Ballysally House, 14 Atlantic Road, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT52 1PX

Ballysally House is a symmetrical three-bay, two-storey farmhouse with associated outbuildings, dated by a datestone to 1838 and situated to the west side of the Portrush Road roundabout north of Coleraine. Well proportioned, the building characterises the transition from the vernacular farmhouse to the more formalised designs of the early 19th century. Despite some 20th-century alterations, its essential character remains clearly expressed. The listing extends to the house, outbuildings, rubblestone walls and cast-iron waterwheel.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION

The house is of rectangular plan with a two-storey return to the rear and a modern single-storey extension at the west. The pitched roof is covered in natural slate with angled ridge tiles, and pebble-dashed chimneystacks to the gables have moulded caps. Rainwater goods are plastic, carried on projecting stone eaves. The walls are finished in pebbledash on a cement plinth, with quoins.

The windows are replacement 6/6 timber sash with horns and exposed boxes, set in cement-rendered surrounds with keyblocks and projecting concrete sills; uPVC windows have been fitted to the rear.

The principal elevation faces south and is five openings wide at each floor. The ground-floor centre entrance is fronted by a modern slated concrete portico on two fluted columns with a concrete step. The entrance door is a replacement plastic panelled-and-glazed door with a faux bat-wing fanlight in a round-headed cement-rendered reveal.

The west gable has a small replacement window at first-floor right and is abutted by the gabled single-storey extension, built in a similar style to the main house. The north (rear) elevation is abutted at centre by the two-storey return, with uPVC windows at each floor to either side. The return has a window to both the first and ground floors of its gable, and a replacement uPVC door to the right cheek in a sandstone surround, accessed by two stone steps. The east gable is blank.

SETTING AND OUTBUILDINGS

The house sits on a large site in a semi-rural setting north of Coleraine town centre, with the ring-road and roundabout to the east and modern housing development to the west. Open fields lie to the south, and to the north is a farmyard containing two ranges of 19th-century two-storey outbuildings running north to south.

The site is accessed from Atlantic Road to the east through two whitewashed rubblestone piers with granite caps supporting replacement timber gates. A fence-lined, tarmacadamed avenue leads to the farmyard at the rear. To the east side of the house runs a whitewashed rubblestone wall extending along the avenue. The entrance to the front of the house is flanked by two square whitewashed rubblestone piers with pointed granite caps supporting cast-iron gates, with a fence-lined lawned garden to the front. The farmyards are laid with concrete and enclosed to the south by whitewashed rubblestone walls with round piers having pointed stone caps and supporting modern metal gates.

The two-storey former corn mill, located to the northwest of the site, is in poor repair with many of its windows boarded over. A dilapidated cast-iron waterwheel stands to the west of the mill. The two large outbuildings to the north have been partially modified and have whitewashed walls and replacement or modern slate roofs. Their east elevation has small timber-sheeted openings; the west elevation has a large square-headed opening to allow access for large modern farming machinery.

The north-eastern range is not in use and is more intact, comprising a two-storey and single-storey block. The two-storey block has a natural slate roof and lime-rendered rubblestone walls, while the single-storey block is partially of red brick. The two-storey block has a variety of timber-sheeted openings including a loading door, all with red-brick relieving arches; window openings are generally boarded, with one partially intact 3/6 timber sash window surviving at first floor. The single-storey block has large replacement metal sliding doors to its east face. To the east of the farmyard is a modified single-storey whitewashed rubblestone dwelling with uPVC windows throughout and a modern uPVC entrance door accessed by a paved ramp at the south gable.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Although the First Survey Record of 1973 noted that Ballysally House did not appear on the first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1830–31, the contemporary Townland Valuations of around 1830 record that an earlier dwelling and outbuilding had existed on the site before 1838. The first edition Ordnance Survey map shows that a whitewashed two-storey outbuilding to the north of the farmhouse had already been constructed by that date, and a second structure — now demolished — is also depicted, which may have served as the original dwelling. The Townland Valuations recorded the house and offices as the property of a Mr Black, valued at £7 14s.

The datestone on site confirms that the current two-storey farmhouse was built in 1838. It first appeared on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of around 1850, which captioned the site as 'Ballysally' and indicated that the two-storey return was also built at this time. By the 1850s, a number of additions had been made to the site since 1831: a single-storey outbuilding had been erected to the north of the house, and several minor outbuildings to the west (all now demolished). Griffith's Valuation of 1857 records that John Black leased the farm in Ballysally from The Honourable The Irish Society, with the property value increased to £17.

John Black continued to reside at Ballysally until his death in 1877. His will recorded him as a local farmer, and he was also noted among the gentry of Coleraine in the Ulster Town Directories. On his death the property passed to his son, also named John Black, who remained there until his own death in 1901. The 1901 Census records John Black (aged 78, Presbyterian) residing at Ballysally with his two brothers, both retired farmers. The census building return described it as a first-class dwelling with eight inhabited rooms and a number of out-offices including a stable, four cow houses, a dairy, a barn and two sheds.

Between around 1850 and the turn of the 20th century, the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1904 records that the Black family had constructed a corn mill at Ballysally. This is the long two-storey outbuilding to the northwest of the site, which was supplied with water by a sluice channel running from a mill pond in the field to the northeast of the farm. Despite this addition, the value of the farm remained unchanged at £17 through to the cancellation of the Annual Revisions in 1930.

John Black died in 1901 without children, and Ballysally House was acquired by Thomas and Joseph Glenn. They resided there until 1910, when James Glenn took sole possession. The 1911 Census records James Glenn (aged 37, Presbyterian) living at the farm with his wife Henrietta (aged 25) and their two infant children, with no major change to the layout of the site noted. In 1935, under the First General Revaluation of property in Northern Ireland, the total value of the house and outbuildings was increased to £19 10s. No further survey was undertaken for over two decades due to the disruption of the Second World War, but in 1956 the value was increased to £28 under the Second General Revaluation.

James Glenn vacated Ballysally House in 1960, at which point his relative Thomas Glenn took over the property, remaining there until at least the end of the revaluation period in 1972. The house was listed in 1977. The First Survey described it — also known as Glenfield House, to distinguish it from another Ballysally House in the area — as a two-storey, five-bay, pebble-dashed house with quoins, a slated roof, rendered chimneystacks to each gable, 12-pane sashed windows in plastered reveals, and an entrance fronted by a glazed gabled porch.

The house continues to be occupied. The single-storey extension to the west gable appears to have been added after the current edition Ordnance Survey map of 1975, which was the first to depict it. The farmhouse remains in good condition, while the outbuildings are in varying states of repair: the single-storey and two-storey outbuildings directly to the north have been whitewashed and are in excellent repair, while the two-storey former mill to the northwest is in poor repair with many windows boarded over.