St. Patrick'S R C Church, Ardicoan, Cushendun, Co.Antrim

St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church, Ardicoan, Cushendun, Co. Antrim

St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church is a mid-19th century parish church built in 1865 to the designs of an unknown architect, on a site of continuous religious use stretching back to the pre-Reformation period. The building stands in the townland of Ardicoan, to the north of the village of Cushendun, and remains the main Roman Catholic house of worship in the area. It is also notable as the only church in the Diocese of Down and Connor to have been constructed on a pre-Reformation site.

Historical Background

The site has a long and layered history. O'Laverty's An Historical Account of the Diocese of Down and Connor (1887) records that during the Penal years, Mass in the Cushendun area was celebrated at the ancient graveyard of Killowen and at an altar built of dry stonework at the margin of Craigagh Wood in Inispollan. This altar — known as the Craigagh Altar, located to the north-west of St. Patrick's Church — is traditionally believed to have been brought to the site around 1780 from a ruined church in Scotland by a trader named O'Neill. O'Laverty records that it was "an object of great veneration among the people" and that it bears "a slab on which is beautifully carved a Crucifix together with some inscription now illegible."

The current church stands on the ancient foundations of the church of Inispollan, an early Christian site traditionally linked with St. Patrick, which fell into disuse and ruin following the Reformation. An early 19th century Roman Catholic chapel was erected on the same foundations at the initiative of the parish priest, Father Brennan, who began construction in 1804. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs of 1835 described this unconsecrated chapel as "a very plain building, 52ft long by 30ft wide" capable of accommodating around 400 persons, and the Townland Valuations of 1834 set its rateable value at £6. O'Laverty records that the building was completed in about ten years, though it was not consecrated until 2nd August 1840, when the Most Reverend Cornelius Denvir (1791–1865), Lord Bishop of Down and Connor, consecrated it under the invocation of Saint Columba. The first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1832 depicted the chapel as a simple rectangular structure on the exact location of the current church; the second edition of 1857 showed a projecting porch or transept on its south side.

The original chapel was reconstructed in 1865 at the initiative of the parish priest, Father Phelan. The nave was extended with the addition of a chancel, and a belfry was installed, with the date 1865 inscribed upon it. The completed church was dedicated by the Most Reverend Patrick Dorrian (1814–85), the new Lord Bishop of Down and Connor, with the dedication sermon preached by Father Charles McAuley of Maynooth. Despite this reconstruction, the site continued to be valued at £6 10 shillings under the Annual Revisions between 1864 and 1929. The church was commonly known as the Church of Cushendun, though it was recorded as St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church by at least the turn of the 20th century. A single-storey vestry was added to the south side by at least 1904, as shown on the County Series Ordnance Survey map of that year. By the end of the Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956–72), the total rateable value stood at £34. The church was listed in 1980.

Architecture and Exterior

The church is of rectangular plan, with a single-storey vestry to the south side constructed around 1904 and a small lean-to extension to the south-west containing a rear entrance porch. The exterior walls are painted roughcast, set on a slightly projecting rendered plinth, with sandstone corner buttresses, stepped quoins, and sandstone dressings to all window and door surrounds. The roof is finished in natural slate with black clay ridge tiles. Gables have raised skews with stone copings, kneeler stones, and stone cross finials to the apse end. Lead valleys sit behind the raised gables, with sandstone coping to the skews. Rainwater goods throughout are moulded cast-aluminium gutters discharging to circular cast-aluminium downpipes.

The north-east principal elevation faces the churchyard and is set behind cast-iron railings. It presents a gable end with a pointed Gothic arch doorway fitted with a pair of vertically sheeted timber doors with vision panels. Above this is a triple lancet Gothic window set in plate-tracery stonework, each lancet having a trefoil inset. At the apex of the gable is a stone bell-cote carrying a rectangular date stone inscribed "A.D. 1865" with an engraving above reading "DEDICATED TO ST. PATRICK," surmounted by a finial.

The south-east elevation overlooks the burial grounds and presents the four-bay nave, with tall, narrow pointed Gothic single lancet windows set in stone surrounds with glazing bars and stained glass. A part-exposed earlier Romanesque arch is visible to the side of one of the windows. To the left, a projecting single-storey annex contains a small square-headed window opening with a stone surround and cathedral square glazing, alongside a square-headed doorway with a rendered band surround and a vertically sheeted timber door with a ventilated panel, approached by two steps from pavement level. To the right of the main elevation there is a small pointed Gothic arch single lancet window containing stained glass.

The south-west elevation overlooks the burial grounds and shows the annex with a corner buttress to the left and a lean-to extension with stone quoins to the right. The central feature is a triple lancet Gothic window set in plate-tracery stonework, each lancet with a trefoil inset. The gable carries a stone cross at the apex above a circular ventilation grill with a sandstone surround. The gable to the main elevation behind also has a stone cross at the apex above a circular ventilation grill with a sandstone surround.

The north-west elevation, set back behind the graveyard overlooking the Glendun Road, presents the four-bay nave with tall, narrow pointed Gothic single lancet windows set in stone surrounds with glazing bars and stained glass. The adjoining annex has a semicircular arched window set in plate-tracery stonework, with double lancets carrying trefoil insets and stained glass. Both the main elevation and the annex have corner buttresses with stone quoins above.

Stained Glass

Five of the church's stained glass windows, located in the Sanctuary, were installed in the 1930s and designed by Mayer and Co. of Munich, an internationally prominent stained glass design and manufacturing firm that was among the chief providers of stained glass to the Catholic Church during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and which carried out at least 70 contracts in Ireland between 1870 and the 1920s for both the Church of Ireland and the Roman Catholic Church. Nine further stained glass windows, plainer in character and arranged throughout the church, were installed in the 1950s by Daniel Braniff's studio in Belfast.

A 1972 Ulster Architectural Heritage Society guide described the church as "a very pleasant, very modest country chapel, on the site of a much earlier church, set in an old graveyard with many tombstones and mature yew trees," noting its cream painted roughcast exterior with corner buttresses, pointed doors and windows of shallow trefoil form, a raked gallery inside, and "a rather fine white marble retable of the death of St. Patrick" on the high altar.

Renovations of 2008–09

The church underwent a major renovation in 2008–09 at a cost of £980,000, carried out in three phases. Phase 1 involved unearthing the original floor, stripping all internal and external plaster, and constructing a new Sacristy and Confessional rooms. Phase 2 covered the replacement of the roof and its timbers, the installation of a new gallery, and the reconstruction of the belfry, which had become unstable. Phase 3 comprised internal alterations including the installation of new timber pews, an overhaul of the building's lighting and sound systems, and the addition of new ornamentation and church furnishings including a new altar, priest's chair, and Ambo. During the same works, the Stations of the Cross — originally installed in the 1950s — were overhauled, and all 14 stained glass windows were removed and fully restored by the Art Glass Company of Derry.

Setting and Materials

The church is situated within its own churchyard, with burial grounds to each side containing many tombstones and mature yew trees. The site is bounded by a low stone wall with two rebuilt rendered pillars with pyramidal caps flanking a pair of decorative iron pedestrian gates accessed from the Glendun Road. The church is located within a conservation area.

Materials throughout are as follows: natural slate roof; cast-aluminium rainwater goods; painted roughcast and sandstone ashlar walling; cathedral square and stained glass windows.