6 Charlemont Square West, Bessbrook, Co. Armagh, BT35 7AF

6 Charlemont Square West is a modest two-storey, two-bay mid-Victorian terraced house built around 1862, forming part of the western terrace of Charlemont Square in Bessbrook, County Armagh. The architect is unknown. The listing extends to the house itself, together with its gate, railings and yard walling.

The building sits within an L-shaped plan, facing northeast, with a large two-storey rear return added around 1994. It is one of twenty-five similar houses which, together with a larger two-storey-with-attic shop building at the southeastern end of the terrace, make up the western side of Charlemont Square — a formally planned square of 66 buildings in total, arranged along north, west and eastern terraces around a central green, principally accessed from Fountain Street to the southeast.

Externally, the walls are of generally random-coursed, rock-faced local Newry Granodiorite (a high-quality local granite also used in the construction of Manchester Town Hall and the steps of St George's Hall in Liverpool), with painted red brick dressings, painted stone cills, and stepped red brick surrounds to gauged-brick cambered door and window openings. The pitched roof is covered in natural slate with angled black clay ridge tiles. There is a rectangular-section red brick chimney stack to the northwest with two terracotta pots. The eaves are flush, with a red brick corbel course. Rainwater goods to the front elevation are metal; those to the rear are uPVC, with half-round guttering discharging to circular-section downpipes.

The front elevation faces northeast and is near-symmetrical, set flush with the main terrace line. A modest gravelled front yard is enclosed by a concrete dwarf wall topped with plain hooped galvanised metal railings, with a matching foot gate hung on slim posts to the southeast. A paved path leads from the gate to a panelled painted timber door positioned to the southeast of the facade; the door has two glazed panels to its upper half, black iron door furniture, and a square-headed fanlight above. A window sits to the northwest side. At first-floor level, two windows align with the ground-floor openings below; all windows are uPVC top-opening casements, replacing the original windows.

To the northwest, the building is attached to No. 7 Charlemont Square West; to the southeast it is attached to No. 5 Charlemont Square West. The southwest-facing rear elevation is largely obscured but where visible shows a single-bay two-storey pitched-roof rear return projecting into the rear yard, roofed in fibre cement tiles, with three-part uPVC casement windows at both ground- and first-floor levels facing southwest. A further single reduced bay to the northwest end of the rear facade has a single uPVC window at each floor level. A planked painted timber door leads from the rear access route into a narrow L-shaped yard, which is a single reduced bay in width at its northwestern extent. The rear facade is generally finished in painted rough cement render; the yard boundary walls have a painted smooth render finish with precast concrete coping.

The building retains its external Victorian character despite the replacement of original windows, some original slates, and the addition of the two-storey rear return.

Charlemont Square and its setting

No. 6 forms part of a planned arrangement of 66 mill workers' dwellings and shops. Each house along the terrace is set back from the perimeter road and footpath behind a modest front yard enclosed by dwarf walling topped with hooped metal railings. The east and west terraces step in groups of two dwellings, respecting the subtle relief of the site. Rear yards are generally larger, enclosed by random-coursed rubble stone walling with square-headed doorways opening onto a wide rear access lane. Rear facades across the square are much altered with various extensions of differing shapes and sizes, while front facades remain 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 retain traditional shop fronts at ground-floor level with dwellings above. The northern terrace is the shortest at only eight houses wide, though these buildings are distinctly larger two-and-a-half-storey paired structures. The central green is now laid to lawn, enclosed by hooped galvanised metal railings with some established trees around its boundary. A children's playground to the southeast includes a monument commemorating the installation of electric lighting in 1911, and Bessbrook's War Memorial is centrally located to the southeast of the playground.

History and significance

The development of industry at Bessbrook dates from 1761, when the first woollen mill and bleach green were opened by a John Pollock. The site, originally known simply as "The Green", was renamed Bessbrook after Pollock's wife Elizabeth (Bess) and the nearby Camlough River. By the 1830s, the first edition Ordnance Survey map shows few buildings had been erected — only Mount Caulfield House and a number of thread manufactories and bleach mills were recorded.

The village of Bessbrook was effectively founded in 1845 when John Grubb Richardson (1813–1891), a linen merchant from Lambeg and a member of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), purchased one of the derelict mills and began building housing for his factory workers. Richardson later wrote that he "had a great aversion to be responsible for a factory population in a large town" and chose this location for its water power, local flax cultivation, and rural character. His layout of the village was influenced by the work of William Penn, the American Quaker responsible for planning Philadelphia in the late 17th century. The village was established as a social experiment, with Richardson providing good living conditions in the hope of fostering productive relationships between employer and workers. His philanthropic approach led him to bring the poor and unemployed from the surrounding countryside to work and live at Bessbrook. He hoped that stable employment and decent housing would help improve their circumstances.

Bessbrook is widely known as a village without the "Three Ps" — no public house, no pawn shop, and consequently no need for police. In exchange, Richardson provided recreational and educational facilities at the Institute, a number of well-stocked shops at Nos. 1–5 Charlemont Square East, and distributed milk, tea and cocoa to mill workers. The strategy proved effective: the majority of the population voted to preserve these conditions in the 1870s, and no public house exists in Bessbrook to this day. Police were not stationed in the village until the turn of the 20th century.

Construction of Charlemont Square began around 1862 and was completed by at least 1866. Griffith's Valuation of 1862 recorded Charlemont Square West — described then as "new row" — as the only completed side of the square, though all 26 buildings along it remained unoccupied at that time. The square was not shown on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1861, confirming that construction was underway but not yet complete at that date. The terraces were built by masons and joiners employed by the Bessbrook Spinning Company. Brett suggests that John Hardy, a civil engineer appointed as company architect in 1881, may have carried out some work at Bessbrook during the 1860s, though his involvement may have been confined to mill building expansion. The architect of the housing remains unknown with certainty.

Richardson became sole owner of the Bessbrook Spinning Company in 1863 following the purchase of his brother's shares. The local linen industry experienced a significant boom during the American Civil War (1861–65), when access to American cotton was cut off, and Richardson greatly enlarged both his factory and workforce in response. In 1865, Lord Charlemont sold the remainder of the Camlough Estate to Richardson, making Richardson the principal employer and landowner in the village. Between 1861 and 1871, the population of Bessbrook rose from 637 to 2,215, with the number of houses rising from 73 to 296.

Each house at Bessbrook was owned by the Bessbrook Spinning Company and contained between three and five rooms. Tenants were required to sign an agreement containing stipulations regarding the keeping of fowl and pigs — these were permitted in a pig-sty or fowl-run in the garden but not in the family's living quarters or yard — and also obliging them to send their children to school until they were old enough for mill work.

No. 6 Charlemont Square West was initially let by the Bessbrook Spinning Company to a Mr. John Fife at a valuation of £5 and 10 shillings. Occupants changed frequently over the following decades, though the valuation remained unaltered until the 1950s. By the time of the 1906 Ordnance Survey Town Plan the building was shown in its current layout, including a tennis ground depicted within the central green. The 1911 Census records the house as occupied by William Thompson, an iron turner employed by the Bessbrook Spinning Company; the census building return described it as a second-class dwelling consisting of five rooms. Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57) the house was occupied by William J. Stewart, who remained at the address until 1969.

During the Second World War the mill workers were engaged in supplying cloth for uniforms. The Bessbrook Spinning Company retained ownership of housing along Charlemont Square until the 1960s, when dwellings began to be sold to private individuals and companies; the majority were purchased by C. R. Morrow, a local car and farm machinery dealer, around 1970. The post-war decline in the textile market foreshadowed the closure of the mill in 1972, after which the building was occupied by the British Army. No. 6 Charlemont Square West was purchased outright by William J. Wogan in 1969, and its valuation was increased to £7 and 10 shillings under the Second General Revaluation (1956–72).

The building was listed in 1981. Bessbrook was designated a Conservation Area in 1983 in recognition of its 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 from 1895), which "have directly influenced town and country planning all over the world." As such, Bessbrook holds international significance as one of the earliest planned mill villages, predating the more widely celebrated English examples. The two-storey rear extension was added around 1994.