Church of the Good Shepherd, Melmount Road, Sion Mills, Co. Tyrone, BT82 9ET

Church of the Good Shepherd, Melmount Road, Sion Mills, County Tyrone

The Church of the Good Shepherd is a remarkable triple-height Romanesque Revival Church of Ireland church, consecrated in 1909 and prominently located on the main road through the centre of Sion Mills. It was designed by William F. Unsworth FRIBA, of the firm Unsworth, Son & Triggs, of Petersfield, Hampshire — the same architect who designed the first Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-upon-Avon. The church replaces an earlier building of 1889, known as St Saviours, which now serves as the parish hall. Unsworth based the design on a church he admired at Pistoia, near Florence, representing a deliberate and scholarly departure from the Tudoresque architecture that characterises the rest of Sion Mills. The Diocesan history for Derry and Raphoe describes it as being in the Italian Renaissance style. It seats 350 persons and stands as an outstanding example of Romanesque Revival architecture in Northern Ireland, forming an important landmark within the Sion Mills Conservation Area.

Sion Mills was a company-owned model village established by Herdman & Co., a flax spinning mill run by the Herdman family, which provided housing, healthcare, and maintenance for its workers until the village was privatised in the mid-1960s when the mills needed to raise capital during a slump in the linen industry. The driving force behind the construction of the new church was the rector, Canon J. Olphert, supported by Brigadier-General Ambrose St. Quentin Ricardo. The builders were Messrs. J. Ballintine Ltd. of Londonderry. Stone, marble, and mosaic work was executed by Messrs. E. Luscombe and Son of Exeter; electric light fittings were supplied by the Well Fire Co. Ltd. of London; door furniture and locks by Thomas Elsely Ltd. of London; roofing slates by David Bros. of Portmadoc; and heating and ventilating apparatus by Musgrave and Co. Ltd. of Belfast. On completion, Unsworth presented a chalice inscribed "Of your charity remember in God W.F. Unsworth, architect of this church 1909."

The plan is rectangular, with a series of semi-circular projections: a full-height apsidal chancel to the east, a double-height stair tower to the west, a double-height store to the north, and a vestry to the south. The stair tower is flanked by lean-to porches, and there is a campanile tower at the north-east corner. The roof is pitched natural slate — specifically Precelly green slates, whose brown and green tones were chosen to harmonise with the colour of the local stonework — with angled clay ridge tiles, stone verges on moulded stone kneelers. Rainwater goods are profiled aluminium over a dentilled eaves course. The walls are built in coursed rubble limestone with ashlar Bath stone dressings. Each elevation, except the chancel end, is divided into panels framed by lesene strips with an arcaded frieze above, raking to the gables. Windows are generally round-headed throughout, all with lattice glazing with lead cames, ashlar surrounds, and flush splayed sills. The clerestory is lit by a continuous series of semi-circular windows, one spanning each panel, with a continuous moulded lead-capped sill course.

The entrance gable faces west and features a central stair tower surmounted by a large circular window, with porches surmounted by a single clerestory window each. The two porches are identically detailed, each with stepped ashlar quoins and a central square-headed door opening with a shallow triangular-headed lintel and deep ashlar reveals; the cheeks have a paired rectangular window with a central mullion and ashlar chamfered surround. The stair tower has a semi-conical roof over an arcaded upper level framed by colonettes, where the recessed arches are alternately blind and glazed; the main body of the tower contains staggered window openings lighting the stairwell.

The north elevation consists of five panels, each with a clerestory window. At the lower level, the right panel has a tripartite rectangular window; the left panel is abutted by the store block; and the remaining panels each have a round-headed window. The vestry has an arcade over a string course at two-thirds height, blind except for two round-headed windows; the lower section has small square windows, with a square-headed door to the north reached by four steps. The south elevation is detailed as the north.

The east end is abutted by the apse at the centre and the square campanile tower to the left. The chancel has a half-conical roof; its walling is divided into panels with a string course, the upper section having a roundel to each panel and round-headed windows to the north and south. The campanile tower has a shallow pyramidal roof and is plainly detailed with loop windows; at its upper section, each face contains a triple-arcaded opening set within a round-headed recess. The roof of the campanile is surmounted by a cross finial over a dentil course.

Internally, the layout capitalises on space and is for the most part plainly detailed, but is dominated by a chancel richly finished in marble. The choir and organ are placed in the west gallery, leaving the whole of the chancel free. The chancel is raised 3 feet 6 inches above the level of the nave and is entirely paved with Devonshire marbles. On the north wall is a memorial to Emerson Tennent Herdman and his wife Fanny Alice, both of whom died in 1918; on the south wall is a memorial to Ambrose St. Quentin Ricardo, who died in 1923.

The church is set close to the road with open grassed areas to all sides except the west. To the west is a semi-circular walled enclosure containing the Riccardo Monument, a classical table-tomb placed outside the front door of the church; this walling also extends to the sides of the site. The listing covers both the church and this walling.