Dictionary of Irish Architects 1720 - 1940

Surveyor, of Dublin. John Ball Greene was born in 1821, the third son of George Greene of Dublin by his wife Jane, daughter of George Ball of Ball's Grove, Drogheda. According to Bendell, he trained as a surveyor in the office of Sherrard, Brassington & Gale.(1) He is probably the John B. Greene of 5 George's Place North who appears in the directories as a surveyor and valuator of estates as early as 1839 and is still listed with the same description and at the same address in 1844.(2) After a period working under ISAMBARD KINDGDOM BRUNEL  ISAMBARD KINDGDOM BRUNEL on the Great Western Railway in England,(3) by 1853 he had joined the staff of the General Valuation and Boundary Survey of Ireland as General Superintendent under RICHARD GRIFFITH. RICHARD GRIFFITH. (4) In 1868 he took over Griffith's valuation duties and became Commissioner of Valuation, while Griffith retained the position of General Boundary Surveyor until at last 1875.(5) On, or perhaps before, Griffith's death in 1878, Greene succeeded him the latter position also.(6)

Greene retired in 1892, when he was succeeded by JOHN GEORGE BARTON JOHN GEORGE BARTON , and died in the late 1890s. He was knighted in 1885. He was married twice: first, in 1850, to Ellen, daughter of Robert Wesley, a surgeon in the Navy ; second, in 1867, to Charlotte Mary, daughter of Edward Henry Courtenay of Cheltenham. He was a magistrate for Co. Dublin.

ICEI:(7) elected member, 1857; council member, 1864,1876,1885; vice-president, 1867; president, 1869-1871; no longer a member by 1887.

Addresses:(8) Work: 5? George's Place North, 1839,1844; 108-111 Baggot Street Lower, <=1853->=1857; 6 Ely Place, <=1863-1892.
Home: 10 Waterloo Terrace, Leeson Street Upper, 1853; St Aubyn's, Ballybrack, Dalkey, 1857; Saintbury, Killiney, 1863; Ardkill, Killiney, 1874,1875; Leeson Park, Dublin, 1887; Landaur, 53 Raglan Rd, Dublin, 1896.

See BIBLIOGRAPHY. BIBLIOGRAPHY.



References

All information in this entry not otherwise accounted for is from E. Walford, The County Families of the United Kingdom (1887), 457.

(1) Sarah Bendall, ed., Dictionary of Land Surveyors and Local Map-Makers of Great Britain and Ireland 1530-1850 (2nd edition, 1997),II, 213; if, as the directories indicate, Sherrard parted company with Brassington and Gale in about 1832, it is more likely that Greene trained with Brassington & Gale.
(2) Post Office Directory 1839,1844; a Mrs Jane Greene was living at 5 George's Place North in 1847.
(3) ICEI admissions applications, I. 21.
(4) Post Office Directory 1853.
(5) Post Office Directory 1875.
(6) In Thom's Directory (1881), 796, he is described as 'Commissioner of Valuation and Boundary Surveyor'.
(7) Information from ICEI lists of members and Jones's transcripts of ICEI officers from Thom's directories.
(8) From Thom's and Post Office directories.


Author Title Date Details
Green, J. Ball 'On the scales of the National Survey of Great Britain and Ireland' 1859 TICEI 5 (1855-59), 192-202.
Green, J. Ball [Presidential address to ICEI]. 1870 TICEI 9 (1866-70), 109-156.