Steward's House, Narrow Water Demesne, Warrenpoint, Newry, Co Down

Steward's House, Narrow Water Demesne

Although now derelict, the Steward's House and its associated yard form an important element of the overall Narrow Water Demesne complex. Built between 1820 and 1839, the house is situated on an elevated site to the south of the main farmyard and immediately northwest of the walled garden, accessed via the main driveway through the principal farm buildings.

The main house is a two-storey, four-bay structure with a hipped natural slate roof (now collapsed) aligned northwest to southeast. A ridge chimney sits between the left two bays, with a wall-head chimney on the rear of the right bay. The northeast-facing façade is rendered rubble stone with an advanced basecourse, stepped stucco quoins, and an eaves course of cow-nosed yellow bricks. All windows have fallen in but appear to have been 2/2 vertically divided sliding sashes with dressed granite cills; the first-floor windows are diminished slightly in height. The left bay contains a single window to each floor. The bays to the left and right of centre are identical, each featuring a canted bay window at ground floor with advanced eaves and flat masonry head, with single window openings to each cheek and a pair of windows above. The third bay to the right of centre has a flight of four granite steps rising to a segmental-headed doorway, retaining the granite base of the doorframe and flanking sidelights, with a single window above at first-floor level. The rear elevation, now rubble stone (formerly harled), is abutted centrally by a small lean-to and to the left by an outbuilding. It retains a window at ground-floor right and one at first-floor centre. The lean-to has a mono-pitched roof and red brick walls with a window to the left and doorway at right.

To the left gable of the house is a two-storey outbuilding enclosing the front northeast side of the rear yard. The right gable has a single window to each floor, with its corner abutted by a two-storey house abutting the outside wall of the outbuilding enclosing the northwest of the yard.

The front outbuilding is a two-storey structure with a pitched natural slate roof aligned northwest to southeast. Its harled front wall has an advanced eaves course, a first-floor loading door with ventilation slits at the left end, and a segmental-headed archway at the right end with roughly dressed granite jambs and a similar head featuring an advanced keystone with an incised oval inset (inscription unreadable). The left southeast gable is blank; the right northwest gable abuts the left gable of the house. The rear southwest elevation facing the yard has the archway at left with a small loft window above, a wide doorway at ground-floor centre, and single storey outbuildings at the right end enclosing the southeast side of the yard.

Enclosing the southeast side of the yard is a symmetrical single-storey lean-to cart house abutting the yard's southeast wall. Its pitched natural slate roof (collapsed) is supported on an arcaded red brick front wall of ten low segmental archways—five on either side of a larger masonry-built archway under a central gable. The southwest boundary of the yard is enclosed by a rubble stone wall, abutted by a collapsed concrete blockwork and corrugated iron lean-to of no interest.

A two-storey, single-bay outbuilding encloses the northwest side of the farmyard, with a pitched natural slate roof (partially collapsed) aligned southwest to northeast. Its harled rubble stone walls contain eight ground-floor openings (left to right: two windows, a doorway, two segmental-headed archways with the right one infilled as a doorway, a window, a doorway, and a window in a common opening). The last three openings open into the small domestic yard at the rear of the main house. The first floor is blank except for a window opening over the infilled archway. Its right gable abuts the rear elevation of the house, and its left gable is blank. Its rear northwest wall fronts the smaller yard and is abutted at the left end by a two-storey house, with a doorway to its right abutting the side of a circular horse walk.

A two-storey, two-bay house abuts the right end of the outer wall of the outbuilding enclosing the northwest side of the yard. Its pitched natural slate roof (collapsed) is aligned southwest to northeast with a chimney breast between the two bays. The walls are rubble stone with red brick dressings. The southeast elevation abuts the outbuilding completely. The southwest gable has a pair of 2/2 sashes in a common opening at first floor. The northwest elevation, collapsed to the left bay, appears to have had two ground-floor windows. The right bay contains two 6/6 sash windows at ground floor and a pair of 2/2 sashes in a common opening at first floor. The north gable has a tongue-and-groove sheeted doorway with transom light at ground floor. Immediately northwest of this yard is a smaller yard containing a horse walk and a range of ruinous single-storey outbuildings.

The circular horse walk is now ruinous with collapsed rubble stone walls. Its northwest end has a masonry wall with two openings into a passage wrapping around the northwest third of the circle, enclosed by a curving rubble stone wall with segmental-headed doorways on each end wall. Its lean-to roof is gone. The southeast end of the horse walk abuts the building enclosing the northwest boundary of the farmyard.

The complex appears on the 1834 Ordnance Survey 6-inch map.