4 Charlemont Square North, Bessbrook, Co.Armagh

4 Charlemont Square North is a two-and-a-half-storey, two-bay mid-Victorian terraced house built between approximately 1862 and 1866 to designs by an unknown architect. It forms part of the northern terrace of Charlemont Square in Bessbrook, County Armagh, and the listing extends to the house itself, its gate, railings, and yard walling.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION

The house is L-plan in form, facing southeast, and is constructed in random-coursed, rock-faced local Newry Granodiorite (a granite quarried on the former Charlemont Estate) with painted red brick dressings, painted stone cills, and gauged-brick cambered window openings. The roof is pitched fibre cement with angled black clay ridge tiles. There is a rectangular-section red brick chimney to the southwest with terracotta clay pots. Eaves project with a painted timber soffit, and rainwater goods at the front southeast elevation are cast iron with half-round guttering discharging to circular-section downpipes; those to the rear northwest are uPVC. There is also a two-storey rear return, abutted by a later monopitched extension to the southwest and a similar outbuilding to the northwest.

Principal (southeast) elevation The front elevation is near-symmetrical and sits flush with the main terrace. A good-sized front yard, set to lawn, is enclosed by a red brick dwarf wall topped by plain hooped painted metal railings. A foot gate hung on circular-section painted metal posts with cast metal conical caps sits centrally to the southeast. A concrete path leads from the gate to a panelled, polished timber door on the southwest side of a single-storey gabled projecting side entry porch. The door has a single oval glazed panel to its upper half and two blind rectangular panels to its lower section. The porch is situated at the northeast end of the facade, has a painted smooth render finish, and abuts the equivalent porch of No. 3 Charlemont Square North to the northeast. The porch gable to the southeast features a painted timber wave-scroll bargeboard with finial and a single top-opening timber casement window. The facade has a near-regular fenestration pattern of two windows at first-floor level, aligned with a reduced-size window to the entrance porch and a wider window to the left-hand side at ground-floor level. Windows to the front are generally top-opening four-pane timber casements; those to the rear are plain top-opening timber casements.

Southwest and northeast elevations The building is attached on the southwest to No. 5 Charlemont Square North. To the northeast it is similarly attached to No. 3 Charlemont Square North.

Rear (northwest) elevation The rear elevation has single top-opening timber casement windows with painted stone cills at both ground and first-floor levels, and a two-storey monopitched rear return at its northeastern end. This return projects into the rear yard. A narrow single-storey monopitched extension abuts it to the southwest, and a similar outshot is attached to its northwest wall, extending to the yard boundary walling. A planked painted timber door set within painted smooth cement-rendered boundary walling leads from the rear access route to a concrete yard. The rear return has a single window visible at first-floor level facing southwest, with a painted stone cill. The single-storey extension below has a two-part side-opening timber casement window with a concrete cill to the left-hand side of a painted panelled timber door with six glazed lights to its upper half. The rear return has flush eaves and a brick corbel course. The rear elevation is generally finished in painted smooth cement render with timber casement windows and painted cills. Two skylights are also visible in the pitched fibre cement tile roof.

As one of a pair of larger two-and-a-half-storey houses, No. 4 is paired with No. 3 to the northeast; each pair in the northern terrace shares abutting gabled side entry porches flanking large rectangular-section chimneys, with painted stepped red brick quoins to each pair of dwellings. The building retains its external character and some internal fittings, although the original windows, door, and roof slates have been replaced.

SETTING

No. 4 forms part of a formally planned arrangement of 66 mill workers' dwellings and shops comprising a Victorian square with east, north, and west terraces arranged around a central green, primarily accessed from Fountain Street to the southeast. Each house is set back from the perimeter road and footpath behind a modest front yard typically enclosed by dwarf walling topped by hooped metal railings. The terraces to the east and west are stepped in groups of two dwellings, respecting the subtle relief of the site. Each dwelling has a generally larger rear yard enclosed by random-coursed rubble stone walling with a square-headed door opening onto a wide rear access route. Rear facades are much altered with various extensions of different shapes and sizes, while front facades are nearly uniform along the east and west terraces. Five larger buildings to the southeast of Charlemont Square East and one to the southeast of Charlemont Square West have traditional shopfronts at ground-floor level with dwellings above. The northern terrace is the shortest, at only eight houses in width, though its buildings are the largest in the square. The central green is now laid to lawn and enclosed by hooped galvanised metal railings with some established trees at its boundary. A children's playground to the southeast includes a monument to the installation of electric lighting in 1911, and Bessbrook's War Memorial is centrally located to the southeast of the playground.

HISTORICAL AND SOCIAL CONTEXT

The development of industry in the area dates from 1761 when the first woollen mill and bleach green were opened by a Mr John Pollock. The site was then simply known as "The Green" but was renamed Bessbrook after Pollock's wife Elizabeth (Bess) and the nearby Camlough River (Brook). The first edition Ordnance Survey map of the 1830s records that few buildings had been erected at Bessbrook by that time; the only significant structures shown were Mount Caulfield House (the residence of the Nicholson family) and a number of thread manufactories and bleach mills.

The village of Bessbrook was effectively founded in 1845 when John Grubb Richardson (1813–1891), a linen merchant from Lambeg, purchased one of the derelict mills at the site and began to build housing for his factory workers nearby. In his own words, Richardson "had a great aversion to be responsible for a factory population in a large town, so on looking around, fixed upon a place near Newry … with water power and a thick population around, and in a country district where flax was cultivated in considerable quantities." Bessbrook was developed as a model village in a number of phases, beginning with the laying out of Fountain Street in the 1840s. The architect responsible for the majority of the housing is not known; however, Richardson's layout of the village was influenced by the work of William Penn, the American Quaker responsible for the planning and development of Philadelphia in the late 17th century. Richardson was himself a member of the Religious Society of Friends and, according to Harrison, possessed a "typical Quaker mix of pragmatic and altruistic expectation to provide jobs and good working conditions for his employees." By providing his workers with good living standards, Richardson hoped to ensure harmonious relations between employers and employed, establishing the village as a social experiment where workers could live and work in contentment. Harrison states that Richardson's philanthropic spirit led him to bring the poor, the unqualified, and beggars from the surrounding countryside to work and live at Bessbrook, hoping to encourage self-improvement.

Bessbrook is often referred to as a village without the "Three Ps" — no public house, no pawn shop, and therefore no need for a police presence — all as a result of Richardson's stipulations. In exchange for keeping the village free of alcohol, Richardson provided recreational and educational facilities at the Institute, a number of well-stocked shops, and had milk, tea, and cocoa distributed to his mill workers. The strategy proved effective: the majority of the population voted to preserve the ordinance in the 1870s, and to this day there remains no public house at Bessbrook. Police were not stationed in the village until the turn of the 20th century.

In 1863 Richardson became the sole owner of the Bessbrook Spinning Company following the purchase of his brother's shares. The local linen industry experienced a boom during the American Civil War (1861–65), as access to American cotton was cut off. Richardson took advantage of this by greatly enlarging his factory and increasing his workforce. Lord Charlemont sold the remainder of the Camlough Estate to Richardson in 1865, making Richardson both the main employer and the principal landowner at Bessbrook by the mid-1860s. Richardson had Charlemont Square laid out between 1862 and 1866 to accommodate the influx of new workers; between 1861 and 1871 the population of Bessbrook rose from 637 to 2,215, and the number of houses from 73 to 296.

Brett describes Charlemont Square as the centrepiece of the new developments at Bessbrook. The two-storey and two-and-a-half-storey houses were constructed along the north, west, and east sides of an open green intended as a recreational space — a tennis ground was recorded within the green on the Ordnance Survey Town Plan of 1906. The terraces were built by masons and joiners employed by the Bessbrook Spinning Company. The Newry Granodiorite used in the masonry was produced locally at a quarry opened on the former Charlemont Estate; granite from this quarry is of high quality and was used in the construction of Manchester Town Hall and the great steps of St George's Hall in Liverpool.

Charlemont Square was not depicted on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1861, but construction had commenced by 1862. Griffith's Valuation of that year noted that Charlemont Square West (captioned "new row") was the only side of the square to have been completed, though all 26 buildings along it remained unoccupied. The remainder of the buildings were completed and occupied by at least 1866, according to the Annual Revisions. Brett suggests that John Hardy, a civil engineer appointed as company architect in 1881, may have carried out some work at Bessbrook in the 1860s, though his role may have been limited to the expansion of the mill buildings.

Each house in Bessbrook was owned by the Bessbrook Spinning Company and contained between three and five rooms. Tenants were required to sign an agreement stipulating, among other things, that fowl and pigs were not to be kept in the family quarters or yard (though a pig-sty and fowl-run were permitted in the garden). A further binding clause required tenants to send their children to school until they were old enough for mill work.

No. 4 Charlemont Square North was initially let by the Bessbrook Spinning Company to a Mr Thomas Saunders and was valued at £8. The occupants changed with frequency over the following decades, though the value remained unaltered until the 1930s. The building's layout, including its entrance porch and rear return, was already in its current form when depicted on the Ordnance Survey Town Plan of 1906. The Census of Ireland records that in 1911 the house was occupied by James Andrew Downey, a commercial clerk employed by the Bessbrook Spinning Company, and was described as a second-class dwelling consisting of eight rooms. Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), the Black family resided at No. 4, by which time the valuation had increased to £9 and 10 shillings; the Black family continued to reside at the address until at least the 1970s.

During the 20th century the mill at Bessbrook continued to expand, gaining the Bessbrook Spinning Company international recognition. During the Second World War the mill workers were tasked with supplying cloth for military uniforms. The Bessbrook Spinning Company retained ownership of housing in Bessbrook until the 1960s, when the dwellings along Charlemont Square began to be sold to private individuals and firms; the majority of the houses along the square were purchased by C. R. Morrow, a local car and farm machinery dealer, in approximately 1970. The sale of property at Bessbrook was necessitated by the post-war downturn in the local textile market, which foreshadowed the closure of the mill in 1972, after which the building was occupied by the British Army. No. 4 Charlemont Square North was purchased outright by the Black family in 1968 and was increased in value to £15 and 10 shillings under the Second General Revaluation (1956–72).

No. 4 Charlemont Square North was listed in 1981 and included in the Bessbrook Conservation Area, designated in 1983 in recognition of Bessbrook's "historical significance as a planned mill village and its distinct form and character." The Conservation Area Guide notes that the carefully planned development of Bessbrook, including the uniform terraces at Charlemont Square and College Square, influenced the design of the English model villages at Saltaire (1852), Port Sunlight (1888), and Bourneville (developed by the Cadbury family in 1895), which "have directly influenced town and country planning all over the world." The building is internationally significant as part of an early planned mill village, contemporary with — and in some respects predating — those celebrated English examples. General improvements were carried out to the property in approximately 1983. At the time of the Second Survey the building continued in use as a private dwelling and retained its original Victorian character.