8 College Square East, Bessbrook, Co.Armagh

8 College Square East, Bessbrook, County Armagh

A modest two-storey, two-bay, mid-terrace house built in around 1883, forming part of the eastern side of College Square — a formally planned late-Victorian square of 53 mill workers' dwellings arranged on three sides around a central bowling green, playground and lawn. The architect is unknown, though the work may have been carried out by John Hardy, a civil engineer appointed as company architect to the Bessbrook Spinning Company in 1881 and responsible for the extension of the mill. The house is listed along with its gate, railings and yard walling, and lies within the Bessbrook Conservation Area.

Architecture and Appearance

The house is of L-plan form, facing southwest, with a single-storey flat-roofed rear return to the northeast. 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 stepped red brick dressings to the window and door jambs, stone cills, and square-headed gauged-brick openings throughout. The roof is finished in fibre cement tile with roll-top black clay ridge tiles, the original slates having been replaced. Eaves are flush, with separate red and buff brick eaves courses and an alternating red and buff brick corbel course above. The chimney to the northwest is of replacement rectangular-section red brick with four terracotta clay pots. Rainwater goods are generally uPVC, with half-round guttering discharging to circular-section downpipes.

Principal (Southwest) Elevation

The front elevation is near-symmetrical and flush with the rest of the terrace. A modest front yard is laid to lawn and enclosed by a dwarf concrete wall topped by hooped painted metal railings, with a matching foot gate hung on slim posts to the southeast. A concrete path leads from the gate to a six-panelled painted timber door at the southeast end of the facade, which has brass furniture and a square-headed fanlight above. There is one window at ground floor level to the northwest side of the door. At first floor level, two windows align directly above the entrance door and ground floor window, giving the facade a regular fenestration pattern. Windows to the front are double-hung sliding timber sash with exposed sash boxes, window horns and granite cills. Windows to the rear extension are timber casements.

Rear (Northeast) Elevation

The rear elevation is enclosed by a rock-faced random-coursed stone boundary wall, with access through a planked painted timber door from a rear access route. At ground floor level on the southeast end of this elevation there is a wider two-part side-opening casement window with a replacement concrete cill. At first floor level, centrally placed, is a single double-hung sliding timber sash window. From the northwest end of the rear facade, the single-storey rear return projects into the rear yard; it has a flat felt-covered roof and is abutted on the northeast by a smaller flat-roofed boiler house. On the southeast side of the rear return there is a panelled painted timber door with two glazed sections to the top half, a top-opening timber casement window to its right, and a separate boiler house accessed from the yard through a painted planked timber door. The rear elevation is generally finished in smooth render with concrete cills and timber casement windows at ground floor level, while the original stone walling is retained at first floor level. The rear return is finished in smooth cement render with uPVC rainwater goods.

To the northwest the house is attached to No. 9 College Square East, and to the southeast it is attached to No. 7 College Square East.

Interior

The building retains its general character internally, though some internal finishes have been replaced.

Setting and Group Value

No. 8 forms part of a planned arrangement of 53 mill workers' dwellings. Each house is set back from the perimeter road and footpath behind a modest front yard enclosed by dwarf walling topped by hooped metal railings. The eastern terrace is stepped in groups of six dwellings to respect the gentle slope of the site. The western terrace is composed of paired dwellings in a similar style. Rear yards are enclosed by random-coursed rubble stone walling, each with a square-headed door opening onto a wide rear access route. Rear facades are generally much altered; front facades are nearly uniform along the eastern terrace. Bessbrook Town Hall — the old Institute building — lies to the southeast of the row. The northern terrace is the shortest at twelve houses wide and is composed of distinctly larger two-and-a-half storey buildings, though in a similar style.

The central area of the square is divided into three sections, each laid to lawn. To the northwest is a bowling pavilion and green enclosed by painted hooped metal railings with established trees at the northwest boundary, added in 1911. To the southeast is a lawn enclosed by hooped metal railings. In the centre is an open children's playground containing three granite monuments. One records: "Erected A.D. 1911 in respectful memory of George Wright, Head Mason; John McClelland, Head Millwright; Michael Boyle, Flax Buyer, who each faithfully served the Bessbrook firm for nearly 50 years. Also Robert Ross, Mill Manager; Austin Kennedy, Rougher." A second records: "The garden in memory of James N. Richardson is arranged by his wife as a playground for the children of Bessbrook whom he loved, November 1927," with an inscription on the opposite side noting that this was the last stone cut from Bessbrook Quarry. A third monument, recently moved from the grounds of Bessbrook Mill to its current location, details the mill's history from ownership by the Pollock family in 1760 to the Bessbrook Spinning Company Ltd in 1878.

Historical Background

The development of industry at Bessbrook dates to 1761 when a Mr John Pollock opened the first woollen mill and bleach green at the site, then known simply as "The Green." It was renamed Bessbrook after Pollock's wife Elizabeth (Bess) and the nearby Camlough River (Brook). By the 1830s, the First Edition Ordnance Survey map shows that few buildings had been erected at Bessbrook, the only significant structures being Mount Caulfield House and a number of thread manufactories and bleach mills.

The village was effectively founded in 1845 when John Grubb Richardson (1813–1891), a linen merchant from Lambeg, purchased one of the derelict mills and began building housing for his workers nearby. Richardson, a member of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), described his intention to establish a factory community in a rural district where flax was cultivated and water power was available, rather than in a large town. His layout of the village was influenced by the work of William Penn, the American Quaker responsible for the planning of Philadelphia in the late 17th century. Richardson's philanthropic approach led him to bring the poor and unqualified from the surrounding countryside to live and work at Bessbrook, hoping to encourage self-improvement. Bessbrook is widely known as a village without the "Three Ps" — no public house, no pawn shop, and therefore no need for police — a condition upheld by Richardson through the provision of recreational and educational facilities at the Institute, well-stocked shops, and the distribution of milk, tea and cocoa to mill workers. The majority of the population voted to preserve this ordinance in the 1870s, and to this day no public house exists at Bessbrook. Police were not stationed there until the turn of the 20th century.

In 1863 Richardson became the sole owner of the Bessbrook Spinning Company after buying out his brother's share. The local linen industry boomed during the American Civil War (1861–65) as access to American cotton was cut off, and Richardson substantially enlarged his factory and workforce. Lord Charlemont sold the remainder of the Camlough Estate to Richardson in 1865, making Richardson both the principal employer and main landowner in Bessbrook. Between 1861 and 1871 the village's population grew from 637 to 2,215, and the number of houses from 73 to 296. Charlemont Square was laid out between 1862 and 1866 to accommodate this influx of workers.

College Square was laid out in around 1883 to meet the continuing expansion of Richardson's business. The mid-1880s were a period of intense building activity in the village, during which the factory was greatly extended and modernised in 1884–85. The square took its name from the primary school on its west side, erected in 1849. The terraces were built by masons and joiners employed directly by the Bessbrook Spinning Company. Each house was owned by the 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 living quarters or yard (though a pig-sty and fowl-run were permitted in the garden), and that children were to be sent to school until old enough for mill work.

No. 8 College Square East was initially let by the Bessbrook Spinning Company to a Mr James Maguire and was valued at £5 and 10 shillings, at which it remained until the 1950s. The Census of Ireland in 1911 recorded the house as occupied by James Maginnis, whose family worked at the local factory; the census building return described it as a second-class dwelling of five rooms. The Maginnis family continued to occupy the property into the period of the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936–57), during which the valuation remained unchanged.

During the 20th century the mill continued to expand, gaining international recognition, and during the Second World War mill workers produced cloth for military uniforms. From the 1960s, as the post-war downturn in the textile market took hold, the Bessbrook Spinning Company began selling its housing. The majority of houses along College Square were purchased by a Mr George Preston in around 1969. No. 8 was purchased outright and subsequently occupied by Mr Arthur Patterson in 1969. The mill closed in 1972 and was subsequently occupied by the British Army. By the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956–72), the value of the house had risen to £8.

The house was listed in 1981 and included within the Bessbrook Conservation Area designated in 1983, which recognised Bessbrook's historical significance as a planned mill village. The Conservation Area Guide notes that the 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 Bournville (developed by the Cadbury family in 1895), which have in turn directly influenced town and country planning all over the world. Bessbrook is recognised as internationally significant as one of the earliest planned mill villages, contemporary with and antecedent to those better-known English examples.

A renovation carried out in 1999 included the installation of new sliding sash window frames. The building retains its external character despite the replacement of the original roof slates, rainwater goods and some internal finishes.