8 Cliff Terrace, Castlerock, Co. Londonderry, BT51 4RQ

8 Cliff Terrace, Castlerock

This is a terraced single-bay one-and-a-half-storey stone cottage built around 1875 as one of twelve similar houses commissioned by Sir William Harvey Bruce and designed by Frederick Henry Godwin. The house retains most of its original external appearance and significant parts of its original internal character, making it one of the best-preserved examples on the terrace.

The building is rectangular on plan, facing north, with a flat-roofed single-storey rendered extension added to the rear around 1960. The steeply pitched natural slate roof has roll-moulded black clay ridge tiles and carries a tall rendered chimneystack to the west, which is shared with the adjoining house. A pair of dormer windows punctuate the front pitch, with hipped slate roofs and timber pinnacles; the eastern dormer is shared with the adjoining property. The eaves are deep and overhanging, with timber sheeting and exposed timber beams supported by two stop-chamfered timber brackets mounted on sandstone corbels. Ogee-moulded cast-iron guttering is supported on a timber fascia.

The walling is constructed from random coursed rock-faced basalt with tooled sandstone ashlar dressings, finished in cement pointing. The front elevation displays a single window opening and a segmental-headed recessed entrance porch. Both feature stop-chamfered dressed sandstone surrounds; the window has a sandstone sill with an original four-light timber window frame with plain glazing, while the porch entrance has a keystone detail. The entrance porch is shared with No. 7 and has a square-headed door opening set at a right angle to the facade, retaining its original sheeted varnished timber door and brass furniture. The porch interior has a clay-tiled floor and opens onto a slightly raised cobbled area running the entire length of the terrace. The east elevation is abutted by the adjoining house. The rear elevation is partly abutted by the flat-roofed extension and retains painted rubblestone walls with a single camber-headed window opening, which now contains a replacement uPVC bipartite window with original iron latticework retained. The west elevation is abutted by the adjoining house No. 9.

All windows are original four-light iron latticed timber casement frames.

History and context

The terrace of twelve houses, known locally as the 'Twelve Apostles', was constructed around 1875 and first appears on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1906. It was built to designs by Frederick Henry Godwin for Sir Henry Hervey Bruce, third baronet of Downhill. The architectural historian Girvan described the terrace as 'an English design in an Irish setting'. The terrace was entered into the valuation fieldbook between 1873 and 1878, when all houses were inhabited and valued at £2 5 shillings. The Irish Builder of February 1882 described the terrace as 'recently erected', though it appears to have been constructed somewhat earlier.

Frederick Henry Godwin, nephew of the better-known architect Edward William Godwin, is little documented. Only three local structures are attributed to him, this terrace being his last work before he moved to England around 1890, when he is thought to have designed additions to Westburton House, Gloucestershire.

The stone used was local basalt with fine-grained freestone (easily worked with a chisel) dressings to doors and windows. According to plans published in the Irish Builder, each cottage originally consisted of a single room on the ground floor with a washhouse or scullery to the rear, with a staircase leading to an upper floor partitioned to form two bedrooms. These modest three-room houses, often housing large families, were built for estate workers, though not all occupants were employed by the Hervey Bruce family.

The valuation of all houses was reduced to £1 10 shillings in 1887, with rent recorded at 10 pence per week that year. By the 1901 census, the three-room houses were designated second class. All tenants leased from the Hervey Bruce estate. The first recorded tenant of No. 8 was William Campbell. The occupier at the time of the 1901 census was Annie Maguire, a widowed seamstress living with her two children. The house was vacant by 1911.

At the first general revaluation of the early 1930s, the building remained largely unaltered, with a kitchen on the ground floor and two small bedrooms upstairs. A separate single-storey washhouse stood in the rear yard, and water had to be carried from a pump. Rents ranged from 6 shillings to 8 shillings 8 pence per month.

Since the 1960s and 1970s, most houses in the terrace have been extended to the rear and refurbished internally. However, No. 8 represents the best-preserved example on the terrace.

Setting

The cottage is built as part of the terrace on an elevated site overlooking the sea to the west of Castlerock. It is street-fronted with a small rear yard enclosed by an original rubblestone wall and a partially intact rubblestone pig-house. A raised cobbled area runs the entire length of the terrace.

The terrace's distinctive steeply pitched roof, deep overhanging eaves, tall chimney stacks, and original basalt stone walling with freestone dressings greatly contribute to the late nineteenth-century character of Castlerock.