Survey Data
Reg No
15611016
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Scientific, Technical
Original Use
Harbour/dock/port
In Use As
Harbour/dock/port
Date
1820 - 1850
Coordinates
320070, 156130
Date Recorded
08/01/2007
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Harbour basin, designed 1823; begun 1824, on an L-shaped plan. Completed, 1834-47, producing present composition. Lichen-spotted coursed rubble stone battered walls with benchmark-inscribed cut-granite coping. Set extending into Saint George's Channel.
Appraisal
A harbour basin completed under the direction of Francis Giles (1787-1847) representing an important component of the built heritage of north County Wexford. NOTE: Although the commercial potential of the harbour was never fully realised 'in consequence of the shifting of the sands and accumulations of silt brought down by the Owenavorragh River', conditions which had impeded progress on earlier designs (1819; 1823) by Alexander Nimmo (1783-1832), the harbour ultimately benefitted 'the fishermen of the coast [and] this, with…the expenditure caused by the influx of bathers in the summer season, induced the creation of the village of Courtown' (Hickey alias Doyle 1868, 153-4).