Banbridge Road Presbyterian Church, Banbridge Road, Dromore, Co Down, BT25 1AA

Banbridge Road Presbyterian Church is a double-height stucco Presbyterian church built in the neoclassical style, completed in 1843 and located on the south side of Banbridge Road in Dromore, County Down. The building was subsequently altered and then substantially refurbished around 1950. It is rectangular on plan and sits within its original setting alongside a boundary wall and adjoining graveyard.

ARCHITECTURAL DESCRIPTION

The roof is natural slate, gabled to the north and hipped to the south, with uPVC rainwater goods on a rendered eaves-band. The walling is stucco to the principal facade and painted roughcast render elsewhere, with a continuous sill course and impost course to the facade windows. The windows throughout are a variety of leaded-and-stained glass casements dating from the circa 1950 refurbishment. On the facade these are round-headed to all floors except the ground floor, with moulded archivolts rising from impost mouldings and keyblocks; the ground floor windows have moulded and lugged surrounds with a cornice over a reeded frieze.

The principal elevation faces north and is surmounted by a decorated dentilled pediment. It is symmetrically arranged with three openings to each floor, divided by four Giant order pilasters with moulded caps and inverted consoles to a plain frieze. At the centre of the ground floor is a replacement double-leaf three-panelled timber door, surmounted by a leaded-and-stained glass round-headed transom light with a moulded archivolt and keyblock.

The east elevation has three evenly spaced elongated round-headed windows. To the far left is a modern six-panelled timber door with a transom light and a square-headed window. The south (rear) elevation has a round-headed window to the centre at gallery level and a square-headed window at ground floor, with two smaller leaded-and-stained glass casement windows to the left. The west elevation has three evenly spaced elongated round-headed windows; to the right are two round-headed windows at first floor level, while at ground floor there is a modern four-panelled timber door with transom light and a square-headed window.

The original fenestration has not survived, though much original fabric remains. The hipped roof construction to the rear of the building is the result of the early addition of a Sunday school room and an additional preparation room.

INTERIOR

The interior dates from the circa 1950 refurbishment, during which the main hall was gutted and a new gallery installed along with new furnishings including the current communion table, pulpit, baptismal font and reading desk. A memorial organ, valued at £30,000 in 1988 and gifted by a member of the congregation, is also housed within the church. Memorial choir stalls were later installed in memory of congregation members who were injured or killed during the Troubles. The original gallery had been accessed by external stone steps, which were removed during the 1953 renovation.

SETTING

The church is set back from the road and accessed through metal gates supported on painted square rendered piers with plinths and corniced caps. A rendered stepped boundary wall to the north is topped with painted saddleback coping stones and metal railings. To the west is a church hall in a similar style, abutted on its western side by a large modern extension. The church is surrounded on three sides by a graveyard, with the earliest recorded headstone dating from around 1850.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Presbyterianism was the predominant religious denomination in the parish of Dromore. Prior to the construction of this church, two Presbyterian congregations already existed within Dromore's urban centre: First Dromore Presbyterian Church, whose congregation had first been established in the mid-17th century, and First Dromore (Non-Subscribing) Church, which formed around 1725 following a theological split. Banbridge Road Presbyterian Church was erected in 1843 as a seceding congregation under the Secession Synod of Ulster, and was first known as Second Dromore. Before the current building was constructed, the congregation had met in the town's courthouse. The project involved around six years of deliberation and fundraising, and when the church first opened the congregation was small but enthusiastic; by 1857 it had grown to 200 members.

The church first appears on the second edition Ordnance Survey maps in 1859, depicted as a rectangular building captioned "Presbyterian Meeting House" and valued at £30 in Griffith's Valuation. No significant changes to the site layout were recorded on subsequent Ordnance Survey editions of 1903 or 1919–20, and the valuation remained unchanged in the Annual Revisions up to their conclusion in 1930.

During the ministry of the Reverend John McKee, the manse was his own dwelling at 17 Princes Street; a new two-storey manse was subsequently erected in 1859–61 in the townland of Ballymacormick and remained in use by ministers of the church until it was sold in 1982. In 1908 the congregation's name was changed from Second Dromore to Banbridge Road Presbyterian. In 1916 the Dromore Gas Company and Dromore Electric Company installed the first artificial lighting fittings within the church, with electric lighting following in the 1920s. The first permanent organ was installed in 1929.

The church hall to the west was erected in 1930–32 at a cost of £2,500. It was designed by the architectural partnership Hobart and Heron, established in 1904 by Henry Hobart (1858–1938) and Samuel Heron (1872–1957), a practice that continues to operate today as Hobart Heron. The firm also designed Dromore's Public Elementary School in 1938. The builders contracted for the church hall were Gardiner and McAllister. During the Second World War the church hall was commandeered by the army and used by the 202 Field Ambulance from Wrexham.

Following the war, a major renovation of the church was carried out in the early 1950s, with George Hobart of Hobart and Heron employed as architect. The church reopened on 14th November 1954 after expenditure of over £20,000. The church hall was extended in 1969–70 at a cost of over £10,000. The building was listed in 1977. The manse in Ballymacormick was sold in 1982 to fund the construction of a new modern manse in the same townland, completed in 1984 and still occupied by ministers of the church. Due to new housing development in Dromore, the congregation today numbers over 400 families.