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If there is a fireplace on the second floor and has been covered, you can still use the downstairs fireplace. They will have seperate flues in the same overall chimney. If it has not been used in a while you should have a chimney sweep clean it and inspect the liner.
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Hi - thank you for your answer. There is no fireplace upstairs - I think the entire internal upstairs chimney breast may have been removed at some point. So I just have to downstairs fireplace (and chimney breast) and what I think is an external chimney stack that leads up the side of the house.
I was not uncommon for the floor layouts to require stepping off of the chimneys. The stack up the side of the house is part of the foundation which bears the weight of all that brick and mortar.
General C&ontractor
35 years of troubleshooting construction, remodel, component & material failures. What to do next