Portrush Presbyterian Church, 3 Main Street, Portrush, Co. Antrim, BT56 8BL

Portrush Presbyterian Church, 3 Main Street, Portrush

This free-standing Gothic Revival Presbyterian church was built in 1843–44 to designs by John Williamson, a builder-architect who was also a member of the congregation. Constructed in squared basalt with sandstone dressings, it stands prominently on the west side of Main Street at the southern end of the town centre, where it and the neighbouring manse together mark the entrance to the principal commercial area of Portrush. It is a notably early example of Gothic architecture in Presbyterian church design, at a time when most Presbyterian congregations favoured the neo-classical idiom. One of the very few earlier Presbyterian Gothic churches is that at Crumlin, Co. Antrim, dating from 1839 and designed by John Millar.

Historical Background

The Portrush congregation was established in 1841, having grown out of seasonal services held as the town developed into a popular bathing resort. The foundation stone was laid on 23rd June 1842, the site having been chosen by Thomas Davison, agent to the Earl of Antrim, whose family granted the plot to the fledgling congregation. A contemporary account in the Belfast Newsletter praised the location as commanding "one of the finest prospects in the world," with views over the town, harbour, the Skerries, the White Rocks, and the headlands towards the Giant's Causeway. The intended building was to be 70 feet by 40 feet with a tower in the Gothic style. A sealed bottle containing the founder's name on parchment and coins of the realm was placed beneath the foundation stone, as was customary.

Construction was hampered by a shortage of funds and had stalled entirely by December 1842. The minister, Reverend Jonathan Simpson, spent a year fundraising in America, collecting £1,150, which allowed the church to be completed in 1844. The church first appears on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853 as a simple hall church with tower. Griffith's Valuation of 1856–64 records it as a Presbyterian Meeting House and National School House: the meeting house measured 60 by 40 by 22 feet, with a separate single-storey national school of 40 by 22 by 10 feet, both relatively modest structures at that stage.

Following the religious revival of 1859, an extension incorporating transepts was added to the rear, first shown on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1906. By the time of the fourth edition (1921–31), side aisles and a chancel had been added. This enlargement was designed by Albert Clarke, the town surveyor, and carried out between 1922 and 1924 at a cost of £6,000. The work provided seating for approximately 900 people — around 300 more than the existing church could accommodate — and included new side aisles, a chancel with choir seating, and a chamber for a pipe organ.

The school house built on the site in the 1850s was replaced in 1881 by a new schoolhouse and lecture hall designed by Young and Mackenzie, again funded by money raised by Reverend Simpson in America. The school was extended in 1906 and again around 1960. By the 1930s, valuation records show the school house contained three classrooms with single-storey and two-storey rear extensions and basement steps. The church itself was fitted with central heating and electric light and could accommodate 1,290 people during the summer season, when the congregation swelled considerably. In 1942, two standard Type B concrete air raid shelters were erected in the school yard; these are no longer extant.

The church was listed in 1977, re-roofed in 1989, and in the mid-1990s the foyer was internally altered to provide toilets and a new memorial window was installed. Today the congregation stands at around 300 families, with additional attendance from summer visitors and students at the University of Ulster.

Architectural Description

The church is cruciform in plan, with north and south aisles, a chancel (added later) to the west, and a church hall abutting the rear. The roof is pitched natural slate with blue-black angled ridge tiles, raised sandstone verges, and sandstone corner pinnacles to the façade. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods sit on projecting stone eaves. The walling is squared basalt laid to courses, with a sandstone ashlar plinth, quoins, and dressings. The rear elevation is cement rendered. An offset string-course divides the two stages of the tower. Replacement twentieth-century windows and doors, along with cement rendering to the north transept and west elevation, detract from the original character, though the main façade remains largely intact and the view of the church from Main Street is largely unspoiled.

The principal elevation faces east and is dominated by a two-stage square tower. The tower has a stone broach spire with lucarnes and corner pinnacles. The second stage has a louvered oculus over a slender rectangular opening on the east face, and a multi-paned timber-framed sash lancet with hood mould on the north and south faces. The ground floor of the tower has tall leaded lancet windows to the north and south faces, and opens to the east through a replacement double-leaf timber-sheeted door with leaded lights and a pointed-headed leaded transom light, reached by a single stone step. The doorway is a three-centred arch set in a moulded sandstone reveal, surmounted by a hood mould with stone voussoirs and an inset carved sandstone quatrefoil plaque. The tower is approached on three sides by four stone steps with modern handrails. Flanking the tower on either side of the principal elevation are tall leaded lancet windows.

The south elevation has two windows to the right. The projecting south aisle is flush with the south transept; its gable has a tall lancet to gallery level and a replacement panelled-and-glazed timber door at the right. The south elevation itself has a camber-headed lattice window at gallery and ground-floor level to the left, and a double-leaf timber-sheeted door with leaded lights in a sandstone surround to the right. The gabled south transept has three windows serving the gallery and ground floor, with two further windows to its west cheek. The original west gable is flush with the transepts and is now abutted by the lower chancel, which has a tripartite staged lancet window. The north elevation mirrors the south, except that the door to the far left is a replacement panelled-and-glazed door reached by a ramp. The north elevation also has three lancet windows at gallery level and is abutted by a flat-roofed single-storey link block to the hall, which has two leaded lattice rectangular windows. A single-storey extension is further abutted to the west by a single-storey hipped-roof hall, accessed at its east corner by a timber-sheeted door with two glass panels and a brass door handle. The rear (west) elevation is abutted by the lower chancel with its tripartite staged window.

Setting

The church stands on the west side of Main Street in Portrush town centre, sharing its site with the associated manse (a separately listed structure) to the north, with which it has group value. To the south is a much-altered four-storey Victorian terrace, separated from the church by an alleyway. The boundary to the east along the road and to the north towards the manse is formed by a staged smooth-rendered wall topped by cast-iron railings, with two tall square piers bearing pointed caps supporting the original cast-iron gates at the centre. A lawned and shrubbed garden fronts the building, with stone steps leading to a tarmacadamed concourse. To the west, a two-storey church hall in a similar style to the church is connected to it via a modern extension and the single-storey hipped-roof hall; the church hall is street-fronted onto Mark Street with a car park to the south. A rendered wall enclosing the car park to the south is topped by an ornate cast-iron lamp standard, though its lantern is missing. As noted by W. D. Girvan, the dressed stone spire with its pinnacles and gablets is of great visual importance and is a feature of the skyline from many directions.