2006:51 - 30–32 Larne Road, Carrickfergus, Antrim

Trial-trenching was undertaken at the site of a proposed development at 30–32 Larne Road, Carrickfergus, which an archaeological impact assessment had shown to be close to St Bridget’s Hospital and associated graveyard (ANT053–007). The hospital is traditionally recorded to lie c. 50m to the east-south-east of the proposed development, although its precise location is not known. There are very few known details about the hospital, which is reputed to have been for the care of lepers. The SMR notes that part of the site was destroyed when the Larne Road and the Carrickfergus–Larne railway line were both constructed in the mid-1800s, and what survived was built over.
A total of eleven trenches were mechanically excavated to subsoil across the site. The trenches showed that the site had undergone major alteration during the construction of the road and railway line. The subsoil was found at a depth of up to 1.8m below the current ground surface, with the dumping of clean, orange, sticky clay being used to artificially raise the ground level. This clay originates from the cut of the nearby railway and was used to raise the overall ground level so that the Larne road could be driven over the railway line. There were no traces of St Bridget’s Hospital, or any evidence for an associated cemetery, nor any unrelated archaeological deposits uncovered within the trenches.