Roman Catholic Church, Fermanagh and Tyrone Hospital, 1 Donaghanie Road, Omagh, Co Tyrone, BT79 0NS

Roman Catholic Church, Fermanagh and Tyrone Hospital

A detached double-height Roman Catholic Church built between 1900 and 1901 to designs by Charles A Owen, located within the grounds of Fermanagh and Tyrone Hospital to the south of Donaghanie Road.

The church is a single-cell rectangular structure with a single-storey gabled porch to the north-east and a single-storey gabled sacristy to the west. The roof is pitched natural slate with terracotta ridge tiles and raised sandstone verges on corbelled kneelers; chimney-stacks rise to each gable. The walls are constructed of squared-and-snecked rockfaced basalt over a stepped plinth, with buttresses featuring offsets and sandstone quoins. Windows throughout are square-headed tripartite openings with sandstone mullions and transoms containing leaded stained lattice lights in stepped sandstone surrounds with segmental-headed voussoirs.

The principal elevation faces east and features a large gothic tracery window surmounted by hood moulding with label-stop and rubble voussoirs. The south elevation contains five windows, each separated by buttresses. The west elevation is abutted at ground floor by the sacristy, which contains a pair of square-headed windows. The north and south gables each contain gothic double-leaf vertically sheeted entrance doors in stepped sandstone surrounds surmounted by hood moulding with stop-ends, with blind gothic openings to the apex; the exposed gables also contain pairs of gothic windows. The north elevation is five windows wide, abutted on the left by the porch; to the west is a square-headed window surmounted by a blind gothic opening to the apex, and to the east are gothic double-leaf vertically sheeted entrance doors with leaded stained glass panels in stepped sandstone surrounds surmounted by hood moulding with stop-ends and a blind gothic opening to the apex, accessed by six concrete steps enclosed by a rubble plinth wall.

The church was designed to complement the original hospital buildings and represents the work of a noteworthy architect who was involved with other works on the site, including the neighbouring County Infirmary, and with asylums elsewhere in Ireland. Charles A Owen designed the Church of Ireland chapel on the same site two years later in 1903, and also built Ward 14 of the New County Infirmary between 1895 and 1899.

The church is part of a significant hospital complex that began with the main block, built between 1847 and 1853 to designs by William Farrell. This was one of the second series of asylums erected by the Irish Board of Works at a cost of £35,000, designed for 300 patients. An interdenominational chapel was later attached to the rear of the hospital, likely erected when architect George Boyd greatly extended the hospital in the late 1860s after patient numbers approached 300. This chapel could accommodate 130 worshippers. Following an increase in patients during the latter part of the nineteenth century, a new dedicated chapel was advised for the grounds at a cost of £1,200 as early as 1894. The Roman Catholic chapel was designed to serve 340 patients, with a gallery added in 1905 that accommodated a further 110 patients. The chapel was paid for by measurement. Following completion of the Catholic chapel and the later Protestant church, the old interdenominational chapel was subdivided and converted to dormitory use.

The builder was Joseph Colhoun of Derry, who was paid by measurement and also built other Omagh landmarks including the Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church, St Lucia's Barracks, and the First Presbyterian Church. Colhoun later died in the hospital. The church first appears on the third edition of the Ordnance Survey Map in 1906.

The building sits within the extensive grounds of Tyrone and Fermanagh Hospital, to the south of the main hospital block. Other structures of note within the grounds include the gate lodge, the Church of Ireland, and a concrete water tower. Cast aluminium rainwater goods are present.