St Eugene's Church of Ireland Church, Ardstraw Parish Church, Main Street, Newtownstewart, Co. Tyrone, BT78 4AA

St Eugene's Church of Ireland Church (Ardstraw Parish Church) is a rendered, rectangular-plan church dating from 1724, situated on an elevated site on the west side of Main Street, Newtownstewart. It stands within a conservation area and is listed at Grade B1. The church is a substantial and historically layered building, combining its early 18th-century fabric with a tower, an early 19th-century spire, Victorian interior remodelling, and an early 20th-century chancel. It holds a remarkable collection of wall-mounted memorials, high-quality 20th-century stained glass, and significant connections to Trinity College Dublin and to prominent local families including the Stewarts and the Galbraiths of Clanabogan, Omagh.

Exterior

The church faces west and is roughcast over a chamfered smooth-rendered plinth. The roof is pitched natural slate with blue-black angled clay ridge tiles, dressed stone verges, and ogee-profile uPVC guttering. The windows are round-headed stained glass casements set in stepped stone surrounds surmounted by hoodmoulds with label-stops, and have stone sills.

The west end is dominated by a four-stage tower, flanked to its left (north) by a lean-to porch that has been raised to two storeys, and to its right (south) by a single-storey lean-to former vestry. The tower has a dressed stone stringcourse and moulded cornice. Its entrance comprises pointed arch-headed double-leaf timber sheeted doors with ironmongery, set in a painted masonry surround. The second and third stages each contain a louvred opening on the east elevation; the fourth stage is blank and is surmounted by an octagonal dressed stone spire with pinnacles. Both the porch and the former vestry are roughcast. The former vestry has a single modern casement on its south side; the porch has replacement casements to the west and a pointed arch-headed door with ironmongery in a painted stone surround to the north.

The north elevation is two windows wide, with quoins at the left. The south elevation is three windows wide and is abutted at its right end by a modern lean-to vestry. The west gable, where exposed between the tower and its flanking additions, is blank. The east gable is abutted by the later chancel; where exposed it is also blank. The chancel has stone quoins and contains a central pointed arch-headed window with decorated tracery and a flush sill. A dressed stone date plaque, serif-inscribed "1724", is positioned below this sill.

Churchyard and Setting

The church is set within a graveyard containing numerous 18th- and 19th-century gravestones, grave slabs, table tombs, and chest tombs on an elevated, terraced site to the west of Main Street. Access is via T-plan stairs through square dressed stone gate piers with ball finials, flanked by cast iron double gates. A modern cast-bronze roundel plaque dated 1995, erected by the Newtownstewart Development Association, is also present. The churchyard to the west is enclosed by a random rubble wall with cast iron gates, bordered by mature trees to the south. The former model school lies to the north.

Interior and Fittings

The interior was altered in 1858 and again in 1867 by architects Welland and Gillespie. The church was redesigned and refurbished between 1906 and 1910. The ceiling was lined with Carolina pine in 1897. The chancel, added in 1909, features ornate floor tiles; its oak panelling was donated in 1938. The communion rails are modern. The church contains a remarkable number of significant wall-mounted memorials, including a monument to the Reverend John Hall dated 1735 and one to Katherine, daughter of Sir William Stewart Kt, dated 1634. The stained glass is of notably high quality, with works by Heaton, Butler and Bayne; Clokey of Belfast (1952); Caldermac Studios; and C.W.S. Design Stained Glass Studio of Lisburn.

Historical Notes

A previous church was erected on this site in 1622 by Sir William Stewart. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs describe the church as "a plain rectangular building with a square tower and spire, 93 feet long and 31 feet broad," containing a gallery on the north side and lit by seven windows — two on the north, three on the south, one at the east, and one small one at the west — and record that "it was rebuilt in the year 1727 by Dr John Hall, then rector of this parish and previously vice-provost of Trinity College, Dublin." However, the datestone on the chancel records 1724, and the Diocesan History places construction at around 1735. The spire was added to the tower in 1806. The parish takes its dedication from St Eugene, who lived in the middle of the 6th century; Ardstraw was for a period the seat of a bishop before the see was transferred to Derry. The area was planted by the Stewart family. The parish was amalgamated with Baronscourt in 1976 and subsequently with Badoney Upper, Badoney Lower, and Greenan in 1986. The church and graveyard were valued at £25 in the Townland Valuation Records of 1828 to 1840, with no major changes recorded in subsequent valuations. On the 1833 Ordnance Survey map the church appears rectangular in plan, with the tower masked by the presence of the original vestry and porch. These had disappeared by the 1854 map, briefly exposing the tower. By 1905 the vestry and porch had been rebuilt. The 1898 Annual Revisions Town Plan marks a new vestry to the east of the south elevation; this was rebuilt in the 1970s.