BOOM HALL ESTATE, DERRY CONSERVATION MANAGEMENT PLAN Prepared for Derry City and Strabane District Council

Prepared by

August 2020 Boom Hall ESTATE, DERRY Conservation Management Plan for Derry City and Strabane District Council

Prepared by: Alastair Coey Architects Ltd

August 2020 DRAFT CONTENTS

Part One: Introduction and Background

1.1 The Site 1.2 Terms of Reference 1.3 Scope of the Conservation Management Plan 1.4 Methodology 1.5 Layout of the Conservation Management Plan 1.6 Consultant Team 1.7 Consultation

Part Two: Understanding of Place

2.1 Sources 2.2 Designations 2.3 Strategic Overview 2.3 Setting 2.4 Description 2.5 Historical Overview 2.6 Comparative Analysis 2.7 Access 2.8 Condition 2.9 Gaps in Knowledge

Part Three: Significance of Boom Hall

3.1 Assessment of Cultural Heritage Values 3.2 Statement of Significance �����������������������������3.3 Threat and Opportunities

DRAFT Part Four: Policies and Recommendations

4.1 Objectives 4.2 Current Context 4.3 Definition of Key Terms 4.4 Existing Statutory Policy, Guidance and Legal Framework 4.5 Policies relating to Protection of Significance 4.5.1 Relationship between assessed level of Significance and Policy 4.5.2 Management 4.5.3 Continuity of Conservation Advice 4.5.4 Significance of Buildings 4.5.5 Significance of the Historic Landscape 4.6 Policies and Recommendations relating to Conservation of the Physical Fabric 4.6.1 Urgent Works 4.6.2 Maintenance, Repair and Remedial Works 4.6.3 Reuse of the Site 4.7 Policies relating to Understanding, Recording and Research 4.7.1 Documentation and Recording 4.7.2 Archaeological Investigations 4.7.3 Academic Research 4.8 Policies relating to Land Use, Land Management and Ecology 4.8.1 Woodland 4.8.2 Ecology and Biodiversity 4.9 Policies and Recommendations relating to Engagement and Understanding 4.9.1 Community Engagement 4.9.2 Providing Understanding 4.9.3 Security 4.10 Review of Policies and Recommendations

Part Five: Bibliography and References

5.1 Bibliography 5.2 Footnotes

Appendix One: Extraction of Policies

Appendix Two: Historic Landscape Assessment

Appendix Three: Condition Report AppendixDRAFT Four: Public Consultation - list of attendees DCC09-R40E Boom Hall Conservation Management Plan

BOOM HALL

Boom Hall demesne contains the remains of a significant historic property which has strong connections to society and history in Derry and touches on themes of national and international importance. Although the house, farm buildings and walled garden are in a state of advanced dereliction and the intactness of the original demesne has been eroded over time, the site is unusual, in the north-west of Ireland, in that it contains not only the remains of a Palladian mansion and its associated infrastructure (with potentially tantalizing links to one of England’s most prolific mid- to late-eighteenth century architects) but also a site of military importance with connections not only to the Siege of Derry but also the Second World War. Figure 1: Boom Hall main house. Boom Hall was constructed in the 1770s by James Alexander, the youngest son of a prominent family of Derry merchants, and lived in by his brother Robert and, after his death, by his widow until 1817. In 1849 the property passed into the hands of the Baird family (later Maturin-Baird) and in due course was let to a number of tenants until 1949 when Charles Edgar Maturin-Baird sold most of the demesne to Michael Henry McDevitt after whose death the house and stable buildings began to fall into dereliction. At present the site is owned by Derry City and Strabane District Council and the public make some use of the demesne for walking, however, the historical relationship between drives, paths, trees and buildings is largely obscured.

The main house is not listed and enjoys no statutory protection. The stables has Figure 2: Caption a Grade B2 listing and is also included on the Northern Ireland Heritage at Risk Register. The grounds, which have a supplementary listing on the Register of Historic Parks, Gardens and Demesnes, comprise mostly parkland, woodland and an extensive walled garden with, in all, a total of eight scheduled assets. The area considered in this plan is understood to form roughly the area of the historic demesne of Boom Hall. Research carried out to date has produced a comprehensive narrative of the site, which makes a strong case for a greater recognition of its significance and the pressing need for its protection and enhancement.

A fire in the 1970s resulted in major damage to the main house causing collapse of the roof and floors and the loss of all windows. Since then, some stabilization Figure 3: Stables. works have been implemented to provide temporary support to the upstanding remains. The stable buildings and boundary walls to the garden are also in an extremely fragile state and subject to progressive collapse. A comprehensive programme of stabilization is urgently required to ensure their survival. Public interest in the future of Boom Hall has been evidenced in attendance at the various consultation events organized during preparation of the Conservation Plan and has established that there is a wealth of local associations and affections and an appreciation that Boom Hall is an important cultural site which is tightly bound up with the story of the city. The challenge is therefore to agree the real significance of the surviving buildings, structures and landscape and to urgently implement measures to halt the progressive loss of historic fabric and find a sustainable use or uses to preserve the demesne for the benefit of future Figure 4: Walled Garden. generations. DRAFT

August 2020 Alastair Coey Architects Ltd  DCC09-R40E Boom Hall Conservation Management Plan

Part One: Introduction and Background

1.1 The Site

Boom Hall demesne is located on the west bank of the River Foyle on the outskirts of Derry city at Irish Grid Reference C 44996 19515, Ordnance Survey National Grid Reference NV 61578 82470. It is accessed from the Culmore Road (A2) immediately to the north-east of the roundabout at the junction with Madams Bank Road which forms the south- western boundary of the site and leads to the Foyle Bridge. The site is bounded to the north by the old Culmore Road and, to the east, by the River Foyle.

The demesne is located on the west bank of the River Foyle on the outskirts of Derry (at Irish Grid Reference C 44996 19515, Ordnance Survey National Grid Reference NV 61578 82470). The site consists of multiple designations including a Grade B1 listed building (Stable Block: HB01/25/004B), eight scheduled monuments and parkland with supplementary listing on the Register of Historic Parks, Gardens and Demesnes (L-003). The remains of Boom Hall are not, and never have been, listed.

The area covered by the Conservation Plan is illustrated in Figure 5 and comprises around 54 acres of the former Boom Hall demesne. The term “demesne” refers to “a piece of land attached to a manor and retained by the owner for their own use”. The surviving portion of the demesne at Boom Hall corresponds with the area registered L-003. The demesne lies on gently rising ground from the west bank of the River Foyle, bounded to the south by Madam’s Bank Road and the Foyle Bridge. Culmore Lane winds through the demesne past the house and stables, but has restricted vehicular access. The southern portion of the site was lost in the early 1980s with the construction of the Foyle Bridge and the reduced demesne was transferred from the ownership of the McDevitt family to Derry City Council in 1996.

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Figure 5: Boom Hall Estate Site Plan.

August 2020 Alastair Coey Architects Ltd  DCC09-R40E Boom Hall Conservation Management Plan

1.2 Terms of Reference

This Conservation Management Plan was commissioned by Derry City and Strabane District Council and has been prepared by Alastair Coey Architects. The context for commissioning the Plan is a recognition of the severe degradation of the physical fabric of the buildings, and of the potential of the former demesne parkland. The Plan informs and accompanies stabilisation works and further conservation to the house, stables and walled garden to enhance the site with a view to finding a long term sustainable use. In this context, the Conservation Management Plan sets forward a full understanding of the site and its significance, to provide proposals for the repair and longer-term safeguarding of the asset, and to provide recommendations for reuse and understanding. Condition Surveys with costed options for repair were prepared at the same time, and are appended to this plan (Appendix Three).

1.3 Scope of the Conservation Management Plan

“The Conservation Management Plan is a process that seeks to guide the future development of a place through an understanding of its significance.” 1

A Conservation Management Plan is a document, which is intended to assist in the process of managing change to a historic asset in a consistent way that does not detract from or undermine its significance. Based on consultation and research, the document provides a framework for understanding what is important about Boom Hall demesne, and why this is so. It identifies issues which threaten significance, and provides policies which, when implemented, will ensure that this significance is retained, and, where possible, enhanced.

The Conservation Management Plan will provide a working document, which will provide an objective framework to guide the decision-making process with regard to future proposals, which should be considered in terms of whether they retain or enhance the significance of the site.

1.4 Methodology

The preparation process of the Conservation Management Plan was as follows:

• Understanding the site: Compilation of photographic record; detailed condition survey; review of documentation including policy and statutory framework; detailed research on history and development of asset, including socio- economic and historic context, and comparative analysis.

• Consultation: On-site public survey; meetings with key informants and stakeholders.

• Analysis: Statement of significance; opportunities and threats to significance.

• Policies and recommendations: Identify appropriate categories for policies in response to conservation principles, considered alongside the principal issues and threats.

1.5 Layout of the Conservation Management Plan

The Conservation Management Plan is divided into four parts:

Part One: Introduction and context.

Part Two: Historical, and developmental context to Boom Hall.

Part Three: Analysis of significance, and identification of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Part Four: IdentificationDRAFT of policies and recommendations to protect and enhance significance, responding to the identified opportunities and threats, and guidelines for implementation and review.

1.6 Consultant Team

This Conservation Management Plan was prepared by Rory Lamb of Alastair Coey Architects. It was drafted with close

August 2020 Alastair Coey Architects Ltd  DCC09-R40E Boom Hall Conservation Management Plan

collaboration with the project team as follows:

Alastair Coey: Conservation Architect (Director, Alastair Coey Architects) Peter Robinson: Conservation Architect ������������������������������������(Director, Alastair Coey Architects) Jenny O’Donnell: Capital Works Project Manager (DCSDC) Dr Sarah Rutherford: ��������������������Landscape Consultant & Arboriculturist������������������������������������������������� (��������������������������������SR Historic Environment Limited) Tony Monaghan: Regeneration Manager (DCSDC) Margaret Edwards: Heritage Development Officer (DCSDC) Maura Fitzpatrick: Heritage Development Officer (DCSDC) Frank Morrison: Head of Capital Development and Building Control (DCSDC)

1.7 Public Information Events

Two public information events were held in the Guildhall, Londonderry, on 28th February 2019 (15:00-17:00 and 18:00- 20:00) to inform the public about the progress of the project, particularly the production of the Conservation Management Plan and condition report. There were 23 attendees at the first session and 11 attendees at the second session.

A report on these information events is attached (Appendix Four). Both sessions indicated the wealth of communal significance relating to Boom Hall through connections and memories held by local people.

Members of the consultant team presented their ongoing work on the condition report and Conservation Management Plan to convey the importance of the site and its current condition. Attendees were then offered two questions for group discussion, “What comes to mind when you think of Boom Hall?” and “What is the future of Boom Hall?” Attendees voiced their opinions on what they felt was special about the demesne of Boom Hall and how they felt it could be reused in the future and the results were recorded.

The key points arising can be summarised as follows:

- The general feeling was that action was needed imminently to secure what is there; - It was felt that Boom Hall comprises a site of great historical importance and this was understood in the context of the whole site, including house, stables, walled garden, landscape, archaeology; - The historical associations of the house, especially with the boom and the siege, and the shipping industry in Derry were held to be of particular value; - In thinking about the regeneration of the site, there was a feeling that a holistic approach should be taken and that authenticity was important to maintain the values of the site; - Awareness of the value of the landscape, views and historic trees was raised along with an appreciation of the therapeutic potential of the demesne landscape, with proximity to the adjacent hospice. The potential for new planting and demesne trails was a common theme; - Attendees were also keen that community involvement played a strong part in the future of Boom Hall through consultation, skills training and in the future use of the site; - It was felt that a coherent business plan was needed and that the sustainability of the project should be important. DRAFT

August 2020 Alastair Coey Architects Ltd  DCC09-R40E Boom Hall Conservation Management Plan

Part Two: Understanding of Place

2.1 Sources

Gaining a thorough understanding of the history and development of Boom Hall is challenging. As is fairly common for a modest country house with frequent changes of occupants, no comprehensive history is available and there is no consistent collection of records in one place.

A good summary of the known history is provided by Annesley Malley’s article in the Foyle Civic Trust Review (1993) which lays out the principal historical events and connections. Another useful source has been MacDonald and McAlister’s article on the seventeenth-century military landscape at Boom Hall, published in the Ulster Journal of Archaeology (2012). While this focuses on the excavations themselves, it also helpfully sets out much of the early history of the site and how it related to the military conflicts, as well as providing some insights into the later history in the endnotes.

The Ordnance Survey map series also offer a valuable resource for understanding the buildings and landscape. While the First (1830-32), Second (1849-53) and Fifth Editions (1939-50) are important sources of information, the Third (1904-06) and Fourth are missing from all available collections which prevents a complete map regression from being carried out. However the available OS maps are supplemented by demesne maps from the 1850s and 1930s.

Primary source material has also been consulted in the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI). This comprises a patchwork of material spread across numerous collections but helps to understand the development of the demesne of Boom Hall and its conveyance to later owners. A box of legal documents from the Caledon Papers is particularly relevant and charts the Alexander family’s purchases of property around Boom Hall and in Derry. Marriage agreements also go some way to establishing dates of purchases and their extent. Documentary evidence relating to later owners is less forthcoming although a few Wills and Tenancy Agreements are available from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. PRONI’s collection of street directories and valuations have also been helpful for locating owners and tenants and giving an impression of change on the demesne.

Invaluable additional research material has also been supplied through dialogue with Bartholomew O’Donnell which provided clarifications to the timeline, details of family members and activities at Boom Hall during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and the opportunity to view some historical documents in Mr O’Donnell’s possession.

This material is supplemented with the extant remains of the buildings and the landscape themselves which are the most important historical record of the demesne’s history. DRAFT

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2.2 Designations

Boom Hall Demesne is included as a supplementary entry on the Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes of Special Historic Interest (reference L-003) which establishes the potential for the former demesne to be recognised as of exceptional importance within Northern Ireland. No statutory controls follow from the designation, and there is opportunity to investigate seeking full designation on the register. Additionally, the site is located within an Area of High Scenic Value, as defined by the Natural Department in the Derry Area Plan (2011), which raises various policies to be observed.

There are several individual designations within the site, reflecting their special architectural and/or historic interest. Six of the eight scheduled monuments are designated based on cropmarks only visible through aerial photography but they suggest sites of archaeological interest from various eras which fits into the varied context of the local area. The two final sites record the probable locations of a seventeenth-century military battery and of the boom dating from the Siege of Derry in 1689.

The stable block lying west of the big house is listed at Grade B2 but is in parlous condition and is also included on Built Heritage at Risk Northern Ireland (BHARNI). The remains of the house were once listed but have at some point been delisted, possibly around the 1990s, when it was taken into the ownership of the former Derry City Council. The house is included in the Second Survey database as ‘Record Only’, visited in 1999.

Ref. No Name Designation HB01/25/004 A Boom Hall Record Only HB01/25/004 B Stable Block Grade B2 HB01/25/004 C Boomhall Gate Pillars Record Only BHARNI 01/25/004 Stable Block Ruinous Grade 1 LDY014:041 A.P. Site - enclosure Scheduled Monument LDY014:045 A.P. Site - circular cropmarks Scheduled Monument LDY014:046 A.P. Site - oval cropmark Scheduled Monument LDY014:047 A.P. Site - circular cropmarks - possibly Scheduled Monument barrow cemetery? LDY014:049 A.P. Site - cropmark Scheduled Monument LDY014:050 A.P. Site - oval enclosure Scheduled Monument LDY014:068 Boom and Chain (site of) Scheduled Monument LDY014:069 Battery (site of) Scheduled Monument L-003 (supplementary) Boom Hall Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes

2.3 Topography and Setting

The demesne of Boom Hall lies on marshy land sloping gently down to the Foyle River from the Culmore Road with a section of steeper land at the river bank. The geology of the surrounding area of the Foyle Basin is of ancient schists of the Pre-Cambrian period with glacial deposits of boulder clay, sands and gravels from the Pleistoncine period.2 At Boom Hall the geology comprises “fine-grained schistose grits and politic schists of the Upper Dalradian, Londonderry formation”.3 There are broad sand banks stretching from the shoreline of Boom Hall into the river, the largest of these being Madam’s Bank to the south-east of the house. Since the 1970s, Boom Hall has been overlooked from the west end of the Foyle Bridge leading onto Madam’s Bank Road. The construction of the new bridge and road severed the southern section of the demesneDRAFT which is now built over by a housing development.

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2.4 Description

Boom Hall is the remains of a late-eighteenth century Palladian country house and demesne lying on the west bank of the Foyle River immediately north of the Foyle Bridge. The demesne takes its name from the floating boom which was used to prevent river access to the City of Londonderry during the Siege of 1689. The Main House comprises a seven-bay two-storey over basement classical mansion constructed c.1779 with a slightly-projecting, full-height, canted bay to the garden front and a, later, Doric-order flat-roofed entrance porch on the front elevation. It is in ruinous condition having lost its roof and floors through fire damage. The primary threats to its condition are a structural crack running from Figure 6: Boom Hall from above (1). cornice to ground level on the south-east corner; an unstable brick partition wall in the north-east corner room; heavy invasive vegetation to the wall heads; and the insecure remains of the roof and slating.

To the north-west of the house is a two-storey quadrangular stable-block arranged around a courtyard, with an arched coach entrance on the south elevation. The Stable Block is in a very fragile condition and is at very real risk of major loss of fabric through collapsing walls and roofs, delaminating wall frontages, invasive vegetation to wall-heads and cores. North of the Stable-Block is an extensive range of enclosed gardens bounded by high walls constructed from stone and brick. At present these are overgrown and used for livestock grazing. The garden walls are in varying states of preservation having Figure 7: Boom Hall principal facade. suffered partial collapse in a number of locations as a result of construction of a mains sewer which traverses the site, attrition by animal action, falling trees and invasive vegetation.

The wider demesne comprises the remains of parkland and woodland containing traces of historical landscaping interventions and rich archaeological potential. Of particular interest is fragmentary evidence of a ha-ha and St James’ Well. The tree-lined avenue along Boom Hall Lane is protected by a tree preservation order and the adjacent green space at Bay Road is designated as a Local Nature Reserve. The River Foyle is designated as an Area of Special Scientific Interest and as European Protected Site. The Boom Hall demesne and Bay Road area are ecologically connected green spaces. An expert assessment of the extant landscape has been carried out as part of this study (Appendix Figure 8: Entrance porch. Two).

2.5 Historical Overview

Early History The area surrounding Derry was inhabited at least as early as the Mesolithic period and the vicinity of Boom Hall reflects various early sites through scheduled monument designations, including Neolithic settlements to the northeast at Thornhill and northwest at Racecourse Road, as well as crannogs and early Christian burials at Lough Enagh and monastic sites around Derry itself. The remains at Enagh constitute sites with a variety of development stretching Figure 9: Canted bay. through the medieval period back to the Neolithic period. The Thornhill site northwest across the river, also provides evidence of early settlement and is thought to have been one of the first permanent communities in the area around Derry. These reflect the beneficial positioning of the area beside the Foyle basin, sheltered from the Atlantic but with close access by water around the coasts of Ireland and DRAFTto Scotland. The site where the city later grew was originally an island in the Foyle, on which was an Early Christian monastery dating to the mid-later sixth century, reputedly founded by St Colmcille. By 1121 at least, the settlement was referred to as Doire Coluim Cille, which may have had a political aim of linking the city, the significance of the first Irish-born saint and his origins in northeast Donegal. Figure 10: Boom Hall from above (2). The monastery was by this time of great local importance, in both secular and

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religious matters, and the seat of the diocese was moved from Maghera to Derry in the following century. The growth of the monastic settlement required associated land and farms, and the land on which Boom Hall lies is thought to have formed part of the monastic estates serving the religious community.

The Sieges of Derry The history of the specific site in Ballynashallog townland on which Boom Hall was later constructed, begins in connection to the military conflicts which affected Derry in the seventeenth century.4 In 1609, King James I approved the Plantation of the North of Ireland and the livery companies of the City of London were encouraged to invest in the new Protestant colony derived from Figure 11: Interior (1). the forfeited estates of the Irish Earls. The Honourable The Irish Society was founded in 1613 to conduct the Plantation and to govern the rebuilt and renamed City of Londonderry, a commission which included the provision of the city with a substantial ring of walls to defend the incoming settlers.5 These comprised a ring of ten artillery bastions, walls and gates which encompassed the settlement and were constructed from 1614-1619. The Irish Society apportioned the lands in the surrounding counties between the various livery companies; the future lands of Boom Hall, within the liberties of the city were administered by the Irish Society itself. During the Civil War the city was held in 1649 by Parliamentarians against a Royalist Siege lasting twenty weeks. As part of their encampment, the besiegers constructed Charles Fort in the townland of Ballynashallog, near 6 to the river where it was attacked twice during the siege by enemy vessels. Figure 12: Interior (2). The site of this structure is thought to have been in the southern half of the later Boom Hall demesne in the area now covered by the embankment of the Foyle Bridge.7 The Royalist Siege was lifted after the Governor of the City, Sir Charles Coote, gained alliance with the forces of Owen Roe O’Neill causing the besiegers to withdraw.

During the Williamite Wars in Ireland, the City of Londonderry and its Protestant defenders were besieged from April to July 1689 by the army of the deposed King James II, a force largely comprised of French support sent by his cousin King Louis XIV. As a pre-existing fortification, Charles Fort was then reoccupied by the Jacobite forces and Brook Hall house was requisitioned to serve as their headquarters. King James is thought to have inspected the camp himself and to have pitched his tent beside a well, which took his name and now lies in the Figure 13: Interior (3). north east corner of Boom Hall demesne.

To prevent the city’s relief by naval reinforcements, a floating boom was built across the River Foyle at its narrowest point north of the city, slightly to the north of Charles Fort. It was anchored into the rocks of the shore on either side of the river, to the east at Gransha and to the west on a rocky outcrop beside the mouth of a stream, where it gave its name to the later house and demesne of Boom Hall. The structure and its defensive fortifications were designed by a French engineer, Jean-Bernard de Saint-Jean, Baron de Pointis, who described them in a letter to King Louis:

At last in spite of the dearth of all things in which we are here I have Figure 14: Stable block from above. completed the boom which I have had the honour of telling you, my Lord, in my last letter of the 6th of this month that I was about to take in hand. It consists of beams a foot square in thickness which I have had removed from houses and joined to another by mortises of a foot and a half; each beam end being attached to the side of that to which it is joined by two iron cramps passed through the one into the other leving [sic] a little play and freedom DRAFTof these pieces. I have placed crosswise upon and underneath the mortises one end of a cable (doubled for want of iron chains) well fixed through each beam, and I have run the whoe [sic] length of the boom a 5 or 6 in. rope which is the thickest I have been able to obtain and which is joined to the said beams by iron cramps in which it runs like a rod in curtain-rings and it has been noticed in stretching out the boom that this rope on the side of the beams which is most in Figure 15: Internal courtyard of stable block.

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the water was able that way to make cutting of it difficult. I know well that with the narrow course ships have in a river it is not possible that these different mutually supporting parts making one structure can be broken asunder. To prevent their being cut I got forts built on each bank of the river right at the ends of the boom. It will be necessary to equip these with guns that will strike between wind and water the vessels which cannot be farther distant than pistol shot. The banks of the river being raised with a very steep slope I have had entrenchments dug in the form of an amphitheatre one above the other where our troops which will be stationed there in such numbers as are needed will be safe even from artillery, not only because of the parapet but from the depth in the earth. Figure 16: 1893 Walker map of Derry as The whole fore which will be discharged from almost the same point Besiged in 1688-89. (each entrenchment firing easily over the heads of those who will be in the other, by reason of the steepness of the slope) can enfilade the boom and with that I have difficulty in believing that they will attempt to cut it with hatchet blows, the workers, as I have said, not being farther than a pistol shot from our entrenchments, and you know well, my Lord, with what difficulty you work on what is in water for it is always giving way (14 June 1689).8

He continued:

I shall not be quite happy until the English are foolish enough presently to attempt this enterprise [of trying to break the boom] when I shall have the pleasure of worsting them. Because as they must come with the wind Figure 17: The Mountjoy at the Boom. entirely behind or at least nearly so, once they are at the boom, return being impossible, they must perish under fire; for they cannot be strong enough to land.9

The layout of the various Jacobite encampments is shown on Captain Francis Nevill’s map of the Siege (1689). Nevill was part of the defending forces but was captured and held prisoner by the besiegers; it has been suggested that his knowledge of the camp’s layout was based on reports given by local Protestants after the siege.10 Charles Fort is shown as a rectangular structure with bastions on three sides. Nevill also depicts the series of entrenchments described by Pointis at the end of the Boom, and a second ‘New’ fort or battery lying just downstream of the boom which added to the defence provided by Charles Fort, the site of which is thought to be that of SMR LDY014:069. These fortifications are presumable the “three Batteryes made to defend the Bome each having three Gunnds apiece built with in high water marke” which Nevill notes in his description.11 Inland, the map shows various encampments and a circular element with a building at the bottom of it, possibly an historic rath repurposed by the army. Water was supplied by the well located at the king’s tent, and by the stream discharging beside the boom. Recent archaeological investigations have suggested that the Jacobites may have built a bridge (IGR C45261980) over the stream to connect their headquarters at Brook Hall with Charles Fort, the footings of which survive. Further excavations may explain how the various scheduled monuments identified from cropmarks in aerial photography relate to these fortifications and encampments.

At the climax of the Siege the boom was rammed through and smashed on the 28th July 1689 by the HMSs Dartmouth, Phoenix and Mountjoy providing much needed supplies to the city and breaking the siege, leading to the retreat of the Jacobite forces. Nevill describes:DRAFT It was between the number 17. & 18 [on the siege map]. That Captaine Brownings Shipp [HMS Mountjoy] after breaking the Bome fell fowle with the Shoare, but the Tyde comeing in, and fireing her Chase Guns, she got off safe to the great Griefe of the Enemy who through they had nothing more secure.12

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The scene of the smashing of the Boom by the Mountjoy has become a highly evocative image in historical perspectives of the Siege as the point of the city’s relief.

All readily available evidence of the siege fortifications has unfortunately been lost due to demesne re-landscaping, the operations of the Women’s Royal Naval Service (W.R.N.S.) stationed at Boom Hall during the Second World War, and the construction of the Foyle Bridge in the early 1980s.13 Damage was also caused by the installation of a modern sewer in the 1970s which eroded much of the historic fabric of the eighteenth-century demesne.14 However, a limited material record highlights the archaeological potential of the site, with Jacobite and French cannon having been excavated nearby in the demesne of Brook Hall and the broader site of potential military archaeology stretching up to Culmore. In Boom Hall demesne, the most important discoveries, now lost, were a sword and pistol unearthed in 1887:

found at the foot of an apple tree, the root of which had not been interfered with within the memory of any persons now in the district…the sword was apparently the property of an officer, the handle being of carved ivory, and the quality of the steel particularly good. Even in its present rusty condition the elasticity of the weapon is surprising. The handle has a shield peculiar of French blades. The gun was, of course, one of the old flint-lock type, and, like the sword, had suffered considerably from its long burial. Close to the apple tree were discovered the remains of a wall, the existence of which was not previously known.15

It is thought that the apple tree lay within the walled garden which is marked as the demesne’s orchard on historical OS maps. More recent archaeological excavations have unearthed a gun flint and musket ball which may have been from flintlock muskets used by Jacobite troops guarding the boom.16 The importance of this overlay of the later gentry demesne upon the rich military landscape was effectively conveyed by Lord Macaulay who visited in the 1840s in his history of the Siege of Derry:

Large pieces of fir wood, strongly bound together, formed a boom which was more than a quarter of a mile in length, and which was firmly fastened to both shores by cables a foot thick. A huge stone, to which the cable on the left bank was attached, was removed many years later, for the purpose of being polished and shaped into a column. But the intention was abandoned, and the rugged mass still lies, not many yards from its original site, amidst the shades which surround a pleasant country house named Boom Hall. Hard by is the well from which the besiegers drank. A little farther off is the burial ground where they laid their slain, and where even in our own time the spade of the gardener has struck upon many skulls and thigh-bones at a short distance beneath the turf and flowers.17

The stone mentioned by Macauley, the “Boom Stone”, has been identified with a 2.5m long rough pillar lying in four unequal parts to the southeast of the house, but the identification has yet to be verified.

The Alexanders of Boom Hall Boom Hall is originally connected to the Alexander family, close relations to the Earls of Caledon, who made their names as merchants and aldermen in Derry. Much of the demesne as itDRAFT appears today was laid out by the family, as was the former house on the site, and they had close connections with the surrounding gentry families, the Fergusons of ‘The Farm’ and the Hill’s at Brook Hall. Rowan notes that the seventeenth-century wars in Ireland took their toll on the country and that it was only with the eighteenth century and the emergence of the more settled Protestant ruling class that country houses began to be built in earnest. These tended to be clustered around water, such as Lough Erne, Lough Swilly

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and Lough Foyle.18 In addition, the mercantile class in Derry began to buy up resources and estates north of the city in Donegal and Inishowen.

In the aftermath of the Williamite Wars the land surrounding the site of the boom was leased in 1689 from the Honourable The Irish Society by John Alexander (c.1670-1747). The family hailed from Erity Churchland near Manor Cunningham in Donegal and from Ballyclose, Limavady, where his father, Andrew Alexander, was confirmed a freeman as a tanner in 1665 and lived at Ballyclose House. John was later named in connection the purchase of an estate called Gunsland in Co. Donegal in 1717, which has previously been assumed to be a seventeenth-century name for the lands of Boom Hall, but may in fact have been a separate estate elsewhere.19 It is possible that John Alexander constructed the first Boom Hall, but this is not supported by evidence. The Rev. Robert Alexander, in his family biography (assembled 1863; published 1946), confirms that his grandfather Nathaniel Alexander (1689-1761), John’s son, lived in Derry and that the family’s country residence “was built on the acres belonging to the house in the City of Derry and was called Boom Hall”.20 This townhouse lay at a prestigious location at the west corner of the Diamond in central Derry, where Nathaniel was an Alderman of the City. Some information about this house is given in the marriage agreement between Nathaniel Alexander’s son, Robert, and Anne McCulloch (1759) which records that on 28th September 1745, Nathaniel received from the city governor: “all those messuages or tenements situate on the north side of Bishop Street…containing in front to Bishop Street thirty five feet and in front to the Diamond fifty four feet and in depth one hundred and fourty feet”.21 The property was bounded at the north by the yard of the First Presbyterian Church, and was neighboured to the northeast by its Minister’s residence. Based on the description, the Alexander’s house presumably lay on the site of the more recent buildings of 23-24 The Diamond (HB01/19/020). The marriage contract goes on to note that attached to this plot were:

…24 acres of land marked 12 on the map of aces situate and lying on the south side of the road leading to Colmore bounded on the east by George Gunn’s Acres on the south by Lough Foyle and on the West by Frederick Gordon and Henry Dixon’s acres and about one mile and three quarters distant from Londonderry…22

It is unclear whether these were the same lands or an extension of the estate received in 1717 by John Alexander. The mention of George Gunn is interesting and might suggest that his family sold part of their estate in 1717 but still retained other acres nearby in 1745. The map of the City Acres reproduced by John Bryson (2001) shows a plot marked 12-15 lying between the Culmore Road and the river, which suggests this was the acreage attached to the house at the Diamond on which the original Boom Hall was built.

Nothing is known about the earlier Boom Hall occupied by Nathaniel Alexander, except that Rev. Alexander implies that it was built following the acquisition of the land by the family rather than being a pre-existing house. This is also suggested by Neville’s maps of the Siege which show that Brook Hall estate and walled gardens existed in 1689; it seems odd that any house existing at Boom Hall would not also have been requisitioned by the Jacobites. The family history indicates that the older house lay to the north of the extant remains of Boom Hall, on the site of the walled garden and near King James’ Well. A surviving ha-ha to the south of the walled garden is thought to suggest the house’s approximate location andDRAFT indicates that by the time of the construction of the next house in the late-eighteenth century, some form of landscape and garden interventions had been undertaken, probably in the more formal garden tradition of the earlier part of the century. It is worth noting that when first constructed after the wars, the landscape around Boom Hall would presumably still have been littered with military remains. The military landscape cannot be read on the ground today and the subject of when these fairly substantial fortifications

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were dismantled, remains a major gap in our understanding of Boom Hall. It is interesting that the Alexanders were keen to celebrate the location of the boom with the name of their demesne, but seem to have eradicated all tangible trace of the siege by the time of the first ordnance survey map in the 1830s. Rev. Robert Alexander mentions that the remains of the “New Fort” at the west end of the Boom survived during his childhood.23

Nathaniel Alexander died in 1761 and was buried in St Augustine’s churchyard within the walls of Derry. He was succeeded by his second son Robert Alexander (1722-1790), the first family member to be styled ‘of Boom Hall’, his elder brother William having left Ireland for Cambridge and been called to the English Bar. Robert was one of the most prominent merchants in Derry, a city Alderman like his father, and developed a reputation as an improving landlord not only at Boom Hall but in his estates to the north in Donegal. His father having established a sugar bakery in Derry in 1755 near Foyle Street, Robert built on the investment with a sugar house in 1762 which gave its name to Sugar House Lane.24 He presumably supported this himself using the sugar he imported along with rum from Antigua on his transatlantic trading vessel, “Alexander”, trading for them herring caught by his fishing fleet at Inch, Co. Donegal. Robert is mentioned in Arthur Young’s “A Tour in Ireland 1776-1779” as “one of the principal merchants of Derry”.25 He rode with Young from Derry to Lough Swilly to inspect the herring fisheries which he reports were founded by Robert in 1773 and that in the year of writing (1776) exported 340 tonnes (1750 barrels) to the West-Indies. He had also recently completed the construction of a salting house, cooperage and boat sheds for the fishery sufficient to process 100,000 herring per day.26 In addition, Alexander Quay, formerly along Foyle Street where it met Bridge Street, is thought to have been named for him, though it is unknown whether this was for his mercantile reputation or whether its construction was one of his ventures. Robert also founded a meat market in Linenhall Street, Derry, and, along with many of the establishment mercantile community in Derry, invested heavily in leaseholds in Moville and Inch gaining a broad additional range of property including a sizeable estate at Glentogher.27 Like his father, he used Boom Hall as a country residence while retaining his strong involvement in city affairs, and he expanded the demesne through the purchase of neighbouring farms from fellow Aldermen, William Hogg and Hugh Edwards in the first half of the 1760s.28

This expansion was furthered and eventually taken over by Robert’s younger brother, James Alexander (1730-1802), who went on to instigate the building of the new classical mansion in the 1770s. James, the third son of Nathaniel Alexander, had gone to India during the early years of the East India Company where he held various governmental posts and made a fortune through speculative investments in wheat. On his return in 1774, he married Anne Crawford of Crawfordsburn, Co. Down, and became MP for the City of Londonderry. Around the same time, he acquired a considerable mercantile premises in the southern suburbs of Derry located on the south side of Bishop Street bounded to the east by Crosses Lane, which was accompanied by eighteen acres of land in the vicinity of Boom Hall.29 From April to June of 1775, he was engaged in negotiations with the families of Lecky, Houston, and Leeson to buy the various parts of a further divided package of twenty seven acres nearby.

The following year, two indentures between the two brothers record the transfer of lands previously acquired by Robert to James, for £500 and £1500 respectively, and the names of the previous owners suggest that these lay DRAFT30 adjacent to the lands James had bought in 1775. Part of this transfer was the twenty four acres on which the first Boom Hall had presumably been built, which had been received by Robert in his marriage agreement (see above).

The construction of a new house at Boom Hall must have begun around this time in the early 1770s. Although the dates are unclear, the 1770s-80s was

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a time when the first houses of clear architectural style were beginning to be built in the north-west.31 The house was certainly complete or near completion by 1779 when a memorandum of the lease of Boom Hall describes it as “new built”. This document formalises the agreement between Robert and James Alexander that Robert should live in the new Boom Hall:

“…the same James Alexander for the Love and Affection which he beareth unto his Brother the said Robert Alexander… hath agreed to sett a Lease of the new built dwelling House with the Office Houses and the Lands of Boomhall with the Appurtenances thereunto belonging situate lying and being in the Liberties of the City of Londonderry aforesaid and now in the Possession of the said Robert Alexander for and during the Life and Lives of the said Robert Alexander and Ann Alexander his present Wife and the survivor of them at the yearly Rent of Ten Shilling Sterling…” 32

It has been suggested that the investment in rebuilding Boom Hall was undertaken to provide a grand residence for James and his new wife.33 The couple were in Rome during part of Boom Hall’s construction, when Anne was painted by Pompeo Batoni in 1777 during her pregnancy. On return to Ireland, she died shortly after giving birth to their first son, Du Pre Alexander, in December that year. This seems to have changed James’ plans, and he focused his energies on another estate, Caledon, Co. Tyrone, which had been purchased in 1776 and went on to erect the house there, before going on to be created successively Baron Caledon (1790), Viscount Caledon (1797), and eventually 1st Earl of Caledon (1800). Having bought up the Boom Hall demesne and built a new house there, the loss of his wife and acquisition of a larger estate seems may have been factors in James’ decision to return Boom Hall to his brother, although the memorandum seems to have been a formality as Robert had already resided on the demesne as his country house for many years and it is possible that he completed its construction. The house was probably substantially complete by 1777 when it is shown on Taylor and Skinner’s map of the area (1777), alongside the nearby Brook Hall. Although the generalised depiction may not be reliable, it appears similar to the house as built. The stable block is probably contemporary with the house as it matches it in its bold rustication and would have been required to service the new house.

Robert Alexander died on March 27th 1790 and was commended by an obituary in the Belfast Newsletter. He was succeeded in his tenancy at Boom Hall by his second son Henry Alexander (1763-1818), his eldest, Nathaniel, having entered the church, becoming successively bishop of Clonfert, Down, and then Meath. Henry was a barrister in Derry and Member of Parliament, firstly for Newtown-Limavady from 1788-90 and then briefly for the City of Londonderry in 1800. He had inherited a large estate of 4000 acres from his father at Glentogher, Co. Donegal, and it is possible that he relocated there, as he had to stand down from representing Derry after only six months due to a change of residence. Two documents signed 5th April 1800 reveal Henry expanding his estates with rentals from the Earl of Donegal of further packages of 2280 acres of land in Glentogher (lands of Oghbooy, Cornagratte, and Miritarness) and 699 acres in Craiganeen, Co. Donegal.34 By the time of the Alexander’s sale of Boom Hall in the 1840s part of these rentals had been inherited by their neighbour, Sir Robert Alexander Ferguson of ‘The Farm’, who had married Robert Alexander’s daughter Elizabeth, while a further part remained held by Henry’s nephew, Rev. Robert Alexander.35 Henry Alexander, possiblyDRAFT through the connection to the Earl of Caledon, was clearly of some local standing, for, in October 1799, Boom Hall played host to Lord Cornwallis, Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland during a visit to Derry in his response to the Rebellion of the previous year, along with a party consisting of “Lord Tyrone, his brother and two cousins with two secretaries”.36 A letter to the Marquis of Abercorn mentions his activities: “he sleeps at Boom Hall, the place of H. Alexander, was entertained the first day by the Corporation [of

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Derry], went to see the forts next day at Burncrana and returned to Alexander’s to dinner…”.37 In 1806, Henry emigrated to South Africa where he was Colonial Secretary to the Governor, his cousin Du Pre Alexander, 2nd Earl of Caledon, and remained there until his death.

In his absence abroad, it seems that Henry’s younger brother, General William Alexander (1768-1824) and his family occupied the house. A letter of July 1817 from William’s brother James Alexander to Lord Caledon clarifies that Boom Hall was the property of the earls and was rented by their cousins.38 The letter relates that James, following discussion with his siblings Nathaniel, Henry, Josias, and Elizabeth (the children of Robert Alexander of Boom Hall), hoped to come to an agreement with Caledon to allow William Alexander to remain the tenant at Boom Hall, indicating that in Henry’s absence at Glentogher and then in South Africa, William’s family had already been making use of the house. The correspondence may have followed from the death of their mother, Anne, who died in January 1817. General William continued the family’s interests in the City of Derry and was also a city Alderman; contemporary lease records indicate that the family owned a warehouse on Magazine Street lying to the northeast of a property called Bridge House.39 William’s son, Rev. Robert Alexander (1795-1872) was born in Drogheda but went to live at Boom Hall from a few weeks old (where he was brought up by his grandmother, Anne McCulloch, Robert’s widow, and an unmarried aunt), and remained there outside of terms during his school years. He returned to Boom Hall following military service in the American War of 1812-15 and went on to study for Holy Orders in Dublin. An odd story is related by Rev. Robert’s granddaughter Eleanor about a mysterious Portuguese woman who was found on the demesne and was taken in by the family, feigning dumbness.40 She chose to work with the servants and was an excellent embroiderer, producing a quilt for Robert which remained in his family. The family understood her to be broken hearted but never discovered her origins, and she died after a few years.

Henry Alexander died in 1818 and his brother William in 1824 and it is understood that around this time the house reverted to the Earl of Caledon, Du Pre, and it may have been from then that Boom Hall was rented outside the family. The valuations of 1831 record the resident as the Dean of Derry, Rev. Thomas Bunbury Gough (1777-1860), who is buried at the gate of the cathedral churchyard in Derry. Six years later, the Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1837 note that Boom Hall was the property of Lord Caledon but the residence of the Bishop of Derry and Raphoe, Richard Ponsonby (1772-1853). Ponsonby had been transferred to (the see of) Derry in September 1831 before becoming the first bishop of the united see of Derry and Raphoe in 1834 following the Church Temporalities (Ireland) Act (1833). Boom Hall served as the starting and finishing point of a tour of his diocese beginning on 19th September 1837. Correspondence from 1837 and 1840 confirm his presence at the house but the letters of 1840, concerning the collection of rents on other estates make it sound as though, due to the bishop’s frequent travels and duties, it was rather his brother who was living in Boom Hall.41 It is worth noting that there was an abortive plan for the neighbouring estate of Brook Hall to be purchased as the Bishop’s Palace for Derry, which may explain Ponsonby’s presence at Boom Hall as an alternative arrangement.42 Although correspondence relating to the house is scarce, some letters indicate that the Lenox-Conyngham family of Springhill, Moneymore, who were related by marriage to Bishop Ponsonby, made fairly regular visits to Boom Hall in the 1830s.43 James Dupre Alexander, DRAFT3rd Earl of Caledon, sold the demesne of Boom Hall (125 acres) to a successful Derry merchant, Daniel Baird (c.1795-1862), in c.1849 for the value of £6,000. Eleanor Alexander reports that this was done to finance the rehabilitation of impoverished tenants on his lands at Caledon during the Famine:

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Lord Caledon sold the old family place of Boomhall that he might buy out a certain fever den in the neighbourhood of Caledon. He relieved the perishing inhabitants, built cottages for some of them fit for human habitation, and sent others to America with sufficient capital to start life again in the New World… It was a great grief for him [Rev. Robert Alexander] that his early home should pass to strangers, and he never cared to revisit it.44

In reality, this may represent a consolidation of the Caledon estates pressed during the years of the Famine and it is unclear whether the proceeds of the sale were really spent on famine-relief. Likewise, despite Eleanor’s latter comment, the Rev. Alexander maintained connections in the area and various family leases and tenancies. He is recorded as leasing a property on the corner of Bishop Street and Ferguson’s Lane with a house and garden to a family called McKay in 1827 at which time he was rector of Errigal Parish Church, Co. Londonderry.45 This was still in the family in the 1880s, for the reverse of the same document contains a renewal of lease to a family called Ferris by Bishop William Alexander, Robert’s son. According to Eleanor, Rev. Robert, and his wife went on to live nearby Boom Hall at Thornhill House, presumably as tenants; in the Londonderry Directory of 1839 he was listed as resident in Aughadowey and was later a prebendary of the cathedral of Derry.46 This directory provides a list of ship owners in Derry at the time which represents the close collection of mercantile families in competition in the city. This is useful as it mentions alongside each other four families who resided in Boom Hall during the nineteenth century: “Alexander, S. and J., Ferryquay-street; Baird, Daniel, Foyle-street; Corscaden, James, Middle Quay; Cooke, John, Strand.”47

Boom Hall after 1849 The demesne was purchased from the Alexanders by Daniel Baird a merchant and ship-owner, who had gained his wealth trading in the Baltic and America in the early decades of the nineteenth century. He served as Mayor of Derry in 1847 and High Sheriff of Co. Tyrone in 1854 as well as being chairman of the Londonderry Harbour Board from 1856-61. Baird’s first villa was the Casino at the south of Derry, a classical pleasure-house built by the Earl Bishop, Frederick Hervey, as a summer residence in 1784. He was clearly rising further in the late 1840s accompanying his term as mayor, acquiring the estates of Newtownstewart in Co. Tyrone (1847) and then Boom Hall (1849), purchases which helped secure his social status as an established member of the gentry class.

Although their dating is unclear, Baird seems to have made various alterations to the house about this time. Evidence within the porch shows that the existing structure is a later addition and that previously the house had a pedimented doorcase. The porch is in a more Neoclassical style than the rest of the Palladian house which suggests its later date. Its unusual arrangement, with the door to the side rather than the front, suggests a reason for the change, namely that of providing an extra window in the front of the porch to light a dark entrance hall. Baird may also have added the canted bay attached to the northeast elevation of the house during general improvements following his acquisition, for the valuations indicate a great increase in the value of the demesne buildings from £48-7-0 in 1831 to £90-0-0 in 1858. The canted bay, which contained indoor toilets was badly executed, leaked and formed an unsatisfactory join with the rest of the house. It seems likely that Baird’s improvements also included the gate, lodge and screen to the west of the demesne (see below). This may have existed on a circuit system with the original drive to allow visitors to functions to DRAFT48 move easily into and out of the demesne.

Baird died in 1862 and left his estates to his wife for her lifetime and then to his grandson David Maturin, with the proviso that he take the name Baird, which he did in 1875. It seems that his widow did not continue living at the house, for on April 2nd 1862 Forrest Reid solicitors of Londonderry advertised the letting

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of Boom Hall “for immediate possession”.49 A series of demesne maps were commissioned from the surveyor R.H. Nolan sometime between 1852 and 1879 of both the estates of Boom Hall and Newtownstewart.50 While those for Newtownstewart are retained at PRONI, it is understood that the Boom Hall maps are in private ownership, but one of the maps has been viewed in the preparation of this plan and is discussed below.51 These maps would have given Baird an accurate understanding of his holdings on either estate. David Baird Maturin-Baird (1849-1924) inherited in 1880 on the death of his grandmother but mainly let his property as an absentee landlord, living in England from at least 1889, although valuations do record him as the occupier of Boom Hall in 1883.52 Documents in the PRONI suggest that he was more Figure 18: 1856 Nolan Estate map. interested in investing in the larger estate and town of Newtownstewart where he was engaged in constructing and repairing tenant buildings in the town and where the pub was named “The Maturin-Baird Arms”.

At the point of his inheritance, Boom Hall seems to have already been occupied by tenants for some time and it is likely that Maturin-Baird merely continued the existing arrangements. The joint owners of the shipping company J&J Cooke, brothers John and Joseph, are recorded as occupiers of Boom Hall in 1870 although it may be that in reality only Joseph’s family resided there. They had acted as Daniel Baird’s executors in 1862 and took up residence as tenants shortly after Baird’s death; valuation records show that the brothers were subletting land in the townland of Ballynashallog from 1860 and that Joseph Cooke was the occupier of Boom Hall by 1864.53 The Cooke’s had been business associates of Daniel Baird in the mercantile community of Derry, and he is mentioned in their Letter-Books.54 They had established their company in the first half of the century as a small transatlantic trading fleet bringing timber to Derry from North America. During the years preceding the Famine, their ships gained increasing use to carry emigrants, and they transported over 5000 people to America in 1847 alone. In 1867 Bradshaw’s Railway Manual, Shareholders’ Guide and Official Directory lists “Joseph Cooke, Esq., Boomhall” as a director of the Londonderry and Lough Swilly Railway Company and he was still resident there in 1886 when the Directory lists him as Chairman.55 Joseph Cooke and his family were photographed at Boom Hall in c.1890 along with the Gilliland family who lived at the neighbouring demesne of Brook Hall. Joseph is still recorded in the Provincial Street Directories as resident at “Bloomhall” in 1896.56 A further branch of the family, J.G.F. Cooke and his family also lived at the house, as is recorded on a plaque to Captain Browning of the Mountjoy on Derry City Walls.

The timeline of residents becomes confusing for the next few decades. On September 21st 1888, the death of the Derry ship owner, James Corscadden, was recorded “at his residence Boom Hall, Londonderry”. He was a member of another prominent Derry shipping family and had previously lived nearby at Ballyarnett House.57 Around this time Boom Hall became first country houses in Derry to have a gasometer installed, probably owning to the influence of both the Cooke and Corscadden families being on the board of the Londonderry Gas Board. The next occupier was Sir John Barr Johnston, recorded in the 1897 directory as living in the city at Bayview Terrace and then as the occupier of Boom Hall in 1899.58 Johnston was two-time Mayor of Derry, and a photograph survives of the assembled guests of his garden party at Boom Hall in August Figure 19: Garden party at Boom Hall, 1898. 1898, thrown to welcome a visit of the Irish Society. He was still living at Boom Hall in 1901, when the valuations note in the margin “Johnston for ho(use), Baird for land”.59 The complicated series of crossing out and rewriting in the valuation concludes in 1910DRAFT with Baird using the lands and Henry Cooke in Boom Hall itself. Henry Joseph was the son of the previous occupant, Joseph Cooke, and resided at Boom Hall from c.1909, when he is first mentioned in the Street Directories, until his death in 1923. He was the secretary to the Young Charity for Girls in the late nineteenth century.60 In 1912 a caretaker’s house is recorded, occupied by James Smith, although it is unclear what this was, for it was leased directly from Maturin-Baird, while the gate lodge is noted as

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leased by Henry Cooke along with the house.61 Maturin-Baird died in England at his townhouse, Croy, Portsmouth Road, Kingston-upon-Thames, having purchased the estate of Hookwood Hindhead in East Anglia.

His son, Charles Edgar Maturin-Baird (1899-1994), inherited the property in 1924, remaining as an absentee landlord in residence at 22 Egerton Gardens, London. Cooke seems to have been briefly succeeded as tenant by a relation (possibly his wife) called Mary until c.1925 and another tenant named Robert Blair was in place by 1929. On 24th June 1932, Charles Edgar leased Boom Hall to Michael Henry McDevitt (d.1969), whose family were the final private owners of the house, and he moved in with his brother Patrick (d.1953) and Figure 20: Boom Hall in 1909 from Malley sisters Annette (d.1993) and Marcella (d.1994).62 The lease gives one of the (1993). best historical pictures we have of the composition of the demesne and is made even more useful by the inclusion of a demesne map:

“…the premises known as “Boomhall” Londonderry consisting of the Mansion House, Shrubberies, the entire of the stable quadrangle (except the portion thereof which is entered from the farm yard) the Roadway of the front avenue leading to the said Mansion House including the front Gate Lodge the quadrangle of out-office the kitchen and flower gardens the whole containing about seven acres and two roods statute measure as delineated and coloured yellow on the map hereon enclosed and Secondly that parcel of land adjoining said Mansion House containing about twelve acres and three roods as delineated and coloured red on said map…“ 63 Figure 21: Historic photo of Boom Hall.

McDevitt was given a 21 year lease with “yearly rent of one hundred and thirty pounds inclusive of tax charges”. It was also agreed that McDevitt would install a hydraulic ram pump and tank connecting to the house water supply, which was a fairly common installation to country houses in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, and undertake redecorating and repair work up to the value of £100, although the nature of the work is unspecified. Water had previously been filled into the house’s supply by a water wheel on the east side of the quadrangle operated by two men. The lease also helps clarify some of the confusion arising from the valuation records as to how the land and house were separately let. The colouring of the map makes clear the areas given over for the tenant of the house, while the text also asserts the right of McDevitt and his “assigns or licensees” to use the back avenue, marked A-B on the map, “for the purpose of driving cattle or other animals to and from the lands coloured red on said map”. Additionally, he was expected to contribute towards dividing his tenanted areas from the rest of the demesne by constructing fences along the lines marked B-C and D-E and maintaining a gate at point B.

Seven years later, the house was requisitioned by the Admiralty and occupied during the war by the Women’s Royal Naval Service (W.R.N.S). Nissen huts were erected around the house, especially to the south western side of the house overlooking the river. Various concrete platforms edged with brick surviving here are the bases of these structures. The Admiralty also broke down the north- western window on the south-western side of the basement into a door and installed a bomb shelter in the vaulted basement there. After the war, the house was found to have been left in a poor state of repair. During their occupation, the WRNS held dances in the drawing room of Boom Hall, and when McDevitt returned he found the floor had buckled and the surviving metal reinforcement bars were inserted below to support the floor joists. Correspondence reveals McDevitt’s concerns with theDRAFT state of his residence, in particular his displeasure Figure 22: W.R.N.S. at Boom Hall. that the whole house was painted in green. A condition report survives which details the damage caused during the Admiralty’s occupancy and the respective cost of repairs for each element. Maturin-Baird filed a claim for £2502-17s compensation, comprising £1409-4s-11d fabric repairs, £1052 to demolish the nissen huts, and £150 to restore the lawns.64 He then set about repairing the dilapidated house for McDevitt, but having run into difficulties in the process, he

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instead sold McDevitt the demesne of 27.75 acres in 1949, along with money for repairs. A further map exists from this transaction drawn by the same surveyor, W.F.W Marks, which shows that McDevitt bought a slightly larger portion of land than he had previously rented, now including the Walled Garden and a further section of parkland to the west of the house.

The insurance condition report gives hints at the character of the interior of the house, noting that most of the rooms had cornices, friezes and picture rail. The dado rails and skirting were timber with the dado between painted to resemble timber panelling and the walls featured a mixture of plain and embossed wall- papers. Figure 23: McDevitt room plans - basement. The house was last occupied by Annette and Marcella McDevitt, Michael having died in 1969, one of whom worked at the nearby Sisters of Mercy Convent School at Thornhill and is thought to have lived primarily in the main drawing room looking over the river. Probably during their lifetime, the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society visited during research for their Guide to the buildings of Derry and provided the only extant description of the house’s interior:

The standard 18th century Irish villa plan, with a wide square hall in the centre giving access to all the main rooms, and with the stair over the left-hand side. The drawing room possesses attractive shutters and chair rail, and the hall has its original flagged floor. Otherwise the main rooms Figure 24: McDevitt room plans - first floor. of the house are unexceptional; the disparity in scale between them suggests that the original architect’s plans may have been adapted by the builder in execution. The basement floor is brick-vaulted along with front of the house and possesses a nice Regency-style kitchen range, with cast laurel devices.65

Following the deaths of the McDevitt sisters the house passed to a niece resident in County Cork, Mrs McCann who had no interest in the property and the house fell into considerable disrepair. In 1969, following various minor fires, Boom Hall lost its roof and has since degraded further. On the night of the fire, the fire-brigade in Derry were reluctant to attend as their previous insistence with the owner to block up the house to dissuade fire and vandals had been ignored. The house was conveyed to Derry City Council on 15th March 1996. Figure 25: McDevitt room plans - second floor. DRAFT

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2.6 Comparative Analysis

A string of demesnes lined the west bank of the Foyle in the eighteenth century. The first of these out of Derry was ‘The Farm’ owned by Sir Robert Alexander Ferguson M.P. (1796-1860). Dean describes his house as a “square Georgian house with noble Grecian portico, ‘and adjacent Pleasure ground’”, but it has been demolished and the site absorbed into the expansion of Derry.66 This basic description indicates that the Farm was of a similar character to the nearby Boom Hall, especially in its portico. The Fergusons were closely connected with the Alexanders, Sir Robert being the grandson of Robert Alexander of Boom Hall, his father Andrew having married Robert’s daughter Elizabeth, Figure 26: Nearby demense houses. and OS maps indicate that there was a drive which directly connected the two demesnes.

Brook Hall lies north along the bank of the Foyle from Boom Hall. An earlier house here served as garrison for the Duke of Berwick, the Jacobite commander, during the Siege. The present house is contemporary with Boom Hall, dated c.1790, and was built for Sir George Fitzgerald Hill (d.1839), M.P. for Derry and Governor of Trinidad. The house displays a simple late-Georgian aesthetic with Regency additions of an encircling veranda and single story entrance front. It was described in 1802 as “a modern edifice, lately finished on a very elegant plan” and it certainly has a later appearance than the exposed stonework of Boom Hall, with taller windows also characteristic of a later date. Like Boom Hall, it has a prominent projecting bay to the east, here segmental in plan, which capitalised on views over the river. The “elegant plan” originally comprised an oval entrance hall lying across the axis with a curved salon at the rear bay, and an oval staircase to the north.

The valuation records indicate that in the late-nineteenth century Boom Hall was a good deal more valuable than the other demesnes nearby at £278, compared to The Farm at £210 and Brook Hall at £200. This depreciated towards the close of the century when the land and buildings began to be separately sublet.

Further to the north towards Culmore is Ballynagard House, the property of the Hart family. The present house was built in the 1850s and like Boom Hall has a canted bay overlooking the river, a feature which could have been drawn from the earlier mansion nearby at Boom Hall. The Hart family also owned Kilderry House, north of Culmore, a peculiar building with a core roughly contemporary to Boom Hall and early-nineteenth century additions. The earlier central portion of the house has a curved bay to the entrance front with another two-storey canted bay to the rear, although it is unclear whether this latter feature, in exposed red brick rather than roughcast-render, is a nineteenth-century addition.

Michael Priestley The design of Boom Hall has been attributed to Michael Priestley (d.1777), a Derry architect active in the mid-late eighteenth century. Priestley is one of the earliest known architects in the area and is thought to have had a successful trade in Derry at the time, although as recently as 1970 none of his works had been Figure 27: Lifford Courthouse. attributed. He is now reliably given as the architect of Lifford Courthouse which is dated and names him as architect, and of much early housing in Strabane, including its original market house. The Lifford Court House is described by Rowan as “one of the finest facades of its date in Ireland” it employs a quirky Classical style with boldly rusticated elements, and he goes on to suggest various other buildings which may be by Priestley, based on its character.67 The most relevant of theseDRAFT are Port Hall, Co. Donegal, and Prehen House, Co. Londonderry. Port Hall (1746) was built for John Vaughan of Buncrana and lies near to Lifford which explains its close stylistic similarity with the court house. The appearance is markedly different to Boom Hall, with a double pile pitched roof and high parapet with a central pediment and Diocletian window, but they share the bold rusticated surrounds to the principle openings. Port Hall predates Figure 28: Port Hall. Boom Hall by c. 30 years and even for the 1740s Rowan describes it as “a little

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old-fashioned”. More close to the classical order of Boom Hall is Prehen House (c.1745) located to the south of Derry and attributed to Priestley on the basis of the initials M.P. found on the attic rafters. This house is more confidently classical and shares Boom Hall’s hipped roof and stepped rustication. A key difference in both Priestley houses is the raised parapet (adopted from the court house) which does not appear at Boom Hall, where the use of a bold cornice below the hipped roof has a strongly classical feel. However, all three employ the slightly extruded central breakfront and the use of bold quoins and surrounds throughout.

Sir Robert Taylor Figure 29: Prehen House. Rowan describes Boom Hall as having “something of the character of a villa by Sir Robert Taylor”.68 Taylor (1714-1788) was a successful Georgian architect in England, whose major country house projects included Gorhambury, St Albans (1777-1784) and Heveningham Hall, Suffolk (1778-80). He completed a small number of works in Ireland as well, most notably the Belfast Assembly Rooms in Waring Street (later remodelled by Sir Charles Lanyon).

Rowan’s comparison likely refers to Taylor’s frequent use of large canted bay fronts in his designs, most notably Asgill House, Richmond (1761-64) built for Sir Charles Asgill, Lord Mayor of London. However, two houses approach the appearance of Boom Hall especially closely, namely Danson House, Bexley (1763-1768) and Sharpham House, Ashprington (c.1770). The rear of Danson is Figure 30: Danson House. certainly comparable to Boom Hall, with the projecting central bay and a similar arrangement of windows, differing in the detailing and sizes of the windows. These houses are more elaborate than Boom Hall, with classical architraves decorating all the windows of the piano nobile, alternating between pediments and flat entablatures. The entrance front of Sharpham House follows a similar arrangement but incorporates a Doric porch, echoing that at Boom Hall, on the ground floor of the canted bay.

In March 2020 Professor Rowan prepared A note on the architecture of Boomhall which elaborates on the possible connection between James Alexander and Robert Taylor: … In London the Alexanders moved among the financial elite of their day; Taylor worked for many city merchants and, as a barrister, William Figure 31: Sharpham House. Alexander would have been aware of his extensive commission to design the ‘Stone Buildings’ for the lawyers of Lincoln’s Inn. It is more than likely that James would have met Taylor in London and have discussed what he was looking for with a man who well understood his requirements.

Thomas Cooley A more recent suggestion of authorship is that of Thomas Cooley (c.1742-1784) one of the best known Irish architects of the later eighteenth century.69 Cooley won the competition for the Dublin Royal Exchange in 1768-69, chosen over designs by Priestley and by James Gandon. Cooley went on have a known connection to the Alexander family, being the executant architect of designs by James Wyatt at Caledon House for James Alexander, who comissioned Boom Hall.70 Before the later additions, Caledon (1779) was a two-storey villa over a basement with a prominent bay to the garden front, and may not have been dissimilar to Boom Hall. Further similarities can be found in considering a number of Cooley’s country houses. Most notably these adopted the arrangement of a sunken basement to the principal elevation which is revealed on the other three elevations by a drop in the land as is used at Boom Hall. This can be seen at Clarisford Palace, Co. ClareDRAFT (1774) built for Robert Fowler, Bishop of Killaloe and Rokeby Hall, Co. Louth (1785). A further hint is the existence of a plan in Cooley’s sketchbook amongst the Caledon papers of a plan very similar to the stables of Boom Hall. As this does not reflect the stable-block at Caledon it is possible it is a design for the Boom Hall demesne.

2.7 The Development of Boom Hall Demesne - Cartographical

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Evidence

Ordnance Survey First Edition (1830-32), Sheet 13 (1830) The house is shown with its south-east canted bay prominently projecting. A large turning circle is shown north-west of the house leading onto the drive which passes the stable block and terminates in a gate lodge on Culmore Road. A path leads from the north-east side of the house probably indicating a service entrance to the building, possibly to the basement as the ground slopes away east across the depth of the building. Radiating away from the house are two tree-lined walks framing expansive views over the River Foyle; one path runs north to the site of a seventeenth-century battery while the other runs to Figure 32: Taylor and Skinner map 271 (1777- the south corner of the demesne. Another path connects out of the demesne to 82). the south-west into the grounds of The Farm, whose owners were intermarried with the Alexanders of Boom Hall; at the time of the map’s production the owner was Sir Robert Alexander Ferguson whose mother, Elizabeth, was the daughter of Robert Alexander of Boom Hall. The stable block is shown as a simple quadrangle along with the walled garden and the footprint of the walled garden is clearly laid out. Notably, the map shows that there were quarries located across the Culmore Road which may have provided the building stone for Boom Hall.

Figure 33: Ordnance Survey First Edition map. Figure 34: Acerage boundaries.

It is evident that landscaping had been undertaken by this point to reflect the naturalistic parkland style of the late-eighteenth century. It is likely that this was remodelled around the same time of the house.71 In addition to parkland planting and planted walks, many of the field boundaries are lined with shelterbelts, including the property boundary to the Farm. In the fields to the north of the demesne are several short straight lines of trees which look incongruous in the parkland setting and may reflect the landscape of the first Boom Hall.

The First Edition map is also of great importance to understanding the development of Boom Hall demesne under the Alexanders as the acreage boundaries are still discernible through comparison with the reproduction of the original map of the City Acres by John Bryson. Plotting this over the first edition map shows clearlyDRAFT the layout of the plots bought by James and Robert Alexander during the 1760s and 1770s. This gives an impression of the build- up of acquisitions which created the demesne over these decades, as detailed in the following table.

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Date Plot PRONI Description OS 1st Purchaser Seller Notes Ref. Edn. 1759 12 D3608/8/14 24 acres of land marked 12 Trees and field Received by Nathaniel Appertaining to the on the map of aces situate boundaries run- Robert Alex- Alexander as house in the Diamond and lying on the south side of ning southeast ander part of wedding the road leading to Colmore from Culmore contract bounded on the east by road, turning George Gunn’s Acres on the due east where south by Lough Foyle and it meets the on the West by Frederick stream Gordon and Henry Dixon’s acris and about one mile and three quarters distant from Londonderry 1st May 10 D2433/A/1/46/1 North: Field Robert Alex- William Hogg 1765 boundary and ander trees to plot 10 East: Field boundary, trees and stream bounding plot 12 South: River Foyle West: roughly following tree- lined drive

25th Octo- 11 D2433/A/1/46/2 18 acres of land marked 11 in James Alex- Samuel Ball Appertaining to prop- ber 1774 the map of the acres bounded ander erty on plots 48 & 49 south by lough foyle and to just outside the city west about a mile and a half walls. from Culmore 12th April 4 D2433/A/1/46/4 2/3 parts of the 27 acres of James Alex- William Lecky 1775 land 4 on the maps. Bounded ander and Rebecca to south by river and north- Houston west by road leading to Muff. about 1.5 miles from Derry. 18th May 4 D2433/A/1/46/5 Third part of the 27 acres James Alex- Robert Leeson Inherited from father 1775 ander Matthew Leeson 6th June 4 D2433/A/1/46/6 ¼ part of the 27 acres James Alex- Anthony Griffith Griffith the widower of 1775 ander Sidney nee Leeson, who inherited land from father, Matthew Leeson 16th March 10 D2433/A/1/46/8 Bounded on the north by the James Alex- Robert Alex- Land previously bought 1776 road leading to Culmore, on ander ander from Hogg by Robert the east by Hugh Edward’s Alexander acres now owned by Robt and on the south by Henry Dixon and Matthew Leeson’s acres in the liberty of the city 16th March 12 D2433/A/1/46/9 24 acres of land marked 12 James Alex- Robert Alex- Land received from 1776 on the map belonging to tene- ander ander Nathaniel at Robert’s ments in the city. South side of wedding the road to culmore. Bounded south by lough foyle about 1 ¾ miles from Derry

Ordnance Survey Second Edition (1849-53), Sheet 13 (1848-52) The Second Edition gives a more detailed view of the demesne buildings and makes clear that the trees had grown up significantly around the house. While the canted bay is not depicted, three small outbuildings are shown around the north-east entrance to the house suggesting the development of several service structures here, possibly for laundry and wash house. Various ancillary structures have also accrued aroundDRAFT the stable block and along the walls of the garden, including a long structure extending from the quadrangle’s north-west corner and further ancillary structures to the west. The walled garden is delineated in some detail, with plots of planting in the lower portion and seemingly more open areas in the upper portion. The two are divided by a wall with a central structure, possibly glasshouses, lying between them. Outside the south wall are three structures, the one at the centre likely a gate or gate house, as a path leads from

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it to the mansion. East of the walled garden, King James’ Well is marked with paths around it connecting to the wider landscape. An important development is the introduction of a new formal gate screen and lodge to the west of the demesne. The gate lodge is now demolished but the screen and piers survive between Gleneagles and Mount Pleasant on Culmore Road (HB01/25/004 C).72 The piers and screen are shown on the map and although the carriageway is less defined than the earlier drive, it was presumably created so that the family and guests could avoid approaching the house past the growing service area and for a better appreciation of the naturalistic landscape. Additional wooded walks are also shown through the trees on the demesne’s southern boundary.

The development of the landscape since the first edition has by this time almost completely obscured the legibility of the historical field boundaries indicating its transformation from plotted farmland into parkland. Another change is the loss of the stream running through the demesne, which has been partially covered over, and still appears running from the walled garden to its discharge in the Foyle. Two bridges seem to have been made to cross the stream, one near the garden with a path leading up to the Brook Hall boundary, and the other near the shore, though the latter may have been created by the Jacobite forces to give access to their headquarters at Brook Hall.

Demesne Survey by R.H. Nolan (1856) Although only dated a few years after the Ordnance Survey Second Edition, the demesne map shows several differences in the arrangement of the buildings and landscape. In particular it makes clear the density of planting across the demesne and marks the areas of meadows and arable land. Especially clear is the layout of the gardens and meadows between the house and the river with tree-lined walks flanking the expansive view across the Foyle and a semi- circle of lawns in front of the house. There is also further detail of the farmyard, showing an adjoining stack yard with a piggery and a horse pond.

Figure 35: Ordnance Survey Second Edition map. DRAFT

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Ordnance Survey Fifth Edition (1919-63), Sheet 14 (1924 & 1948) The next available map edition is the fifth edition, which makes clear the encroaching residential development around the Farm and Boom Hall. The porch of Boom Hall is now visible, along with the ancillary structures to the northeast but the buildings around the walled garden and stables appear reduced. The walled garden itself is no longer shown as planted and the upper section has been given over to pasture. Much of the landscape planting appears less well defined although the two drives are more clearly tree-lined. In the intervening years a series of lighthouses and beacons had been built around the bend of the river including “Boomhall Lighthouse” lying on the shore directly east of the house which is shown in historical photographs.

A caption beside the north gate lodge reads “Automatic Telephone Exchange”. This may be a development of the agreement made by Daniel Baird Maturin- Baird in 1903 with the National Telephone Co. Ltd. to install a pole, switchboard and call office in a house he owned which was occupied by Mrs Catherine Orr.73 The record incorrectly names the address as Ballynashallog, Co. Tyrone.

W.F.W. Marks Lease Map of Boom Hall Demesne (1932) This simple survey map was produced alongside the lease of part of the demesne to Michael Henry McDevitt in 1932. It is discussed in the historical narrative section (see 2.5 above).

W.F.W. Marks Sale Map of Boom Hall Demesne (1949) Marks’ second map is slightly more detailed, being drawn for the sale of land to McDevitt after the War, and may have been copied from the OS 5th Edn. It provides the last map evidence of the demesne while still in use confirming all of the features still existing in 1949, including both gate lodges, the service buildings and yards, and King James’ Well. It is also useful in naming the main fields around the demesne: Shore Brae Field (SW); Mount Pleasant Field (W); Lime Kiln Field (N), and Orchard Field on the site of the former north section of the Walled Garden.

Figure 36: Ordnance Survey Fifth DRAFTEdition map.

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2.8 Condition

Alastair Coey Architects conducted a condition survey of Boom Hall and the Stable Block in October and November 2018 (Appendix Three).

The survey highlighted a number of significant defects in the external and internal fabric of the buildings and the need to ensure their structural integrity and safety of the public. Urgent work to prevent further deterioration of the buildings is needed as both buildings have been derelict and open to the elements for some time. The roof structure and first floor structure to Boom Hall house are missing as are the doors, staircase and associated trimmings. There is a major vertical shear crack in the external wall at the east end of the south elevation extending from the eaves cornice, continuing vertically through windows to ground level. Heavily rooted invasive vegetation is a major factor in the destabilisation of the projecting stone eaves cornice and wallhead.

Parts of the roof structure and first floor structure to the Stable Yard building survives, albeit in a partially collapsed state and is in very poor and precarious condition. The doors, staircase and trimmings are missing. There are a number of locations of collapsed walling as a result of water saturation through unprotected wallheads and invasive rooted vegetation. The projecting stone eaves cornice is extensively disturbed by well-established tree saplings.

Complete structural failure of walls has occurred to both buildings. An internal full height two storey brick wall is in imminent danger of collapse as a result of a heavily decayed timber lintel built into the structure at first floor level. There are other decayed timber lintels evident to other internal walls. The Stable Yard buildings are most at risk with a number of walls already collapsed and others in danger of imminent collapse.

If the failures identified are not remedied in the near future the risk of total loss of the structure will increase rapidly.

2.9 Gaps in Knowledge

In the production of this section of the Conservation Management Plan various gaps in our understanding of the site at Boom Hall have been iden¬tified. These unanswered issues are set out here to avoid specula¬tion.

• Precise location of military fortifications from the Jacobite camp • Location of the original Boom Hall house and its designed landscape • A definite attribution of the architect of Boom Hall • Details of the internal decoration and finishes of the main house • Dating of significant alterations such as the porch addition and possible addition of the rear aedicule • Clear progression of residency in the late-nineteenth century • Evidence of lost demesne structures • Layout of gardens • Evidence relating to Second World War occupation

Some of these questions may not be possible to answer but they could form the basis of future research projects, archaeological excavations, or public events at Boom Hall. DRAFT

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Part Three: The Significance of Boom Hall

The basis of protection for sites of cultural heritage significance is understanding their unique identity, expressed as a collection of values enshrined by a place – in other words, what is important, and what aspects of the site contribute to that importance.

Boom Hall embodies a broad range of cultural values relating to historic, economic, cultural, social and associational aspects of its past use, and its context. An overview of these helps define what makes the asset special and is therefore essential to making informed decisions about future interventions.

The following assessment of significance is laid out in accordance with BS Standard 7913 Conservation of Historic Buildings, which acknowledges that understanding historic assets is vital. The standard advocates that sustainable management of a site must begin with gaining an understanding of its cultural and natural heritage values, then setting out its significance, in order to guide appropriate conservation decision-making which seeks to sustain those values. Further, The ICOMOS Charter for the Conservation of Places of Cultural Significance (1988, also known as The Burra Charter), lays down the principles for assessing cultural significance, defined as “the aesthetic historic, scientific or social values for past, present and future generations.”

3.1 Assessment of Cultural Heritage Values

BS Standard 7913 identifies four categories of primary values, paraphrased as follows:

1. Evidential value: An element of an historic asset that provides evidence about past human activity, including standing structures that are easily visible, as well as those that may be hidden below ground or under water. This aspect of value is strongly related to physical remains, but may also include documentary sources, pictorial records and artefacts. 2. Historical value: These aspects of significance are often less tangible than physical evidence, including associations with notable people, or historical events or developments. They often connect past people, events and aspects of life with the present, and are likely to have changed with time of shifting perspectives. Historical values are less vulnerable to change than evidential values. 3. Aesthetic value: This is derived from the way in which people draw sensory and intellectual stimulation from an historic asset, including its appearance and how it lies within its setting. As such, this aspect of value is more subjective than the preceding classifications, being particularly sensitive to change over time and subject to fluctuations depending on many factors. 4. Communal value: This element of value derives from the meanings an historic asset holds for those who relate to it, or for whom it forms part of a collective experience, or memory. This may include emotional links, and aspects of the site that people can relate to their collective history and heritage. It is important to remember that not all aspects of communal value are positive and can often relate to uncomfortable experiences and events. Aspects of social valueDRAFT are included in this category.

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3.2 Statement of Significance

Evidential value:

The evidential significance of Boom Hall Demesne is exceptional, possessing evidence of change over four centuries of building and landscaping including nationally important seventeenth-century fortifications, the development of the big house demesne and its twentieth-century wartime occupation. A rare and valuable contrast is created by the historical existence of two primary landscapes, the military landscape of the seventeenth-century sieges and the demesne landscape of eighteenth and nineteenth-century mercantile prosperity.

The Main House, Stable Block and Walled Garden represent substantially unchanged designed eighteenth-century demesne structures. Lack of thorough documentary records enhances the value of the historic fabric itself which is threatened by the progressively poor condition of the structures. The main house retains the character and form reflective of eighteenth-century Palladian design rooted in regular fenestration and proportion. The few remaining decorative features are representative of the sober classical detailing of Palladianism which is enhanced by the later addition of the simple Neo-Classical porch. Evidence of its internal arrangement survives to a certain extent in the remaining partition walls, floors, and roof timbers. A small amount of material in the form of family memories and several historical photographs enhances the understanding of the physical fabric as well as traces of change, such as the removal of the earlier pedimented entrance doorcase and the addition of the smaller canted bay.

Understanding of the functioning of the demesne is enhanced by the survival of the stable block and walled garden which appear to be contemporary with the main house and are the remnants of a wider array of demesne buildings. The stable block reflects the grandeur of eighteenth-century demesne buildings, being largely in keeping stylistically with the main house and retaining evidence of both plan form and aesthetic details. Internal evidence of fittings and construction is presently at increasing risk as a result of the declining condition of the building. The walled garden, though simple and functional, is remarkable in its size and the impressive extent of the surviving walls, and the ground to its north may contain archaeological traces of further wall footings for the upper section of the garden. Historical maps complement this evidence with details of the garden plots, changes to the landscape and other demesne structures.

The landscape is a good example of the reuse of land around Derry for new estates in the peaceful eighteenth-century, especially in their development up the banks of the River Foyle and, although overgrown, its naturalistic layout is still discernible. The evidence of historic maps enhances this value, showing the development and original characteristics of the parkland.

Additionally, there is information about the earlier history of the site with archaeological potential reflected in the designation of eight individual scheduled monuments, most of which are poorly understood. The historical record shows that the site comprises a rich archaeological network of military encampments, most visibly represented by King James’ Well, many of which related to the Siege of Derry, an event of national significance. The site contains considerable scope to yield further important archaeological information relating to several aspects of its history, of whichDRAFT the discovery of the sites of batteries, the Charles Fort and the boom anchor would greatly further its cultural values.

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Historical value:

Boom Hall encapsulates a history which weaves closely alongside the narrative of the development of Derry. Its owners and residents were very involved with the political, mercantile and religious interests of the city and its hinterland from the late-seventeenth century, and many were involved with events and institutions on national and international levels. The pre-historic importance of the area around Boom Hall is reflected in the designation of the important nearby site at Thornhill and connects across the Foyle to those at Enagh, establishing strong early connections between the site, the river and the surrounding hinterland of Derry.

The demesne retains a particularly strong association with the military conflicts of the seventeenth-century, reflected directly in its name, taken from the floating boom built across the river during the Siege of Derry in 1689. This represents a rare and complex historical link which underscores and amplifies the connection between the later demesne and the site’s origin in conflict. The demesne is reflective of the unrest in Ireland during the seventeenth century and the events which helped shape the character of Irish society in the following centuries. Pre-eminent amongst these Boom Hall represents the Jacobite encampment of the Siege of Derry and the location of the famous breaking of the boom, which had ramifications in the story of succession in the British monarchy and is a highly important episode in the history of the city. These historical connections, enhanced by the historical record relating to the Siege, are of national significance, with strong associations with other nearby sites, especially Derry City Walls.

Additionally, Boom Hall is illustrative of the development of the west bank of the Foyle Estuary stretching from Derry to Culmore with an important collection of riverside country demesnes. Comprising The Farm, Boom Hall, Brook Hall, Thornhill and Ballynagard, they create a striking historical impression of the spread of affluence after conflict and represent some of the first confidently classical villas to be built in the hinterland of Derry. This connection reflects the broader context of relative peace in Ireland, particularly for the north-west, in the eighteenth century and is enhanced by the familial connections between the Alexanders of Boom Hall and their neighbours, especially the Fergusons of The Farm. Boom Hall is a good example of a simple Palladian country villa, unusual in the North-west of Ireland, and retains strong associations with Caledon House, County Tyrone, through its builder James Alexander, later the first Earl of Caledon.

Boom Hall also retains important associations with mercantile trade and shipping in Derry across a period of over 150 years. The Alexanders were among the most prominent local merchants of their day and represent the aspirational confidence of the post-Siege Protestant community in Derry and its investment in houses and land around the city, and in neighbouring Inishowen and Donegal. This narrative runs on into the later nineteenth-century residents, together representing the development of the shipping industry in the city, with connections to its involvement in a widening trading world and subsequently with Irish emigration. The social prominence of these owners also resulted in an abiding connection with the city of Derry, through property investment, parliamentary positions, religious and civic offices, and close familial connections other neighbouring big houses, for example, the family connection between Hill Estate at Brookhall and the Rea family of St Columbs Park House (formerly Chatham).DRAFT The landscape itself is representative of the naturalistic landscape tradition which spread to Ireland from England from the mid-eighteenth century and was characterised by groups of parkland planting and tree-lined walks and drives with gate lodges at the extremities. The demesne, enhanced by historic maps, also reflects the servicing arrangements of a county house, with the

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quadrangular stable block lying in close proximity to the house and its attached walled garden extending further to the north. Boom Hall reflects the cycle of growth, prosperity, change and decline common to country houses, with its absentee landlords and decline in the twentieth century being representative of the wider context of in Ireland.

Aesthetic value:

Boom Hall is an important example of a compact Palladian villa in the north-west of Ulster with a strong sense of proportional design in elevations and plan form. Its Palladianism offers a valuable contrast with the local context of surrounding demesne houses at Brook Hall and Thornhill and, in a wider context, sits in a historical progression between early-eighteenth century vernacular classical houses and later regency and Adamesque examples.

The upstanding remains of the house still present a harmonious architectural character with firmly regular fenestration, quoining and a prominent projecting rear bay, although its proportions have been spoiled by the loss of the roof. Its aesthetic is largely original, rooted in the Classical tradition and complemented by the addition of the Doric porch which is probably a nineteenth-century change indicating the Neo-Classical taste of its later occupants. Despite its current condition, it is understood that Boom Hall was always of a pared-back appearance with minimal decoration and extravagance which enhances the value of the few surviving decorative elements such as the front porch, rear window aedicule and a decorative internal frieze.

Aesthetically, there is a strong connection between the house and the stable block which reflects the design of the house in its rubble walling and ashlar quoins. The stable block presents a pleasing combination of agricultural aesthetic enhanced by classical additions of roundels and keystones and is representative of the designed character of demesne service buildings in the eighteenth century. This design value may be greatly increased if a plan of a quadrangle in the Caledon Papers can be confirmed to show the stable block at Boom Hall.

These views are heightened by the historic landscape for which they were designed and the remains of avenues of trees which focus attention on the house at its centre. Historical map regression enhances understanding of this landscape development and its aesthetic characteristics of drives, avenues and demesne parkland and rejuvenating this would greatly benefit significance.

The compact design of Boom Hall is emphasised by its prominent location on the Banks of the Foyle commanding expansive views and enjoying a close relationship with the river itself. From the opposite bank striking views from the railway line, looking towards the demesne, are captured in a series of photographs in the Lawrence Collection. The impact of the demesne woodland and the house itself, even in its ruinous condition, can also gained by views from the Foyle Bridge and from the rising land inland of Boom Hall.

Communal value:

Boom Hall is a site of strong communal significance, with important connections to present-day communitiesDRAFT in Derry and its hinterland. As a family home, the house was a place of family life, activity, death and service. In communal understanding, Boom Hall is representative of the success and prosperity of the rising mercantile class in Derry in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, enhanced by a continuum of association with various ship-owning families and merchants. Further connections to the clergy and mayoralty of Derry demonstrate the abiding connection to society in Derry. The high status of those

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living there points to the social activities which took place on the demesne, best represented by the photograph of the Irish Society’s visit to the house in 1901 and the recorded visits of dignitaries.

Additionally, the prominence of the stable-block reflects the role of the demesne as a place of employment, where people lived their lives in work for the big house. This mutual reliance with local people created important local connections which survive into living memory through people who were brought up on the demesne. This also pertains to the residents of houses built on the former demesne, especially south of Madam’s Bank Road, where aspects of the historic landscape, primarily the entrance gate, are still traceable. Likewise, through views across the river and the connection of the boom itself, these values extend to residents across the Foyle and further up and down the river.

Communal value is significantly enhanced through the site’s connection to the Siege of Derry which roots it in the city’s communal memory as a place which helped form characteristics of its historical identity. It reflects a site of important military activity which had repercussions throughout Irish society and firmly connects Boom Hall to communities and sites in the city which commemorate the siege. There is great potential to build on this value through active partnership for public engagement, events and activities between Boom Hall and sites such as the Siege Museum and the City Walls to encourage a greater awareness of the site.

The visual character of Boom Hall also adds communal value. It represents an unusually visible demesne site and sweeping views of the house and its trees are enjoyed by the occupants of thousands of vehicles every year from the elevation of the Foyle Bridge. More historically, it is also prominent to travellers on the Derry to Coleraine railway line which provides direct views to the house across the Foyle. In this connection, public feedback has indicated that Boom Hall has a therapeutic character for local people, offering quiet and calm beside the city which can be freely enjoyed through its accessibility.

3.3 Threat and Opportunities

Threats

• Vacancy – There is no doubt that redundancy and vacancy are the main threats to the survival of historic buildings. The possibility of consolidating and maintaining the upstanding structural remains will be an insurmountable challenge at Boom Hall if a viable and sustainable use for at least some of the structures is not found. • Condition – The semi-consolidated situation with the main house and progressive collapse of the stable block and garden walls are matters of great concern which, if not promptly addressed, will within a few years result in total loss of these assets. • Inappropriate redevelopment – Inappropriate development within the demesne will inevitably erode the surviving heritage values. • Communication between interest parties – Various parties have expressed interest in becoming involved with the future development of Boom Hall. If common ground is not established between such groups there is a real danger that forward movement in developing viable new uses will stagnate. • Vandalism – AlthoughDRAFT the main house and stables block are both afforded some protection from vandalism by the boundary security fences, the buildings remain vulnerable to unauthorised access and malicious damage.

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Opportunities

• Refurbishment of buildings – Consolidation, stabilisation and repair of the historic structures on site will secure their heritage values for the future and create the possibility of a new lease of life. • Reuse of the site – The most appropriate new use(s) for the site will ensure that its assets are safeguarded sustainably and present opportunities to acknowledge and enhance its heritage and natural values. • Building partnerships – Consultation has reflected the extent of local interest in Boom Hall and the diversity of groups concerned about its future. Capitalising on partnership in and around Derry could be mutually beneficial, helping to promote Boom Hall as a place of local identity and relevance with rich associations with the city’s heritage and helping spread heritage interest beyond the City Walls. • Location – Boom Hall benefits from its close proximity to Derry and local residential communities. Its relative accessibility also creates possibilities for the development of tourism and other visitor opportunities. • Learning – Boom Hall’s rich history, reflecting key themes in the development of Derry and its hinterland, represents a valuable resource which could be capitalised on for learning and engagement. Additionally, the complexity of the site at Boom Hall has left several gaps in our historical understanding unresolved, which present opportunities for archaeological and historical research projects. It is important that Boom Hall develops both an engaging education programme, and the facilities to ensure its delivery. • Volunteering – There is capacity to build volunteering opportunities through a programme of values-based development, enhancing involvement, engagement, and appreciation, and developing skills. Young people in particular should be given the opportunity to participate. • Traditional building skills – The potential exists to promote and provide traditional building skills training opportunities as part of the repair and restoration of the historic structures. This could be further developed into a traditional skills training school developed in conjunction with the Department for Communities Traditional Skills Working Group. • Interpretation – In tandem with future development of the site, there is great opportunity to improve interpretation of cultural significances. The complex history of the site encompasses nearly 400 years, and aspects such as the connections to the Siege of Derry and the city’s shipping heritage have potential to present a more vibrant story of the buildings and its occupants. There would be opportunities for various forms of interpretation including both physical (information boards, room guides etc.) and digital (apps, augmented reality etc.). • Local Development Plan 2032 (LDP) – The emerging LDP presents an opportunity to recognise Derry City and Strabane Districts Council’s commitment to the future of the Boom Hall site. DRAFT

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Part Four: Conservation Policies & Recommendations

4.1 Objectives

The purpose of the policies and recommendation laid out below is to inform the conservation of Boom Hall in a way that sustains its significance, to ensure its physical survival for the benefit of future generations while enhancing presentation and understanding. The conservation management plan should be a key initial reference point in informing any policies and plans that might be put forward in respect of the conservation, management or development of this important site. It is recommended that Council should have due regard to the policies contained therein and that any third parties with an interest in the site are also acquainted with them.

4.2 Current Context

The conservation management plan has been prepared for Derry City and Strabane District Council in advance of proposed major structural and conservations works to preserve and enhance Boom Hall Demesne. The Council has previously undertaken assessment work on the property comprising: • Derry City Council’s Development Department, ‘Boom Hall Stable Block: Report on the Heritage Approach to its Repair and Restoration’ 2012 • Taylor & Boyd ‘Boom Hall House’ Limited Structural Report Dec 2013 • ASM Feasibility Study Boom Hall Estate (2014) • Boom Hall Bat Survey 2014

Further work has been commissioned by other local interest groups: • Lidar Survey carried out of the Boom Hall Estate commissioned by the Boom Hall Partnership • City of Oak Vision (commissioned by the Foyle River Gardens Trust)

In the context of these studies the Conservation Management Plan was commissioned to inform: • Understanding of the site’s history and significance; • Long term management strategy; • Strategies for repair, conservation or restoration; • Ongoing maintenance of the property.

The policies and recommendations set out below have been drafted to take account of these requirements, especially in the context of potentially significant developments in the not-too-distant future. New sources of funding and proposals for the future use of the site and its surroundings have the potential to enhance and consolidate the significances outlined in Part Three but there is a clear need to strike a balance between effective discharge of operational requirements and ensuring that cultural heritage values are appropriately revealed, enhanced and celebrated.

The policies are set out in italics in highlighted boxes. They are preceded by the information on which the policies are based and, where thought appropriate, followed by recommendations for action arising from the policies. The policies should therefore be read in conjunction with the accompanying text.

4.3 Definitions of Key Terms

The following definitions are used for key terms within this document. A number of these have been taken from the Australia ICOMOS Charter for the Conservation of Places of Cultural Significance such terms are underlined:

Cultural significance “Cultural significance” means aesthetic, historic, scientific, social or spiritual value for past, present or future generations. Cultural significance is embodiedDRAFT in the place itself, its fabric, setting, use, associations, meanings, records, related places and related objects. Places may have a range of values for different individuals or groups

Fabric “Fabric” means all physical material of the place.

Conservation

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“Conservation” is defined in the Principles (2011) as the ‘careful management of change’. It means all the processes of looking after a place so as to retain its cultural significance. It includes maintenance and may, according to its circumstance, include preservation, restoration, reconstruction and adaptation and will be commonly a combination of more than one of these.

Maintenance “Maintenance” means the continuous protective care of the fabric, contents and setting of a place, and is to be distinguished from repair. Repair involves restoration or reconstruction and it should be treated accordingly.

Preventative maintenance “Preventative maintenance” means planned maintenance which is carried out on regular cyclical basis that, if carried out properly, will reduce the likelihood of decay, prevent the loss of original fabric and be cost-effective.

Restoration “Restoration” means returning the existing fabric of a site to a known earlier state by removing accretions or by reassembling existing components without the addition of new material.

Interpretation “Interpretation” means all the ways of presenting the cultural significance of a place.

Intervention “Intervention” means any action which has a physical effect on the fabric of a building.

Conjectural restoration “Conjectural restoration” means restoration or reconstruction of the existing fabric of a site to a supposed earlier state where there is incomplete information or little definitive evidence available to justify such an intervention.

4.4 Existing Statutory Policy, Guidance and Legal Framework

The policies and recommendations set out below are bounded by an existing statutory and legal framework at national, regional and local level. All proposals must be carried out in line with the requirements laid out in the relevant legislation. The key relevant statutory documents are:

• Historic Monuments and Archaeological Objects (Northern Ireland) Order 1995 • The Planning Act (Northern Ireland) 2011 • The Wildlife & Natural Environment (NI) Act 2011

The following are the key strategic and planning policy documents relevant to the site:

• Regional Development Strategy for Northern Ireland 2035 • Department of Environment Strategic Planning Policy Statement for Northern Ireland • Derry Area Plan 2011 • Strategic Riverside Masterplan for River Foyle (2011) • Derry & Strabane Local Development Plan 2032

Relevant internal policy for DCSDC also includes:

• Strategic Growth Plan • Local Growth Plans • Local Development Plan • Green infrastructure Plan • Tourism Strategy • Arts and Culture Strategy • The Climate AdaptionDRAFT Plan (in development) Although non-statutory, there are several key international charters which guide best practice in terms of protection of cultural heritage including:

• Valetta Convention 1992, Charter for the Protection of Archaeological Heritage of Europe • Venice Charter, 1964, Charter for the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites

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• Granada Charter, 1985, Charter for the Protection of Architectural Heritage of Europe • Burra Charter, 1988, Australia ICOMOS Charter for the Conservation of Places of Cultural Significance • The European Landscape Convention, 2000

Conservation Management Planning is widely accepted as being the most effective way of managing historic assets. Effective management of a heritage asset relies upon a thorough understanding of what makes the asset important. The process of Conservation Management Planning sets out the significances and vulnerabilities associated with the asset, which informs a series of policies designed to mitigate perceived risks, guide future interventions and enhance understanding to ensure that the identified values of the site are protected going forward.

The policies also take account of the established principles first laid out by English Heritage in 2008, now adopted as BS Standard 7193 Conservation of Historic Buildings. They are:

• Principle 1: The historic environment is a shared resource • Principle 2: Everyone should be able to participate in the historic environment • Principle 3: Understanding the significance of places is vital • Principle 4: Significant places should be managed to sustain their values • Principle 5: Decisions about change must be reasonable, transparent and consistent • Principle 6: Documenting and learning from decisions is essential

The policies are bounded by an existing statutory and legal framework at national, regional and local level. All proposals must be carried out in line with the requirements laid out in the relevant legislation. The key relevant statutory documents are: • Historic Monuments and Archaeological Objects (Northern Ireland) Order 1995 • The Planning Act (Northern Ireland) 2011 • The Wildlife (Northern Ireland) Order 1985 • The Wildlife and Natural Environment Act (Northern Ireland) 2011 • Conservation (Natural Habitats) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1995 • Environment (Northern Ireland) Order 2002

The Strategic Planning Policy Statement for Northern Ireland (SPPS) contains guidance on planning policy implementation: It supersedes the former Planning Policy Statements (PPS):

• PPS1: General Principles • PPS2: Nature Conservation • PPS6: Planning, Archaeology and the Built Heritage • PPS16 (Currently in draft form): Tourism

4.5 Policies relating to protection of Significance

4.5.1 Relationship between assessed level of Significance and Policy The current statutory designations for heritage assets relate to the stable-block, archaeological features, and the demesne landscape setting. This Conservation Plan lays out the significance of the site, in terms of its evidential, historic, aesthetic, and communal significance. Impacts on significance should be carefully and comprehensively assessed before commencing any future alterations. The intention should always be to retain and, where appropriate, reinforce significance, whether it be tangible evidential and aesthetic qualities or intangible qualities such as communal value or the ability to reveal past history.

Significance changes with time as alterations are made, original fabric is lost, and new information is revealed. This is relevant at Boom Hall where further archaeological investigation and documentary research are likely to reveal new information.

Policy 01 The Statement of Significance will be accepted as the basis for all future planning and work related to the site. DRAFT Policy 02 Where some reduction of significance is necessary to achieve overall conservation objectives, alternatives should be tested using an impact assessment methodology to reveal the least damaging approach and outline strategies to mitigate adverse impacts

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Policy 03 The Council shall seek to ensure that the Conservation Management Plan is referenced in future development plans, strategies and management policies relating to the site.

4.5.2 Management This Conservation Management Plan, and the accompanying condition report, were commissioned to help guide the Council’s long term management of the site and its assets. It is clear that Boom Hall has in the past been a challenging asset to manage and for which to devise a future strategy given the derelict state of the surviving built structures since the late 1960s. Disputation over ownership and established uses has also hindered effective management of the site since Council acquired it in the 1990s. These issues are now being resolved and the Council accepts its responsibility for the day-to-day management and maintenance of the site and its historic assets to safeguard them for the future.

At the time of writing, a programme of repair and intervention is urgently required, given the ruinous condition of the main house and the increasingly parlous state of the stable-block and walled garden. The Council may wish to consider partnership approaches which will go some way towards addressing the issues highlighted in this Plan. To ensure an integrated approach, and to develop the opportunities for use, it is recommended that this take the form of a Heritage Steering Group for Boom Hall.

Recommendation 01 The Council should devise and implement a management strategy for Boom Hall which can be reviewed and updated appropriately over the course of future projects on the site.

Recommendation 02 A Council-led working group made up of relevant cross-Departmental representatives, should be established to oversee the initial implementation of a programme of repair, enhancement and engagement. This group may wish to give consideration to liaison with relevant statutory and community stakeholders as part of its programme of activities.

4.5.3 Continuity of Conservation Advice The significance of the site can only be maintained over time if interventions are guided and monitored by suitably qualified and experienced conservation professionals. They should work to a consistently applied conservation strategy based on best practice.

Policy 04 Appropriately qualified, experienced and accredited conservation advisors should be engaged regarding the execution of all proposals dealing with the consolidation, repair, maintenance of, and in consideration of interventions to designated and historically significant assets within the demesne.

Policy 05 All personnel with responsibility for undertaking works to heritage structures should be appropriately trained and experienced.

4.5.4 Significance of Buildings Various structures on the Boom Hall demesne have been demolished or destroyed during the twentieth century, including ancillary structures around the main house, while significant aspects of the surviving buildings are in danger of being lost through dereliction. Two gate lodges have also been lost, one as a result of the development of Madam Bank Road and the Foyle Bridge. A co-ordinated and consistent approach to repair, intervention and enhancement of the surviving structures in the demesne is essential to ensuring that decline is halted and significance is retained for future generations.

Given the cultural significance of the main house, it is treated here as if it were a listed building along with the stable- block, which is. It is recommended that to ensure the future safeguarding of the house’s significance through statutory process, the Council considers seeking to have it listed in recognition of its importance.

Policy 06 No demolition of historic structures, listed or unlisted, should be permitted without robust justification in the form of a Heritage Impact Statement, demonstrating thorough understanding of the element to be removed and consideration by The Council

Policy 07 All work to existing buildings will be carried out to high standards of physical repair, aesthetic quality and fitness for purpose. AllDRAFT works will be carried out in line with the appropriate statutory and legal requirements, so that they are executed in a manner that retains significance and avoids destruction of evidence.

Recommendation 03 The Council should seek statutory listing of Boom Hall house to help safeguard its significance.

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4.5.5 Significance of the Historic Landscape The grounds of Boom Hall are significant for their layering of various phases of human activity on the site, including pre-history settlement , remodelling and natural growth, military activity in the seventeenth and twentieth centuries and residential occupation including replacement of an earlier house with the Palladian house and accompanying stable block, walled garden, gate lodges, driveways and landscaping. Map regression additionally reveals the change of various path networks and avenues around the house and demesne. A large section of the landscape, comprising the lands to the south-west, the nineteenth-century gate lodge and drive have been overlaid by the developments around Madam’s Bank Road, while woodland and some parkland survives intact around the house and outbuildings.

Boom Hall occupies a site of both historical and aesthetic prominence. The demesne, with the house at its centre, commands excellent views across the River Foyle and there is potential for changes in planting to re-open these historical vistas. While the changes resulting from the construction of the Foyle Bridge are irreversible, other areas like the build-up of trees between the house and river, could be addressed to improve views. The process of landscape enhancement would be aided by seeking the designation of the demesne as a fully registered historic demesne on the Register of Historic Parks, Gardens and Demesnes in Northern Ireland (the current designation is supplementary).

In addition, the trees are of particular significance, and attest to the longevity and quality of the site, and many individual veteran specimens appear to be of intrinsic interest as living assets. An expert assessment of the existing landscape has been prepared (Appendix Two).

Policy 08 Boom Hall demesne will be managed to conserve and enhance the character of its historic designed landscape. Key views and vistas within and from the demesne will be protected.

Policy 09 All interventions to the historical designed landscape should respect the historic integrity and character

Recommendation 04 The possibility of having Boom Hall upgraded to full designation on the Register of Historic Parks, Gardens and Demesnes should be investigated.

4.6 Policies and Recommendations relating to Conservation of the Physical Fabric

4.6.1 Urgent Works The Main House, Stable Block and Walled Garden are all in various states of advanced decay and require urgent interventions in the short term to prevent major loss of historic fabric. The remains of the Main House, although having been in ruinous condition since a fire in the early 1970s, are relatively stable but, nevertheless, free-standing walls require structural support and woody vegetation should be removed and wall heads consolidated. The Stable Block was listed in 1997 and, since then, it appears that its condition has rapidly deteriorated. The boundary walls to the Walled Garden are heavily overgrown and large stretches have collapsed. All the areas requiring urgent intervention are detailed in the Condition Report. These issues present a potential risk to public safety and, if not addressed, will inevitably result in the irreversible loss of important physical fabric and associated historical evidence.

Policy 10 Temporary support, specifically designed by a structural engineer, should be put in place where the buildings are deemed to be at risk of further loss of fabric. Some localised dismantling and rebuilding may be acceptable only where there is extreme risk of collapse of a part of the structure leading to further loss of evidential significance. This should be undertaken under carefully controlled circumstances under guidance of an appropriately qualified specialist.

Recommendation 05 Each of the structures (Main House Stable-block) must be cordoned off at the earliest opportunity, and clear warning signs should be put up. Barriers should be subject to regular inspection to ensure they have not been damaged.

4.6.2 Maintenance, Repair and Remedial Works The historic fabric of the Main House, Stable Block and Walled Garden contribute greatly to their significance and will require careful conservationDRAFT to safeguard as much of the original fabric as possible, especially given that the assets have suffered greatly from fire-damage, exposure to the elements and vandalism over the past fifty years. A specialist approach to repair and maintenance is required for designated assets, owing to the statutory processes, and their defined special historic or architectural interest. These elements require a detailed understanding before being worked on. This should not solely apply to the listed stable block but also to the main house and walled garden as well as to other identifiable and vulnerable elements of the registered historic landscape.

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The asset is currently at acute risk of further loss and damage, due to its condition, and ongoing damage from antisocial behaviour. Prompt and appropriate remedial works and repair will safeguard the fabric of the asset for the foreseeable future, and will be maintained by a regular and systematic programme of maintenance, avoiding costly major repairs in the future.

Policy 11 Appropriate conservation guidance should be included in all contracts and tenders relating to designated assets. Only appropriately experienced personnel should be engaged in the specification, repair and maintenance of these assets.

Policy 12 The basis of all repair should be an understanding of the element to be repaired, its condition and its contribution to the greater significance of the whole. All personnel should be required to demonstrate a sound understanding of the potential risks of any proposed repair techniques, through detailed written methodology summarising the work to be carried out, with details of the methods and materials to be used.

Policy 13 Materials selected for repair of the historic assets should be of appropriate conservation standards, chosen on the basis of avoiding possible damage to the site, or negatively impacting its appearance or special interest.

Policy 14 The value of preventative maintenance should be promoted in all work to the structures through consistent implementation of the Conservation Management Plan.

Policy 15 Vegetation which is causing, or has the potential to cause, damage to historic masonry on the site, should be carefully and appropriately controlled and managed.

Policy 16 Loss of historic fabric should be avoided. Where loss is unavoidable, a record of fabric should be taken and retained in a Council archive.

Policy 17 Restoration will be acceptable where based strictly on the availability of archaeological or photographic evidence or inspired by strong historical precedent. The retention of authenticity will be a primary objective of any restoration works undertaken at the site.

4.6.3 Reuse of the Site It is acknowledged that finding a sustainable new use for historic buildings and structures is the best way to ensure the long term benefits of their conservation. While the implementation of urgent remedial works will prevent further immediate degradation of historic fabric, it is important that a sustainable end uses are established for the assets so that these can be implemented after the immediate stabilisation works have been carried out. A full site appraisal should be undertaken to examine the appropriateness, feasibility and sustainability of any proposals presented for the site by Council or by any third-party interest groups.

In this connection, there is scope for new development on the site and this will in all likelihood form an important consideration to complement future plans. Large portions of the wider Boom Hall demesne have previously been developed without reference to the significance of the site. Careful consideration will therefore need to any proposals for new development to ensure that these will not further degrade the remaining parkland or adversely affect the identified heritage features and natural sensitivities of the site. Such development is likely to require the provision of facilities such as car-parking to improve visitor accessibility. Any new development will be a material consideration in the process of options appraisal and must be justified through an impact assessment methodology.

Recommendation 06 A feasibility study should be commissioned to examine the appropriateness, feasibility and sustainability of any development being proposed for the Boom Hall demesne.

Policy 18 New development to facilitate reuse of the site will be welcomed but will require justification in the form of a Heritage Impact Assessment and consideration by the Council. It should be well designed and respect the identified significancesDRAFT of the site. 4.7 Policies relating to Understanding, Recording and Research

Although the physical evidence provided by the upstanding structures on Boom Hall demesne is critical to developing understanding, this can be supplemented by other evidence, in the form of documentary research, and potential below- ground remains, relating to the different periods of the demesne’s history in the last 350 years.

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4.7.1 Documentation and Recording Lack of records can be a major challenge to understanding past interventions, not only historically, but also in respect of more recent repair strategies, which might help inform future phases of repair and consolidation. British Standard BS7913 highlights the importance of recording conservation works and retaining as-built information. Interventions, whether it be remedial works, or investigative work when deemed appropriate or required to enhance the understanding of the site and inform new work, should be recorded in full. Further, the Burra Charter advocates that records associated with the conservation of a place should be protected, placed in a permanent archive and, where appropriate, made publicly available. DCSDC Museum Service and the Council Archivist should facilitate archival processes and the city archive should be the repository for records relating to Boom Hall.

Policy 19 Thorough records should be made of all decision-making processes and physical interventions that affect the site, to include written and photographic records and be followed by any necessary investigation and analysis. These should be appropriately stored in a Council archive at a suitable civic museum facility

Policy 20 Personnel engaged to carry out work on the heritage assets should be supervised and trained to be aware of the potential for uncovering new evidence while undertaking site clearance or remedial works, and procedures should be developed to ensure that appropriate monitoring and recording of works is in place.

4.7.2 Archaeological Investigations There is great potential for archaeological discovery across the site at Boom Hall. Excavations undertaken in 2013 by Queen’s University researchers yielded limited information but highlighted the potential for a more thorough study. A follow up dig was carried out in September and October 2018 by the Centre for Archaeological Fieldwork at Queen’s University investigating the seventeenth-century military landscape as a community-led project to raise awareness of the Siege Museum in Derry and of Boom Hall.

A wider investigation of the site could throw light on the arrangement of the seventeenth-century Jacobite camp and boom, the location of the original Boom Hall and its garden features, aspects of the eighteenth and nineteenth-century demesne landscape and further details of the WRNS Nissen huts around the house. In the Tower Museum team, DCSDC has existing structures to provide a starting point to lead future archaeological research, and an existing initiative in their Young Archaeologists Club to encourage community and youth involvement.

The process of excavation is destructive and no archaeological interpretations are sustainable unless they can be backed up with the evidence of field records and post-excavation analysis.

Policy 21 All archaeological investigation at Boom Hall should be undertaken by suitably qualified professionals and be appropriately recorded for future reference.

4.7.3 Academic Research During the preparation of this Plan, various gaps in historical understanding have been identified (outlined in Section 2.8). These suggest interesting study projects which could enhance the historical significance of the house and its collections, offering an opportunity for public involvement.

An exhaustive study of historical documents falls outside the scope of this plan which has been limited to the known materials available in the PRONI. It is known that portions of original documentation remain in privately-held collections, some in the families of the former owners of Boom Hall. A more dedicated search may uncover further historical material in PRONI, the National Archives of Ireland, Irish Architectural Archive, or private collections. Likewise, uncatalogued cartographical material exists in the Council’s archive which may relate to Boom Hall. Knowledge of a site can always be enhanced and there is scope for this to incorporate a range of internal Council research, community volunteering projects and external academic researchers.

Policy 22 Potential research opportunities should be identified and pursued by the Council internally and in partnership with relevant research institutions, individuals or community engagement initiatives.

4.8 Policies relatingDRAFT to Land Use, Land Management and Ecology 4.8.1 Woodland Given the age and fragility of some of the specimens at Boom Hall, it is recommended that a long-term process of regeneration is undertaken to bolster the long-established parklands. The arboricultural report included in the Landscape Assessment (Appendix Two) will help inform decisions about management of the surviving woodland.

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Policy 23 Tree management should be carried out in accordance with the DCSDC Tree Management System, Tree Preservation Order and Environment Assessment for Council Managed Trees/Woodlands and Built Structures.

Policy 24 Tree management and maintenance planning should reflect the importance of veteran trees and maintain agreed views and vistas for enhancement.

Policy 25 Only skilled operatives should be employed for tree work; they should demonstrate proven expertise in the areas of work specified, should hold all relevant certificates of competence and comply with BS3998 standards.

Policy 26 New planting should be carefully planned in terms of scale, form, location and species, and should be in accordance with British Standard 8545. This should improve the green infrastructure of the site, improving connectivity with the adjacent Bay Road Park Local Nature Reserve.

4.8.2 Ecology and Biodiversity The greenspace surrounding Boom Hall provides a habitat for protected species, including bats and red squirrels. The Council-commissioned September 2019 bat survey report highlighted that the surrounding habitat was considered to be of high quality for bats. It was classified as a site of local nature conservation importance, supporting a diverse range of species. The site hosts eight tree bat roosts, one close to the stable block and the other seven roosts close to Boom Hall.

An updated bat and bird survey will be required, if repair works commence after October 2020. This should be in line with the published guidance for Environment Assessment for Council managed Tree, Woodland and Built Structures.

Policy 27 The Council’s Environmental Assessment for Bats and Birds in Trees/Woodlands and Building Structures should be adhered to ensure best practice and protection of priority species. All works to be carried out on the site will be in line with the appropriate statutory and legal habitat protection requirements and will be executed under appropriate ecological mitigation, avoiding destruction of habitat. This should include up-to-date bat and bird surveys carried out prior to any repairs to the built structures or carrying out of tree surgery. Also, any works immediately adjacent to the River Foyle, will require approval and a Habitat Regulation Assessment.

Policy 28 Appropriate species sensitivities, relating to flora and fauna, must be taken into account when planning work and appropriate surveys undertaken where the presence of protected species are known prior to commencement of works, to include bat and bird surveys.

4.9 Policies and Recommendations relating to Engagement and Understanding

4.9.1 Community Engagement Boom Hall is a place of communal significance with historical roots in the surrounding community through its military and mercantile history. Future developments present a major opportunity to engage the local public in Derry, especially through connection to the Siege Museum. Re-engaging with the community would provide impetus for wider cultural development amongst the historic demesnes on the banks of the Foyle.

A potential public information forum is under discussion by Council which will ensure some public engagement throughout the duration of the project. In the manner of the Council led Public information sessions undertaken in February 2019, this would not be for decision-making but would offer a process for regularly updating interested members of the public with the progress of works at Boom Hall. To benefit future stages of the project, it is recommended that at a later stage of the project a stakeholder mapping exercise is undertaken and a more formal stakeholder group established.

Recommendation 07 To promote Boom Hall, links with community and cultural organisations and related sites in the area should be actively explored.

4.9.2 Promote Understanding Promoting understanding Boom Hall represents not DRAFTonly an important historical monument in itself, but one which contributes to the cultural identity of Derry. Due to the ruinous condition of the buildings and the overgrown nature of the demesne, the site is generally not well understood and improved understanding and interpretation will bolster local connection. Good interpretation will leave the visitor with increased understanding of the site, and a feeling of attachment, stimulation and inspiration.

Boom Hall is a complex site offering a variety of narratives for themed interpretation including its social history, architectural heritage, maritime connections and military past. Its location also offers potential to relate to heritage on both sides of

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the Foyle, on the Inishowen peninsula and in Derry itself. A holistic approach to interpretation will allow the full range of the site’s heritage and connections to be revealed, including maritime heritage, the importance of nearby pre-historic settlements and natural heritage. Boom Hall’s consistent connection to the River Foyle, which interweaves through its different historical periods is a property specific narrative which could be emphasised in interpretation.

At present, a number of interpretation boards explain some of the background to the ruinous structures on the site. There is great scope for interpretation to be developed alongside the future regeneration of the site. This should be creative and appropriate to the new use of the site, covering both the buildings and grounds to ensure that all significant aspects of the site are presented. Con¬sideration should be given to a range of media, both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’, which will make every effort to transcend physical, cultural and linguistic barriers (see section on Access, below).

Policy 29 Interpretation should be historically accurate and socially relevant, striving to place Boom Hall in the wider context of local, national and international history, especially with the surrounding heritage of Derry and the Foyle riverside demesnes. Interpretation and way-finding within the site should be sensitively located and be of an appropriate style and design which is in keeping with the character of the site.

4.9.3 Security Boom Hall has a history of suffering from anti-social behaviour. There is the potential that, once works begin that will raise the profile of the site, this risk will increase. Not only does this present a risk to the site, both during ongoing phasing of works and on completion; it also presents considerable risk to those accessing the site at night. However, with the extension of the greenway network, connecting the site to Culmore and Muff, there will be a significant increase in the number of visitors, which tends to reduce the risk of anti-social behaviour.

Recommendation 08 Careful monitoring of the site for signs of vandalism and anti-social behaviour should be undertaken as part of the regular cyclical maintenance inspections, and the situation regarding access kept under review.

4.10 Review of Policies and Recommendations

The policies and recommendations contained in this Conservation Management Plan will need regular review and adjustment in response to developing needs and changing circumstances.

Policy 30 This Plan, and the policies in it, should be reviewed as the need arises, but not later than three years after their initial acceptance by the Council. Procedures for review mechanisms should be established by the bodies responsible for the implementation of the Plan. Derry City and Strabane District Council will reconvene a meeting for this purpose. DRAFT

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Part Five: Bibliography and References

5.1 Bibliography

Alexander, E., Primate Alexander, Archbishop of Armagh: A Memoir (London: Edward Arnold), 1914.

Alexander, R., The Alexander Family of Boom Hall (Londonderry: Londonderry Sentinel), 1946.

Clark, Kate ‘Informed Conservation: Understanding historic buildings and their landscapes for Conservation’ English Heritage, 2001

Colby, T., Ordnance Survey of the County of Londonderry Vol I (Dublin: Hodges and Smith), 1837.

Curl, J.S., The Londonderry Plantation 1609-1914 (Chichester: Phillimore) 1986 Dean Gatelodges of Ulster.

Fergusson, W.S., List of historic buildings, groups of buildings, areas of architectural importance in and near the city of Derry (Belfast: UAHS), 1970.

Gavin, R., Atlantic Gateway: The Port and City of Londonderry since 1700 (Dublin: Four Courts Press), 2009.

Macaulay, T.B., The History of England from the Accession of James II, Vol. III (1855).

MacDonald, P. & McAlister, G., “Archaeological Investigations of the Seventeenth-Century Military Landscape at Boom Hall, County Londonderry” Ulster Journal of Archaeology Third Series LXXI (2012), pp. 150-165.

Malley, A., The History of Boomhall, Londonderry (Foyle Civic Trust Review, Issue 4) Spring 1993.

Milligan, C.D., The Walls of Derry: Their Building, Defending and Preserving (Lurgan: Ulster Society) 1996.

Mitchell, B., On the Banks of the Foyle (Belfast: Friar’s Bush Press), 1989.

Mullin, T., Ulster’s Historic City: Derry Londonderry (Coleraine: Coleraine Bookshop), 1986.

Rowan, A., North West Ulster (Harmondsworth: Penguin), 1989.

Semple Kerr, James ‘The Seventh Edition Conservation Management Plan: A guide to the preparation of Conservation Management Plans for places of European Cultural Significance’ Australia ICOMOS, 2013 http://australia.icomos. org/publications/the-conservation-plan/

Thomas, A., Irish Historic Town Atlas: No. 15 Derry-Londonderry (Dublin: Royal Irish Academy), 2005.

Young, A., A Tour in Ireland 1776-1779 (London: G. Bell and Sons) 1892. https://unknownswilly.wordpress.com/2013/06/16/holywell-hill-part-2/ https://collections.leventhalmap.org/search/commonwealth:cj82kz26fDRAFT

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5.2 Footnotes

1 James Semple Kerr (1996) The Conservation Management Plan: A Guide to the Preparation of Conservation Management Plans for Places of European Cultural Significance; 4th Ed.; The National Trust of Australia, Sydney 2 Thomas (2005), 1 3 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 150 4 An initial analysis of this military landscape was made by MacDonald and McAlister in 2012. 5 Milligan (1996), 19 6 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 152 7 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 163 8 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 153 9 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 154 10 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 152 11 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 152 12 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 152 13 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 152 14 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 155 15 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 164 16 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 157 17 Macauley (1855), 158 18 Rowan (1989), 40-41 19 MacDonald & McAlister (2012): the article observes that Gunsland is said to be in Donegal, not Derry, and questions whether this border territory may have been referred to interchangeably. 20 Alexander (1946) 21 PRONI D3608/8/14 22 D3608/8/14 23 Alexander (1946), 5 24 Malley (1993), 5 25 Young (1892), 167 26 Young (1892), 169-70 27 Gavin (2009), 9 28 PRONI D2433/a/1/46/1 29 D2433/a/1/46/2 30 D2433/a/1/46/8-9 31 Rowan (1989), 40 32 D2433/a/1/46/10 33 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 161 34 PRONI D652/527 35 PRONI D652/1291 36 PRONI D623/A/91/20 D623/A/108/34 37 Ibid. 38 PRONI 39 PRONI D3608/8/14 40 Alexander Eleanor 41 PRONI D669/177; D1514/2/5/17/12-13-15 42 https://www.nidirect.gov.uk/sites/default/files/publications/hill-of-brook-hall-d642.pdf 6 43 D1449/12/330s 44 Alexander (1914), 79 45 PRONI D3608/8/15 46 Alexander (1914), 46 47 Directory 39 48 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 163: Could be last work of the Alexander’s 49 Bart notes 50 Date range given in PRONIDRAFT catalogue for NS maps : D2584/1/1 51 Pers. Comm. Bart O’Donnell 52 Val12/b/32/8d 53 Val12/b/32/8a + b, 53 54 MIC112/1 55 Bradshaw (1867), 207 https://books.google.co.uk/books?redir_esc=y&id=2l7XAAAAMAAJ&q=cooke#v=snippet&q =cooke&f=false / 204 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=3e5NAQAAMAAJ&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=cooke

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56 http://streetdirectories.proni.gov.uk/media/WJI3OCLJqANRhFiWeHFp8g..a?ts=9WJXQBI7ZoCNhUC0OOkicQ..a 57 http://streetdirectories.proni.gov.uk/media/KC6yWn9xkKjGtqppvozKhw..a?ts=1FOHXjj_ 5FyREcV5f8fJ1sdul2oGTHZZrXVX8mqL0GI.a 58 1897 1288/ 1899 1414 59 Val12/b/32/8f, 94 60 SD 1899 1413 61 Val12/b/32/8g 62 Bart 63 D2584/2/20 64 Report summary 65 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 160 66 Dean 116 67 Rowan (1989), 43 68 Rowan (1989), 51 69 Bart O’Donnell/ Alastair Rowan 70 https://www.dia.ie/works/view/4292/building/CO.+TYRONE%2C+CALEDON+HOUSE 71 MacDonald & McAlister (2012), 150 72 There is a lack of clarity surrounding this gate and screen. The record lists them incorrectly as the work of Priestley, but the map date suggests they were installed when Baird purchased the estate, and they may have been repaired or replaced by McDevitt. 73 D2584/2/16

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August 2020 Alastair Coey Architects Ltd 45 APPENDIX ONE – EXTRACTION OF POLICIES

DRAFT APPENDIX TWO – HISTORIC LANDSCAPE ASSESSMENT

DRAFT APPENDIX THREE – CONDITION REPORT

DRAFT APPENDIX FOUR – PUBLIC CONSULTATION - LIST OF ATTENDEES

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