Stewart Street is in the Markets district of south Belfast, close to Oxford Street and the River Lagan. It formed part of the mid-19th-century street-making on reclaimed ground in and around May’s Fields, as Belfast expanded southwards in the 1840s and 1850s.
The street is firmly attested by 9 April 1850, when it appears in parliamentary evidence reported in the Belfast News-Letter concerning proposed new streets along the bank of the Lagan. In that evidence, Stewart Street is used as an established point of measurement: the intended new street is stated to lie “between 250 or 260 feet” from Stewart-street. This confirms Stewart Street was already in existence and sufficiently well-known to serve as a reference point by that date.
Later 19th-century directories list Stewart Street as a residential street off Eliza Street. In the early 20th century, as municipal market infrastructure intensified in the area, the street became associated with Belfast’s municipal abattoir.
The precise naming origin has not been located in surviving naming records; the name is most plausibly from a local Stewart connected with ownership or development of the area, consistent with common Belfast street-naming practice in privately developed districts.
Belfast News-Letter, Tuesday 9 April 1850 (British Library Newspapers), report of parliamentary evidence on proposed streets along the River Lagan; reference to “Stewart-street … between 250 or 260 feet”.
Belfast street directories (later 19th century), entries listing Stewart Street off Eliza Street.