First Presbyterian Church, Kilrea, Coleraine, Co. Londonderry, BT51 5QU

First Presbyterian Church, Kilrea — a freestanding, symmetrical, double-height Presbyterian hall-type church constructed between 1837 and 1839 to designs by the London architect William Barnes, partner and pupil of George Smith, who served as architect to the Worshipful Company of Mercers'. The building replaced a previous Presbyterian Meeting House established in 1783–84, which by 1836 was described in the Ordnance Survey Memoirs as a plain, slated and whitewashed building capable of accommodating 480 people but in a bad state of repair and lacking a ceiling. The new building cost approximately £2,300, funded jointly by the Mercers' Company, the Irish Society, and contributions from the congregation. Its foundation stone was laid on 23rd June 1837, and the Reverend Seaton Reid opened the building for public worship exactly two years later. The church is located to the eastern side of Church Street, within a lawned burial ground, in the centre of Kilrea town.

Historical context

The church is directly connected to the Mercers' Company's ambitious mid-19th-century programme of improvements to Kilrea and its surrounding estate. During the Plantation of Ulster, the Worshipful Company of Mercers', a principal Livery Company of the City of London, took direct control of approximately 33.5 square miles of land in County Londonderry centred on the districts of Kilrea and Movanagher. By the mid-17th century the estate had been let to individual tenants, many of whom were absentee landlords, and it fell into severe decline. Following the death of the final tenant, Alexander Stewart, in 1831, the Mercers' Company repossessed the estate and appointed architects — George Smith and subsequently William Barnes — to develop a cohesive plan for the improvement of Kilrea, with public buildings largely funded by the Company. The earlier congregation had its origins in a split from the congregation at Boveedy, led by the Reverend John Smyth, who formed a new congregation in Kilrea town in 1783–84. The first minister of the new building was the Reverend James Rogers. The church is first shown on the Second Edition Ordnance Survey map of 1853, captioned as the 'Presbyterian Meeting House', with a combined value of £50 recorded in Griffith's Valuation of 1856. By the time of the Third Edition Ordnance Survey map of 1905, the building was recorded as the 'First Presbyterian Church'. The estate was sold to tenants under the Wyndham Land Purchase Act of 1903, though the church remained under Mercers' Company ownership until at least 1935, as recorded in the First General Revaluation of that year.

Exterior

The building is rectangular on plan with advancing single-storey wings and a central three-stage pierced spire. The roof is pitched slate with angled grey and brown ridge tiles; the raised gables are topped by angled stone coping, with the overlaid coping stones to the west having kneeler stones. The advancing, slightly lower gable-fronted entrance has a lead-covered ridge. A pointed stone finial rises from the west gable. To the east gable, an ashlar stone square base to the spire sits on the axial ridge, with an instepped base to octagonal lucarnes containing a hung bronze bell, rising to a pointed spire with a conical stone pinnacle. Cast iron ogee rainwater goods are supported on a projecting stone eaves course, with some decorative cast iron hoppers. The walling is coursed and squared rubble with sandstone dressings, including strip quoins, a projecting plinth, and window and door surrounds. Window openings are generally lancet-shaped with voussoired rubble-stone heads, chamfered reveals and sills, fitted with leaded stained-glass windows.

The principal elevation faces east and comprises an advancing narrow-fronted gable at the centre flanked by lower flat-roofed bays that project out from the elevation line and the sides of the building. At the centre is a round-headed doorway set within a round-headed opening; the timber sheeted, square-headed door has a matching fixed tympanum with a pole-moulded reveal and raised chevron surrounds. Above sits a three-light lattice-paned lancet window with a higher centre light, surmounted by a continuous hood mould. The square bays to each side at ground floor level each have a similar single lancet window at the centre.

The south elevation has a single lancet to the square projecting bay, as described above, with six equally spaced windows lighting the nave. The west elevation has been repointed and contains a blocked window to the centre of a bow-abutment; there is replacement slate to a hipped roof above and a timber-sheeted diminutive square hatch breaking through the plinth course. A recent extension abuts to the left side of this elevation; the gable end extends beyond the boundary wall. The right cheek has two windows to the left and a projecting doorway with a timber-sheeted door to the right beneath a catslide roof; the left cheek has two windows to the right and a timber-panelled door to the left, accessed via concrete steps. The north elevation matches the south.

Alterations

In recent decades, the cast iron tracery of the diamond-paned lancet windows has been replaced. A small vestry was added to the north-west elevation around 1990.

Setting

The church sits within an urban residential setting to the south of Kilrea's central Diamond, enclosed within a burial ground by rubblestone walls. The boundary wall to the east along Church Street is coursed and squared rubblestone with saddleback stone copings; it rises to a pair of central cast iron octagonal piers supporting decorative cast iron gates, with a similar opening to the north along Church Street. A modern metal gate to the west wall of random rubble is supported by replacement brick piers abutting the boundary wall. A bifurcated concrete path leads to the main entrance door and continues around the perimeter of the building, terminating at the rear vestry extension. Raised concrete drainage troughs are present to the north and west elevations. Mature trees are present within the grounds. The former Office of the Mercers' Agent is situated at the south-east corner of the site, and St Patrick's Church is a short distance to the south. A modern two-storey hall to the north-west of the site and a modern church hall to the north are both of little architectural interest.