47, 47A, 47B and 47C Castle Street, Ballycastle, County Antrim, BT54 6AR

This is a two-storey terrace block on the south side of Castle Street, Ballycastle, containing three apartments and a shop. It was originally built as a single house, probably in the 1740s as part of Hugh Boyd's development of the town, and sits to the west of the town centre with its front elevation facing north.

The front facade was undoubtedly symmetrical as originally built, though this symmetry has since been disrupted by the insertion of a modern shop front. Centrally placed at ground floor level is the main entrance — now used to access the apartments — comprising a panelled timber door with plain timber jambs and a plain rectangular fanlight, approached by three splayed stone steps. To the left of the entrance is a flat-arched window with a horned timber sash frame and plate glazing. To the right, a somewhat crudely fashioned modern shop front has been inserted, with a painted signboard above. At first floor level there are three relatively large, evenly-spaced windows with horned timber sash frames glazed in Georgian panes (eight over eight). A projecting street lamp sits between the second and third of these windows. The entire front facade is finished in painted lined render with moulded 'in-out' quoins.

The rear elevation is complex in appearance. To the right-hand side is a large modern return, two storeys to the north and receding to a single storey to the south. A large modern metal fire escape stair is attached to the north face of this return and to the rear of the main building. The single-storey section of the return has one window to its west face and a smaller window to its south face, both with modern timber frames. The two-storey section of the return has, to its west face at ground floor level, a timber-sheeted door with a window immediately to its left, and at first floor level a doorway with a similar door to the left and a relatively small high-level window to the right. The south face of the two-storey return, exposed only at first floor level, contains a single window.

On the ground floor of the main building's south-facing rear wall there is a doorway to the left with a mainly glazed timber door, and a small window to the right. At first floor level there is a window to the left, then a doorway with a timber-sheeted door, and a semicircular-headed window to the right — this last opening may be the only surviving original window at the rear. Above this, a second floor has been created by raising the roof on this side of the building, and contains two windows to the left, a roughly central doorway with a partly glazed timber door, and a large window to the right. The entire rear elevation, including the return, is finished in dry dash render. Several satellite dishes are fixed to the rear.

The gabled roof of the main building is covered in fibre cement slate and has a Velux window to the front slope. Two rendered chimneystacks rise from each end of the ridge. Both sections of the return have single-pitched, lean-to-style roofs, also in fibre cement slate. Rainwater goods are a mix of cast iron and uPVC.

To the rear of the building is a brick-paved yard. On the south side of the yard stands a large two-storey gabled outbuilding, now converted into a shop and an apartment.

The history of the building is well documented through valuation records. A house of similar dimensions — recorded as 37 feet by 27½ by 20 feet, with a cellar measuring 14 by 17 by 5½ feet — appears in the first valuation of January 1835. Because later records refer only to repairs rather than demolition or major structural rebuilding (other than the return), the building surviving today is considered to be substantially the same structure as that recorded in 1835. The 1835 valuers described the house as already 'old' at that date, suggesting an 18th-century origin, and possibly placing its construction within Hugh Boyd's development of Castle Street in the 1740s.

The 1835 occupant was a William Hill. An ironmonger of the same name is recorded in Castle Street — then known as Main Street — in Pigot's Directory of 1824, and if these are the same person, he likely conducted his trade from the large 'range of offices' noted by the valuers, measuring 54 by 19 by 9½ feet. The house also had a substantial return at that time, measuring 11½ by 19 by 20 feet.

By the time of the second valuation in November 1859, the lease had passed to a William McAleese. The valuer described the house as containing eight rooms and two in the return, and noted that it was undergoing repairs that would result in a 'very good house'. The full extent of these repairs is uncertain, but it is possible that the front windows were modestly enlarged at this time, as they appear somewhat generous for a house of the 1740s. McAleese added new offices to the rear in or just before 1862, and his family occupied the property until 1884, when Susan McAleese — probably William's widow — rented it to the police for use as a barracks. The police remained until 1893, when a William D. Black became tenant. Black's family left in 1903, after which Jane Ewing became leaseholder, living in the house herself until sometime between 1930 and 1936, when the lease passed to William J. Scally. The following decades saw a high turnover of residents: William McLaughlin (1936–41), the local YMCA (1943–46), Joseph P. Dougherty (1946–48), Alexander Stewart (1948–date unknown), Pierce Dempsey (circa 1952–56), Phyllis Boyd (1957–64), John J. Butler (1965–70), and Archibald Currie (1970–72 and beyond).

When the building was surveyed in October 1972 as part of the First Survey of Historic Buildings, the window to the right of the entrance had already been enlarged and part of the ground floor had been converted to a shop selling antiques. The more extensive alterations to the rear — principally the conversion of most of the building into three apartments — appear to have been carried out around 1990.

Like many of Castle Street's 18th-century buildings, this former house has had its architectural character adversely affected by 20th-century alterations. It lies within a conservation area.