Mourne Wood, Lurganconary Road, Kilkeel, Newry, Co Down, BT34 4LL

Mourne Wood is a substantial two-storey-plus-attic-and-basement Georgian house, believed by the current owner to date from the late 18th century, situated on the east side of Lurganconary Road in the townland of Ballynahatten. The building is recorded as derelict and was delisted in March 1987, as loss of fabric and detail was judged to have compromised its value sufficiently that it no longer merits listing. Its interest lies in its imposing exterior, its developed and somewhat complex plan form, and the deliberate separation of servants' quarters from the main house — a restraint considered appropriate to its original use as a rectory.

The house is composed of two principal blocks, with several rear returns and adjoining farm outbuildings.

EAST-WEST BLOCK

The larger of the two main blocks is aligned east-west and is five openings wide. It has a pitched natural slate roof with plain verges, a cement-rendered and granite-coped chimney on each gable, and corbelled eaves. Rainwater goods are half-round cast iron, now mostly missing. The walls are painted wet-dashed. The principal, south-facing elevation has its main entrance in the middle bay. Three granite steps rise to a granite-paved threshold, which formerly had a gabled porch — the ghost of which remains visible on the wall. The entrance comprises a pair of glazed and panelled doors, each with a single bottom panel and six glazed panes above, topped by a radial segmental fanlight, all set within a segmental-headed encasement with ashlar granite jambs and voussoirs. There are two windows to the ground floor on each side of the entrance and five windows to the first floor, all aligned with the openings below. All windows are 6/6 sliding sashes with painted granite cills.

The left gable of this block is abutted at ground-floor level by a single-storey, two-bay return. The dash finish on the exposed section of the main block is partially missing, revealing a mixture of red brick and granite random rubble beneath. A narrow buttress incorporating a chimney flue abuts the extreme left. There is a 6/6 sliding sash window to the first floor left of this gable (smaller than those on the façade), and a 4/8 sash to the attic right. A similar attic-left window has been infilled with brick and its granite cill removed.

The single-storey return has a pitched roof, now largely missing its slates, which projects forward over a bay window on the south-facing main façade. It has a dashed brick chimney on its left gable. Its walls are dashed but unpainted over random rubble. The windows in the right-hand bay of this return are large cast-iron lattice casements; the left bay has a 6/6 sash. The left gable is blank. The rear wall has a door and is abutted by a one-storey outbuilding facing the yard.

The rear elevation of the main block is abutted at the middle and left by two returns (Returns 1 and 2, described below). The exposed section of wall to the right has lost some of its render, revealing random rubble below. There is a 6/6 sliding sash at ground-floor level and no window to the first floor. A slated hipped dormer breaks the eaves line and contains an 8/8 window with the bottom sash missing. The right gable of this block is abutted by the 19th-century north-south addition.

NORTH-SOUTH BLOCK

This two-storey, two-bay structure rises to the same eaves height as the east-west block but has no attic and is only one bay deep. It has a hipped natural slate roof. A rendered brick chimney rises from the rear right as seen from the east. Rainwater goods are missing. The walls are painted dash over a moulded granite base course (also dashed below), with finely dressed stepped quoins to all corners and projecting eaves matching those of the first block.

The principal elevation faces east and has four regularly spaced 6/6 sliding sash windows to each floor, all in line with one another, with painted granite cills. The left (south-facing) gable advances forward of the east-west block's principal elevation. It features a recessed panel with a segmental head at first-floor level — a detail also found on the Kilmorey Arms Hotel in Kilkeel. This panel contains a tall 6/6 sash window at ground floor and a slightly shorter 6/6 sash at first floor. The right gable, which projects well beyond the two-bay depth of the east-west block, is blank and is abutted by a one-storey farm outbuilding. The rear elevation is almost entirely abutted by Return 2, save for a small section of wall at the north end. The formerly abutted ground-floor lean-to porch has left only a trace. There is a tiny sash window to the first floor on this elevation.

RETURN 1

This return to the middle bay of the east-west block is three storeys high, though it reaches the same overall height as the main block. It has a pitched natural slate roof, now largely gone, which ties into the rear pitch of the main block. There is a partially collapsed cement-rendered chimney on the yard gable. The dash finish is partially missing from the walls. The ground floor is blank. At first floor there are two 6/6 sliding sashes, the sashes now gone from the left one. At second floor there are two 8/8 sashes, the right one now missing. The right cheek of this return has a 6/6 sliding sash at ground-floor left and a tiny four-paned casement to its right. The left cheek is entirely abutted by Return 2.

RETURN 2

Return 2 is the same height as Return 1 and accommodates two stairwells. Its yard-facing gable has a hipped natural slate roof (slates gone), and the other end ties into the rear pitch of the main block. The exposed gable is dashed, with some render fallen away to reveal brick walling identical to that in Return 1; the extreme left side is slate-hung. There is a distinct wall break between the two returns at ground-floor level, though the walls are continuous above. It is likely that Return 1 was originally one storey high and was raised to three storeys when Return 2 was added.

At ground floor there are three openings: a 6/6 sliding sash window to the right, and two segmental brick-headed door openings to the middle and left, leading into a rear passage. At first floor, a window opening to the right (probably originally a 6/6 sliding sash) lights the servants' stairwell, and to its left is a tall 6/6 sash with a spoked semicircular head lighting the main stairwell. At second floor there is an 8/8 sliding sash window to the servants' stairwell. The right cheek of Return 2 is abutted by Return 1; the left cheek by the north-south block.

FARM OUTBUILDINGS

The outbuildings enclose a yard immediately to the rear of the house (Yard 1), and a second yard beyond it (Yard 2), both fully enclosed by outbuildings. All have natural slate roofs, cement-dashed walls, and some ashlar dressings. The most notable features are the entrances to each yard. The entrance to Yard 1 is at the north-west corner and takes the form of a large semi-elliptical coachway with finely dressed granite jambs and splayed voussoirs, fitted with a pair of sheeted timber doors. The entrance to Yard 2 is also on the west side and is flanked by ashlar gate piers, the right one of which rises to a small bell-cote with the bell now gone. Within Yard 1 is a cow-tailed water pump whose head is embossed "W. Weir Ballyroney". The pump is complete but no longer working.

GROUNDS AND SETTING

The house formerly had landscaped and planted grounds to the front, of which little now survives following extensive sand extraction to the south. The 1942 Land Registry map shows the grounds enclosed by a belt of mixed woodland, with a small planted area to the north-east laid out as a picturesque walk. The main drive ran from Cranfield Road to Lurganconary Road with a gate lodge at either end. Two short drives ran north from the main drive to the house, with a lawn and planted area enclosed between them. To the west of the house there was a linear group of buildings and an enclosed area that may have been a walled garden.

No. 11 Lurganconary Road was formerly a single-storey gate lodge associated with the house but has been entirely modernised and is now of no architectural interest. A second gate lodge once stood nearby, of which no traces remain, having been cleared during the Second World War.

HISTORY

The house is shown in its present form — with the exception of Yard 2 — on the first-edition Ordnance Survey 6-inch map of 1834, where it is captioned as "rectory." The 1834 Valuation records the occupant as Reverend John F. Close, rector of Christ Church, Kilkeel, with a valuation of £44 13s 0d — the most valuable building in the area outside Kilkeel itself. The earliest known association between the church and the house dates from 1826, and it is possible that an existing house was enlarged at that time. If so, the most likely sequence of construction is that the east-west block and its middle rear return (containing the stairwell) were erected in the late 18th century. The north-south block and Return 2 were then added in the 1820s, at which point the first floor of the middle return would have been taken down and rebuilt to tie in with the new Return 2. The house was purchased from the church by Reverend Close on his retirement in the 1880s. By the time of the third-edition Ordnance Survey map of 1901, Yard 2 had been added and the building was captioned "Mourne Wood" rather than "Mourne Rectory," as it had appeared on the 1859 map.

During the Second World War the property was requisitioned by the Air Ministry. The gardens were cleared of mature trees and shrubs to accommodate construction of Greencastle Aerodrome. The airfield administration centre was constructed on the front (tennis) lawns and aircraft hard-standings were laid to the south of the main drive. The east gate lodge was demolished during this period. The property was sold by the Ministry of Defence in the early 1960s.