County: Derry Site name: COLERAINE: Kingsgate Street
Sites and Monuments Record No.: SMR 7:91 Licence number: —
Author: Alan Reilly, NAC
Site type: Town defences
Period/Dating: Post Medieval (AD 1600-AD 1750)
ITM: E 684953m, N 932383m
Latitude, Longitude (decimal degrees): 55.131522, -6.667836
Monitoring of the foundation trenches (c. 5m wide) of a retail building development at 1, 3 and 5 Kingsgate Street/2 and 4 Society Street, Coleraine, Co. Derry, was carried out. This exposed the surface of what was probably the fill of a large ditch on the eastern side of the site, which ran 5m east of and parallel to Society Street. An 18th-century jug handle was found in the upper part of the fill, but further investigation could not be carried out as the foundations only intruded on the surface of the fill. Only the western edge of the ditch was exposed-the eastern edge lay under a standing building. Cartographic evidence indicates that the cut and fill were a stretch of the early 17th-century town's defensive ditch. A maximum width of 8m of the ditch was noted. Historical records indicated that it was originally c. 12m wide.
Unit 6, Farset Enterprise Park, 638 Springfield Road, Belfast
