henry McCartney (1913), Michael J Fairley (1914), James Toner (1915), and Hugh Fairley (1918). Hugh Fairley remained resident until at least the 1950s. Valuer's notes from the 1930s list the accommodation as a bar and passage on the ground floor with six rooms not in use on the first and second floors. The associated plan shows a bar with bottling store and WC to the rear. The notes record a turnover of £1100 and profit of £350 in 1932. Fifty-one gallons of whiskey were sold in 1932 and 81 in 1933. One barrel a week of Guinness was bottled and sold and one barrel a week of draft Guinness. Forty gallons of spirits were sold, one barrel of Bass and Worthington bottled, and a small quantity of draft beer. The rent was £30 per year.

The building was listed in 1977 and delisted on 28 September 2015. Planning permission to demolish was granted in 1998, and the building was subsequently replaced with modern shops.