Drummaul Parish Church, (St Brigid's C. of I.), Church Road, Randalstown, Co Antrim

This 19th-century church is built in Gothic Revival style, comprising a nave, chancel, and triple-gabled south aisle, with a square tower at the west end surmounted by an octagonal spire. The main entrance faces north in a gabled porch at the west end of the nave.

Construction and Materials

The walls are of blackstone rubble, with squared and coursed blackstone to the angle buttresses at the west end and to the south aisle. Similar quality blackstone quoins appear at the tower base and the east end of the nave, while grey sandstone quoins are used at the east end of the chancel and the gabled projections on the north and south sides of the chancel. A projecting sandstone plinth runs around the entire building except the front face of the main porch. The roofs are tiled—modern replacements for the original slates.

North Elevation

The north elevation comprises a nave with a chancel of lower roofline to the left and a square tower with spire to the right. Four windows appear in the main wall of the nave: three to the left of the main entrance porch and one to the right. The three windows to the left are Gothic arched lancets with grey sandstone dressings, raised surrounds with chamfered edges, projecting moulded hoods, and projecting chamfered cills. The central window contains stained glass but is currently boarded up due to recent vandalism. The flanking windows are two-light metal-framed openings of diagonal pattern with clear glass and cusped tracery roundels.

The window to the right of the porch is a Gothic lancet with cusped head, dressings flush with the main walling, and tinted glazing of leaded quarries. The end bay containing this window projects slightly from the main nave and has a crenellated sandstone parapet between angled two-stage buttresses. Sandstone gabled weatherings appear on the lower stage of the buttresses, with sandstone pinnacles surmounting the upper stage. A cast iron gutter serves the nave (in poor condition), with a painted asbestos downpipe to the right and a cast iron downpipe to the left discharging onto the roof of the vestry porch.

The projecting main entrance porch has a gabled front containing a Gothic doorway with plain sandstone colonnettes with moulded bell capitals and floriated stops to the moulded label above. A sandstone doorstep leads to a ledged and braced Gothic-headed door of diagonal pattern, fitted with large scrolling iron hinges and an original ironwork handle. Above the doorway is a small Gothic-headed window in the apex of the gable, containing tinted glazing of leaded quarries. A flagpole is mounted in front of this window.

Chamfered sandstone coping crowns the gable, with notched sandstone kneelers surmounting two-stage buttresses on each side. Wrought iron bootscrapers stand to each side of the main porch doorway. Angled cast iron gutters on each side wall of the porch are carried on projecting rafters with notched ends, oversailing a projecting sandstone eaves course. A cast iron downpipe of rectangular section is fixed to the east side with a trefoil bracket, while a painted asbestos downpipe of circular section serves the west side. Small Gothic cusped-headed windows appear in each side wall, containing leaded quarries (the one in the west side currently boarded up as a result of vandalism).

The chancel has one window to the left of the projecting vestry: a two-light Gothic window of diagonal metal glazing bars with cusped heads and a quatrefoil tracery light, with projecting drip mould and cill matching those of the nave. A moulded cast iron gutter serves the chancel, with a cast iron downpipe of rectangular section.

A projecting gabled vestry stands over the right-hand end of the chancel and the left-hand extremity of the nave. Small rectangular windows appear in the north gable and in the east side of the vestry, with dressings flush with the main walling and glazing of small quarries in diagonal metal glazing bars. A lean-to porch projects from the right-hand side of the vestry, with a doorway and window in the west face. The shouldered arched doorway contains a ledged timber door with a Gothic arched fanlight above containing translucent glazing and fitted with a modern metal handle. A scrolling iron lamp bracket is mounted above the door. A short concrete ramp bordered by a plain black-painted steel handrail leads up to the door. Moulded cast iron gutters serve the vestry and side porch.

East Elevations

The east gable of the nave is of low pitch, with a square sandstone chimney on the apex of the gable coping topped by a small modern-looking pot with wire cowl. The east gable of the chancel is of steeper pitch than the nave and contains a three-light stone traceried window with cusped circular tracery lights, all filled with stained glass and protected by wire mesh grilles. The sandstone dressings are flush with the main walling, set in a basalt Gothic arch. A High Victorian stylised foliated sandstone finial crowns the apex of the gable coping.

The south side of the chancel is blank, with a moulded cast iron gutter and cast iron downpipe discharging into a similar gutter of the lower organ chamber, which projects toward the south.

South Elevation

The south elevation comprises the triple-gabled south aisle, with one bay of the nave set back to the left with the tower behind it, and the gable of the organ chamber to the right with the chancel behind it.

The organ chamber gable has one window—a Gothic arched opening with metal lattice glazing matching those previously described on the entrance elevation of the nave. Sandstone coping crowns the gable. A downpipe to the left of the window in the gable and another on the east side wall appear to be of painted asbestos.

The south aisle gables have sandstone copings, with a short square chimney at the apex of the eastern gable fitted with a modern pot and wire mesh cowl. Projecting sandstone hoppers at the two valleys between gables have painted asbestos downpipes. Each of the three aisle gables has a large three-light traceried stone window of cusped and intersecting pattern, with projecting moulded drip mouldings and projecting sandstone cills. The western window has metal lattice glazing; the other two contain stained glass, with a steel mesh protective grille over the eastern one. Below the eastern window stands a low, flat-roofed, smooth cement-rendered store with painted felt roof, reached down concrete steps via a doorway.

The east and west walls of the aisle have low parapets with sandstone coping. The east wall is blank, with a painted asbestos downpipe from a concealed gutter. The west wall has one window—a Gothic lancet with projecting drip mould and cill as previously described, containing stained glass—served by a painted asbestos downpipe with a rectangular moulded hopper of uncertain material.

The bay of the nave facing south, set back to the left of the aisle, is similar to the equivalent on the entrance elevation except for having only one pinnacle over the corner buttress.

West Elevation

The west elevation of the nave is symmetrical, comprising a tall square tower with a raking bay set back slightly to each side. The tower has a single Gothic lancet in the base stage with cusped head and dressings flush with the main walling, containing stained glass. A moulded cast iron gutter with short returns back to each side terminates on the left side with a rectangular section cast iron downpipe fixed with trefoil brackets.

Each of the raking bays set back to each side has one window: Gothic lancets with projecting drip moulds and cills as previously described, containing stained glass. Raking sandstone crenellations crown the parapets, with spiky pinnacles on the angle buttresses at the extremities.

The upper stage of the tower has main walling of basalt rubble set back, with moulded octagonal buttresses of sandstone ashlar to the corners topped by spiky sandstone pinnacles. One window opening in the west face has a projecting drip mould as previously described and contains timber louvres. The other three faces of the upper stage are similar to the west, except the north face has a large openwork metal clock face with gilded hands and numerals mounted above the louvred opening, and the south face has a rectangular ledged timber door set into the louvred opening, reached by a small ladder.

The spire is entirely of ashlar sandstone, of octagonal plan on a stepped base, with two stages of gabled stone lucarnes and an ironwork weathercock at the top.

Setting and Surroundings

The church stands facing the main road, set back within its own extensive churchyard. The area around the church to the front, rear, and west is gravelled; the graveyard to the east is grassed. The front boundary is formed by a low basalt rubble wall with rough basalt rock copings. The main gateway at the western end is recessed beyond curving screen walls, with square greystone piers mounted with double gates of modern scrolling ironwork incorporating roundels of St Brigid's Cross pattern. A small pedestrian gateway in the front boundary to the east of the church has similar piers and ironwork. The inside face of the front boundary wall is rendered with a dry dash of blackstone chippings.

The boundary to the west is formed by a modern steel fence bordered by grass with concrete kerbs. The boundary to the graveyard to the east and to the south is formed by a basalt rubble wall with basalt rock copings.

Standing to the rear of the church is a modern hall of gabled form with dry dash render to the walls and synthetic slates to the roof.

Standing close by to the east of the church is the O'Neill Vault, a sandstone tomb in a railinged enclosure. Adjacent to it at its north-east corner is a rectangular stone-roofed and smooth cement-sided vault to the Kennedy family of Hollybrook circa 1835, surmounted by two ornamented sandstone urns, with entrance by an iron-plated door in the east side.

Some distance to the south-east is another O'Neill plot, laid out as a terraced lawn surrounded by low iron railings. It contains two memorial slabs of somewhat unusual form, comprised of shamrock-ornamented roundels set in rustic rock-like slabs: the one to the south is to the memory of Reverend William 1st Baron O'Neill, died 1883; the one to the north is to his wife Elizabeth Grace, died 1905. Both bear religious inscriptions on front and rear. None of the other memorials in the churchyard are of special note.

A small portion of basalt rubble walling stands amongst the memorials at the east end of the churchyard—a relic of the predecessor of the present church, of very plain character and insignificant appearance.