4 Wakefield Terrace, Bessbrook, Co.Armagh

4 Wakefield Terrace is a two-storey two-bay terraced house in painted lined cement render, built around 1865 to designs by an unknown architect. The building was rebuilt and extended around 1926 with the addition of a two-storey rear return and gentrification of the front facade. It forms part of a terrace of six houses of similar design and detailing, located on a corner site at the southwest end of Fountain Street and southeast of Church Road, at the southeast end of Charlemont Square.

The rectangular plan form faces northeast with a two-storey rear return. The walling is generally painted lined cement render with square-headed door and window openings and painted stone cills. The pitched roof is finished in fibre cement tile with angled black clay ridge tiles. The rear return has a pitched natural slate roof with roll top terracotta ridge tiles, with a valley formed between the front block and rear return.

The building has two chimneys to the front. The northwest chimney is rectangular-section red brick with a single buff clay pot; the southeast chimney has been rebuilt in rustic brick and has two terracotta clay pots. Two further red brick chimneys serve the rear return, each with a single buff clay pot. Flush eaves feature a painted timber fascia.

Rainwater goods are generally cast iron. Half-round guttering with a circular section downpipe serves the front; ogee guttering with decorative trefoil brackets and a square-section downpipe serves the rear.

The principal northeast-facing elevation is flush with the rest of the terrace. A window to the northwest side of the door is matched by a gabled window above at first floor, with all windows being top-opening timber casements. The door is adorned with a moulded pediment entablature featuring raised panels to brackets and a raised triangular panel below. A painted four-panelled timber door with a square-headed fanlight and brass furniture opens onto a single stone step and the public footpath. Ground floor has a window to the northwest side of the door.

The southeast elevation is attached to No. 3 Wakefield Terrace. The southwest elevation faces into a rear yard shared with other houses on the terrace. This elevation consists of the two-storey pitched roof rear return added around 1926, abutted to the similarly sized front block and forming a valley between them. The elevation has a lined cement render finish, a single window to the centre of the first floor, and two similarly sized top-opening casement windows to ground floor, all with stone cills. A door to the southeast side of the ground floor windows opens onto a concrete yard and is a painted timber door with multiple glazed panes to the top half. The rear yard is enclosed by stone-built southwest wall.

The northwest elevation is attached to No. 5 Wakefield Terrace.

The building occupies a gently sloping site at the southeast end of Charlemont Square. Numbers 1 to 5 of the terrace face northeast towards Fountain Street and are fronted by the public footpath; numbers 2 to 5 share a continuous ridge-line. No. 6 faces northwest onto Church Road, being narrowly set back from the public footpath. Rear yards are open to neighbouring dwellings and are typically enclosed by random-coursed rubble stone walling to the southwest; a section of original yard walling facing southeast is rendered with a tall pier with concrete capping, adjacent to No. 1 Wakefield Terrace.

The village fountain, from which Fountain Street takes its name, is located to the northeast of No. 1. It is square-plan, built in granite ashlar with cast iron spouts to each side and a finial to top, surrounded by a rectangular area enclosed by dwarf granite walling topped with painted metal railings; a stone trough remains.