27 Charlemont Square East, Bessbrook, Co.Armagh

Two-storey mid-Victorian terraced house of Grade B2 value, built between 1862 and 1866 to designs by an unknown architect. The building forms part of Charlemont Square East, one of the three terraces enclosing a formally planned mid-Victorian square of 66 buildings in total, primarily accessed from Fountain Street to the southeast.

The house is constructed in an L-plan form facing southwest, with a single-storey rear return. The main walls are built of randomly coursed rock-faced local Newry Granodiorite with painted red brick dressings. Openings have painted stone cills and stepped red brick surrounds with gauged-brick cambered door and window heads (now mostly squared off and finished with painted smooth cement render). The pitched fibre cement roof is crowned with angled black clay ridge tiles. A rectangular-section red brick chimney to the northwest has a single terracotta clay pot. The eaves are flush with a red brick corbel course, and cast iron rainwater goods with half-round guttering discharge to circular section downpipes.

The principal southwest elevation is near symmetrical and set slightly back from the larger shop buildings at the southeast end of the terrace. A modest paved front yard is enclosed by smooth rendered dwarf walling topped with hooped metal railings and a painted metal foot gate to the southeast. A paved path leads to a six-panel varnished timber door positioned to the southeast of the facade. The top half of the door has two elongated rectangular panels flanking a central glazed section with frosted and coloured glazing, and a square-headed fanlight above contains clear glass. The facade has regular fenestration with two double-hung 1/1 sliding timber sash windows with window horns and exposed sash boxes at first-floor level in line with ground-floor openings. A window to the northwest side completes the elevation.

The building is attached on the northwest side to No. 28 Charlemont Square East. The northeast elevation provides limited visibility of the rear, which consists of a single-storey flat roof rear return at the northwest end projecting northeast to the boundary of an enclosed rear yard. A planked painted timber door in the random-coursed rock-faced stone boundary walling provides access from the rear access route to the yard. The rear elevation retains original random-coursed rock-faced walling with one timber sash window visible at ground-floor level; the rear return has smooth rendered finish with a flat felt roof, and the yard boundary walling remains in near original condition. Modern uPVC rainwater goods have been added to the rear return. To the southeast, the building is attached to No. 26 Charlemont Square East.

The house is one of twenty-seven similar dwellings forming the eastern terrace of Charlemont Square, which together with five larger two-and-a-half storey shop buildings to the southeast comprise a planned development of mill workers' dwellings arranged in three terraces around a central green. Each house is set back from the perimeter public road and footpath with a modest front yard typically enclosed by dwarf walling topped with hooped metal railings. The terraces to the east and west are stepped in groups of two dwellings to respect the subtle relief of the site. Each dwelling has a larger rear yard enclosed by randomly coursed rubble stone walling with a square-headed door opening onto a wide rear access route. Front facades are nearly uniform along the east and west terraces, although rear facades have been much altered with various extensions of different shapes and sizes. The northern terrace contains only eight larger two-and-a-half storey paired buildings. The central area is now laid to lawn and enclosed by hooped galvanized metal railings with established trees at its boundary. A children's playground is located to the southeast with a monument to the installation of electric lighting in 1911, and Bessbrook's War Memorial is centrally positioned to the southeast of the playground.