Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB19/16/017 B

Address :
3 Victoria Crescent Lisburn County Antrim BT27 4TG

Townland:
Lisnagarvy

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Survey 2:
B2

Date of Listing:
05/04/2013 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
House

Former Use
House

Conservation Area:
No

Industrial Archaeology:
No

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
No

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OS Map No:
165/7SW

IG Ref:
J2722 6465

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Owner Category

Private

Exterior Description And Setting

Symmetrical bow-fronted mid-terrace three-bay two-storey with attic polychromatic brick house, built c.1880 with pair of single-storey canted bays. Wedge-shaped on plan facing west and built as part of a terrace of nineteen similar houses on Millbrook Road as it curves onto Wesley Street. Pitched and curved natural slate roof with roll-moulded black clay ridge tiles, two original polychromatic brick chimneystacks and two gabled redbrick dormers with exposed rafters. Plastic rainwater goods to yellowbrick angled eaves course and frieze below. Redbrick walling laid in English garden wall bond with yellowbrick courses and brick plinth course. Segmental-headed window openings with yellowbrick surrounds, black brick keystones, painted sandstone sills and replacement hardwood windows. Front elevation is five windows wide and bow-fronted. Central projecting arched yellowbrick door surround having black brick keystone, impost mouldings, stop-chamfered pilasters, brick plinth blocks and replacement hardwood glazed door and overlight. To either side is a three-sided canted bay built in yellow brick with angled brick cornice and roof hidden behind brick parapet. Left side elevation abutted by adjoining house No.1 (HB19/16/017A). Concave curved rear elevation with replacement hardwood windows and a small rear yard. Right side elevation abutted by adjoining building No.5 (HB19/16/017C). Setting: Part of a crescent of nineteen similar houses laid out on Wesley Street and Millbrook Road on the east side of Queens Road and set at a lower level than the road. One of three curved houses connecting the southwest part of the terrace on Millbrook Road to the north facing section on Wesley Street. Roof Natural slate RWG Plastic Walling Red and yellow brick Windows Hardwood casement

Architects

Not Known

Historical Information

The terrace first appears on the third edition OS map of c1900. It appears to date from c1880 and shows some stylistic echoes of the neighbouring Methodist church which was opened in 1876. This part of Lisburn began to be developed towards the end of the nineteenth century, comprising largely low-cost housing for workers in the nearby linen mills. Barbour’s thread mill, Richardson’s beetling mill and the Island flax spinning mill were all a short distance away. The Lisburn Standard of 1898 advertises seven dwelling houses in Low Road, which is adjacent to the current dwellings, saying that the area is ‘one of the best letting districts in the town, convenient to Messrs Barbour’s Mills and other large public works’. (Lisburn Standard) The present terrace was of rather better quality than other housing in the area and the current occupants state that it was built by Barbour’s as accommodation for ‘bachelors and spinsters’. Census returns from the early twentieth century show that about half the inhabitants of the terrace were employed in the linen industry, mostly linen thread (and therefore likely to be employees of Barbour’s Thread Mill). Many other occupations are also represented within the terrace, the larger houses around the curve of Wesley and Millbrook Streets tending to be run as boarding houses. Despite the current residents’ perception that this was accommodation for single people, the majority of residents in the first decade of the twentieth century appear to have been families. (1901, 1911 census) At the time of the 1901 census the house was occupied by Annie Johnston, the widow of Thomas Johnston, grocer’s assistant, who had died in 1895 (Will of Thomas Johnston). Annie Johnston had two boarders, a young journalist of 24 from Wales, who unusually gave his religious profession as ‘don’t profess anything’ and a commercial clerk in the bleaching industry from County Londonderry. By 1911 the house had been taken over by George McDowell, a linen thread manufacturers’ (most likely Barbour’s) clerk and his wife. The house was designated first class, according to its size and construction and comprised nine rooms. (1901, 1911 census) References: Primary Sources 1. PRONI OS/6/1/68/3 – Third Edition OS Map c1900 2. PRONI OS/6/1/68/4 – Fourth Edition OS Map 1921 3. PRONI OS/6/1/68/5 – Fifth Edition OS Map 1939 4. PRONI Will of Thomas Johnston, died 7/4/1895 5. Lisburn Standard, Feburary 5th 1898 6. 1901 census online 7. 1911 census online Secondary Sources 1. Owner information

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

A. Style B. Proportion C. Ornamentation D. Plan Form H-. Alterations detracting from building I. Quality and survival of Interior J. Setting K. Group value

Historic Interest

X. Local Interest R. Age S. Authenticity T. Historic Importance

Evaluation

Mid-terrace three-bay two-storey with attic polychromatic brick house, built c.1880. Despite the loss of its original windows the house retains much of its late victorian character externally and the original stair internally. Built as part of a terrace of nineteen similar houses originally built for workers in the nearby linen mills at Hilden, it is laid out as a crescent over two streets converging at an unusual acute angle (HB19/16/017A-S). It has group value with the other houses in this distinctive terrace, and with the Methodist Church (HB19/16/018A) and Manse (HB19/16/018B) to the north.

General Comments

This record was completed without access to primary source material held by the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland.

Date of Survey

15 November 2010