Springfield, 72 Ballinderry Road, Magheragall, Lisburn, County Antrim, BT28 2QS

Springfield is a detached, multi-bay, two-storey stucco-fronted country house built around 1860 to designs by Thomas Jackson (1807–1890), with a northward extension added around 1900. It stands at the end of a long tarmac avenue on the north side of Ballinderry Road, Magheragall, set within its own extensive landscaped grounds. It is rectangular in plan, facing west, with a central two-storey canted bay to both the north and south elevations. The house was built as a substantial linen merchant's residence and is noteworthy for the high degree of intactness it retains, both internally and externally, together with the survival of its walled garden structures.

EXTERIOR

The roof is hipped natural slate with roll-moulded black clay ridge tiles and eleven rendered, profiled chimneystacks fitted with decorative clay pots. Guttering is concealed behind an overhanging sheeted eaves cornice supported by pairs of shaped brackets with drop finials, with a string course below. The external walling is painted ruled-and-lined render with a moulded plinth course and rusticated render quoins. Ground-floor window openings are square-headed; first-floor openings are segmental-headed. All windows have moulded architrave surrounds, painted masonry sills, and timber sash windows.

The symmetrical three-bay principal (west) elevation has a shallow entrance breakfront with a recessed north wing three windows wide. The first floor and the north wing have 2/2 timber sash windows, while the ground floor of the principal elevation has single-pane timber sash windows with a plain frieze and cornice above. The doorcase is an elaborate tripartite moulded stucco composition incorporating an original diamond-panelled timber door with a rectangular overlight flanked by plain sidelights, which are in turn flanked by slender pilasters with oversized console brackets rising to a stepped lintel cornice, above which sit a plain stepped frieze and a dentilated cornice. The door opens onto a stone step leading to a front gravel area.

The north side elevation is largely obscured by a range of single-storey outbuildings and features a two-storey three-sided canted bay at its centre. This elevation has no decorative eaves brackets and relatively few windows. The multi-bay east rear elevation is five windows wide, with the recessed north wing extending it by a further three windows. The first floor has 2/2 timber sash windows and the ground floor has single-pane sash windows, with a plain frieze and cornice over. The south garden elevation has a two-storey three-sided canted bay with windows and detailing consistent with the principal elevation.

SETTING

The house is approached via a long tarmac avenue from the north side of Ballinderry Road, set within landscaped grounds with mature trees and an ornamental garden. Two redbrick walled garden structures stand to the north. The entrance to the avenue from the road is formed by a pair of swan-neck railed walls with decorative cast-iron railings and moulded concrete piers with decorative iron gates. The original gate lodges are still extant, now altered and in separate ownership.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

Springfield first appears in its present form on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of the Magheragall area (1900–01). It replaced an earlier building a short distance to the west, which appears on the first edition map of 1834 as an oblong building with three outbuildings. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1837 record that Springfield was at that time the seat of Major Richard Haughton, describing it as "a very neat oblong house, slated and stands one-storey high … entrance from the road by a neat wrought iron gate at which stands a neat Porters Lodge." The Memoirs further note that the house was originally a simple farmhouse until around 1777, when a Mr Edward Wakefield occupied it and rebuilt it, residing there until his lease expired in 1811. Major Haughton came into possession that year and made Springfield his seat until his death in 1828. His son Captain Richard Haughton, a local magistrate, then occupied and improved the property. The Townland Valuation of the 1830s valued the house and its offices at £12 18s.

By 1859 the site was in the hands of Mr Joseph Richardson, a local merchant and Quaker. Griffith's Valuation records Springfield House, a gatehouse, and its offices as valued at £80. The second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1857 shows that an extension had been added to the earlier house, connecting it to one of its outbuildings. Construction of the present house is likely to have begun between 1857 and 1859, given the sharp rise in value recorded in Griffith's Valuation. In 1863 a valuer noted that the value of the house appeared low relative to comparable properties in the county because it remained unfinished, and stated that the new house had cost £4,000 to build. The value was not altered until 1872, when it was raised to £85 — an increase attributable to the addition of a second gatehouse that year.

Joseph Richardson bought the property in 1906. By that date the house was shown on the third edition Ordnance Survey map (1900–01) as a square building with a small outbuilding to its north, and the former earlier house had greatly expanded, though it is unclear whether it was still in use as a dwelling at that point. The 1901 Census records Joseph Richardson (aged 79) living at Springfield with his wife Eliza (aged 71), who was involved in the flax, corn, and linen industry. The house was recorded as an extensive first-class dwelling with 16 inhabited rooms (rising to 22 by 1911) and almost 20 outbuildings, the majority of which were clustered around the earlier house. Joseph Richardson died in 1906, leaving effects of £83,120 12s 5d to his son Joseph Robert Richardson, who is recorded as occupant and owner until the end of the Annual Revisions in 1928.

According to Rankin, Joseph Richardson (1821–1906) married the daughter of Major Richard Haughton in 1850 and, after retiring from the family business in Liverpool, acquired the original Springfield House in 1855. The Richardson family held a number of fine gentlemen's seats, including Glenmore House, Old Forge, and Lissue House. On coming into possession of Springfield, Richardson engaged the family's trusted architect Thomas Jackson — a fellow Quaker, architect to the Ulster Bank and to the Banbridge, Lisburn and Belfast Railway — to design a new house and a new gate lodge in his characteristic neo-classical style.

In 1928 the house passed to Mr Fergus Wilson (1872–1957), director and later chief officer of the Blackstaff Flax Spinning and Weaving Co. Wilson occupied Springfield with his sister until her death in 1950, after which he moved to Belfast. During Wilson's occupancy the second gate lodge — known as Lisburn Lodge, built by Jackson around 1857–59 in his distinctive neo-classical style — was used as a residence for his chauffeur and family. The first gate lodge at Springfield was erected around 1845, with many of its neo-classical features added by Thomas Jackson during his commission. According to Brett, the original Springfield house is still standing, describing it as "a pleasant 18th-century cottage with Georgian glazing" with a slated roof; it has since become a separate dwelling.

Springfield house was listed in 1977. Roof renovation work was carried out in 1992. Rankin describes Springfield as exceptional in being one of the last linen houses still held in private ownership with the majority of its original features intact.