Tullycarnaught Orange Hall, 23 Drone Hill Road, Banbridge, Co Down, BT32 5JN

Tullycarnaught Orange Hall

A detached, asymmetrical single-storey Orange Hall dated 1917, situated on the north bank of the River Bann to the east of Banbridge. The building is rectangular on plan, facing northwest, and constructed of limewashed lime render with roughcast rendering to the southeast and southwest elevations. The pitched roof is covered with natural slate, fitted with angled ridge tiles and tiled raised verges. Smooth rendered chimneystacks project from the gables. Cast-iron rainwater goods are mounted on projecting eaves.

The principal northwest elevation is four openings wide, featuring three evenly-spaced square-headed window openings to the right of a timber-sheeted entrance door with a cast-iron door knob. Above the entrance is an inscribed date stone set within a segmental-headed recess, reading "TULLYCONNAUGHT / ORANGE HALL / ERECTED A.D.1917". Three painted brick infills are located at ground level to the right. All window openings are boarded and have projecting painted masonry sills. The northeast gable is blank, whilst the southeast elevation contains a single window opening at the right with concrete block infill. The southwest gable is also blank.

The hall is enclosed by a set of roughcast-rendered boundary walls with square piers having pointed caps. An original cast and wrought-iron latch-gate with emblematic detailing provides access, with a gravelled parking area to the left. The building sits on a small plot on the north bank of the River Bann, south of Castlewellan Road and accessed via Drone Hill Road. To the west is a small development of two-storey detached houses, whilst a tarmacadam laneway to the north leads to a small agricultural unit enclosed by mature trees.

The Orange Hall was erected on the site of a corn mill recorded on the 1859 Ordnance Survey map and may incorporate some of the fabric of this earlier building. The corn mill and surrounding land were formerly the property of the Mulligan family, linen bleachers and beetlers of Tullyconnaught who operated textile works adjacent to Corbet Lough in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Corbet Lough, a storage lake built in 1836 to supply water for the linen industry, was originally fed by a mill race that powered the corn mill, though this feature is no longer present.

The Orange Hall first appears in valuation records in 1920, leased from Martha Mulligan at a valuation of £2 10s. The building originally included living accommodation for a caretaker. In the First General Revaluation of 1933–34, the hall was revalued at £3 as a "one-roomed hall" measuring 45 by 19 by 12 feet and described as "an old building, poor finish and condition". The caretaker's accommodation, comprising a kitchen and bedroom measuring 19 by 19 by 7 feet, was valued separately at £1 5s, with a weekly rent of 2 shillings. Early caretakers included Miss Elizabeth Fordyce and later James Henry Dunlop.