Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB20/13/024

Address :
Crookedstone 1 Ballyarnott Road Aldergrove Crumlin Antrim Co Antrim BT29 4DT

Townland:
Crookedstone

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Survey 2:
B+

Date of Listing:
11/12/1974 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
House

Former Use
Thatched House

Conservation Area:
No

Industrial Archaeology:
No

Vernacular:
Yes

Thatched:
Yes

Monument:
No

Derelict:
No

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OS Map No:
112/10

IG Ref:
J1570 8224

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Owner Category

Private

Exterior Description And Setting

A two-storey thatched and harled house with a small tiled porch and an L-shaped gabled and tiled extension at one end. Main entrance faces south-west. Entrance elevation is five openings wide, with two windows to each floor to each side of an off-centre porch. Walls are rendered with a wet dash painted white, of battered profile at base with plinth painted black; projecting plain eaves course. Roof of thatch, between gable upstands with painted concrete copings; ridge and eaves protected by chicken wire; three rows of scallops at the ridge and one row at the eaves. Three chimneys, one on each gable and one in intermediate position: rendered as walls. Ground floor windows are rectangular timber sliding sash, vertically hung, 6 over 9 with horns, in exposed sash boxes, recessed in smooth rendered reveals with recessed cills. First floor windows are rectangular timber 18-pane side-hung casements set in exposed timber frames in similar reveals to previous. Porch is rectangular, with rendered walls, flush, without any batter; lean-to roof of red tiles; PVC gutter returning to left-hand side, with PVC downpipe; rectangular timber 6-panel door. In wall above porch is a datestone with 1699 painted on it. Right-hand gable is two-storey, rendered as entrance front. One window to ground floor: semi-circular arched neo-Georgian style timber fixed light of 16 panes with radial fan set in smooth rendered reveals. Two windows to first floor, rectangular timber 12-pane side-hung casements set in exposed frames, in similar reveals as previous. Rear elevation is two-storey: walls, roof, and gable copings as previous to entrance front, but no projecting eaves course; projecting single-storey flat roofed porch to right-hand side. One window to first floor, sashed as previous to ground floor of entrance front. Three windows to ground floor, from left to right: tall narrow 10-pane casement; coupled two-light 8-pane casements; 12-pane casement, all with exposed frames and set in smooth reveals. Porch has flush walls, rendered as previous; with smooth rendered parapet above a lower corrugated perspex roof to an open shelter which embraces it; open shelter has steel posts and timber beams and fascia. Left-hand gable is rendered to upper portion above single-storey link block to new house. New house is of two-storeys, gabled, with red tiled roof, with a single-storey flat roofed link block; walls rendered with roughcast; windows mainly rectangular timber sliding sashes of similar pane size to old house. SETTING: the house is located in a rural area, standing in its own grounds at the end of a very long private lane off the road, and hidden from public view. Lane ends in a tarmac forecourt area in front of house, enclosed by a low wall of large boulders linked to a single storey rendered and slated garage or outbuilding facing the house. A detached rubble stone outbuilding with asbestos slated roof stands to the south side of the forecourt with a single circular conically capped whitened rubble stone gate pier adjacent. Beyond, to the front of the house is an expansive lawn. Tarmac area to the rear of the house with gardens beyond. Barns and other outbuildings stand well to the south. Along the base of the front of the house and the right-hand gable are flower beds, with a pair of tapering Tardree granite bollards standing immediately outside the front porch, but not fixed in position.

Architects

Not Known

Historical Information

This house bears a (painted) datestone of 1699. It is believed to have been built for the Cunningham family who moved to Antrim from Ayrshire some time in the 17th century. The precise date of the building is uncertain, but it is thought to have began life as a single-storey dwelling in the 1620s and raised a storey towards the end of that century, as indicated on the datestone over the entrance porch. Crookedstone continued to be occupied by the Cunninghams throughout the 18th century, with Thomas Cunningham (died c.1727), followed by his son Samuel. Samuel took a lease, (with a clause for perpetual renewal), of the lands in the townland already occupied by him in 1739, and was followed by his son, another Samuel. It was possibly this Samuel, or his son of the same name, who obtained a renewal the lease from William Hartson Williamson of Kells in May 1811. This Samuel Cunningham appears to have died in the later 1820s, and although Barber Cunningham of Belfast secured another renewal of the lease -from Hartson Williamson’s successor, James Owens of Holestone- in November 1830, the family appear to have vacated the house either before or shortly after this point and allowed the lease to revert to the Owens’s. The property is shown on the OS map of 1832 and recorded in the 1835 valuation as a very old thatched dwelling in good condition, (quality letter ‘2C+’), measuring 47ft x 23 x 13½, with old thatched ‘offices’ to the northwest of 33 x 17½ x 6½, 53 x 20½ x 10 and 39 x 20 x 7, and a slated office of 22 x 20½ x 13. The occupant is noted as William Strain. By c.1860 the property was in the hands of an Andrew Davidson, with John Owens named as the lessor. By this stage two more slated outbuildings had been added, one of 29ft x 16 x 8, the other, relatively newly built, of 68 x 16 x 10. At this point the rateable value stood at a respectable £10. In 1880 the house became vacant and remained so until around 1935, when it was repossessed by the Cunningham family and restored from a derelict state. This restoration reportedly involved the partitioning of the north end of the ground floor, the insertion of Georgian style sash and casement window frames. In 1966 the large extension was added, doubling the size of the property in the process. A photograph taken prior to restoration in c.1935 shows that the chimneys were of brickwork, the porch had a slated lean-to roof, and a sheeted timber door, and the first floor windows were sashed 6 over 3 without horns. A photograph taken prior to the extension of 1966 shows that by that time the porch roof had been tiled, the front door was a panelled replacement, and the first floor sashed windows had been replaced by casements. A photograph prior to restoration c 1935 shows that chimneys were of brickwork, the porch had a slated lean-to roof, and a sheeted timber door, and the first floor windows were sashed 6 over 3 without horns. A photograph prior to extension in 1966 shows that by that time the porch roof had been tiled, the front door was a panelled replacement, and the first floor sashed windows had been replaced by casements. The present hearth and chimney in the central rear room, which was the original kitchen, replaced an original clay-plastered wattled chimney canopy In the 18th century the Cunningham family built up a wide range of commercial interests, not only in southwest Antrim but also in the West Indies, one of the ‘Samuels’ of the family establishing himself as a merchant in Martinique in 1792. References- Primary sources 1 PRONI D.1108 Cunningham Manuscripts (1792-1851) [These letters mainly concern the Cunningham family’s business ventures in the West Indies. D.1108/1, 17, 19, 21, 23 and 25 are letters dating from 1792 to 1797, all written by various members of the family living at Crookedstone.] 2 PRONI D.1824 Papers relating to the Owens, Orr and Orr-Owens families of Holestone, Co. Antrim [These papers contain a series of title deeds and leases relating the townland of Crookedstone dating from1701 to 1937 (see D.1824/B/1/2/1-18, D.1108/B/1/2/2/1-16 and D.1108/1/3/3/1-79) 3 PRONI VAL/1A/1/55 OS map, County Antrim sheet 55, with valuation
references (1832 / 33-c.38) 4 PRONI VAL/1B/164A-C First valuation, Killead (1835) 5 PRONI VAL/2A/1/55B OS map, County Antrim sheet 55, with valuation references (1857-c.60) 6 PRONI VAL/2B/1/55A Second valuation, Killead (c.1860) 7 PRONI VAL/12B/1/9A-F Annual valuation revision books, Ballyrobin ED (1864-1929) 8 Photographs in possession of owners (c.1935, c.1965) 9 Datestone above porch, inscribed 1699 in paint. Secondary sources 1 Girvan, W.D., ‘Lists of Historic Buildings…West Antrim’ (Belfast, 1970), p.10 2 Pierce, Richard, Cooey, Alistair and Oram, Richard, ‘Taken for Granted…’ (Belfast, 1984), p.122 3 Gailey, Alan, ‘Rural Houses of the North of Ireland’ (Edinburgh, 1984), pp.80, 86-88, 188 4 Brett, C.E.B., ‘The Buildings of County Antrim’ (Belfast, 1996), p.140 5 Information supplied by owners (June 2000).

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

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

Historic Interest

Z. Rarity W. Northern Ireland/International Interest

Evaluation

This is a 17th century thatched house of vernacular type which has been modified over the years. It is located at the end of a long private lane off the Ballyarnot Road not far from the international airport and faces south west. Although it has been extended into a later modern dwelling, and has lost some of its original features as well as having undergone some inappropriate alterations, it retains its most important features which are the thatched roof, the 'jamb wall' layout to the ground floor, and the exposed original cruck roof trusses. These cruck trusses in particular are a rare survival of such structural elements anywhere in Ireland, and only two other cases of the same type are known in Northern Ireland. As such its interest extends beyond the merely local to the national and international. The building also enjoys a largely unspoiled setting.

General Comments

Date of Survey

10 June 2000