Sexton's house at St Patrick's RC Church, (off) Barnfield Road, Lagmore, Lisburn, Co Antrim

Sexton's house at St Patrick's RC Church, Lagmore

Single storey gabled vernacular dwelling of perhaps circa 1835, originally the sexton's house and vestry for the neighbouring St Patrick's RC Church. The building is situated in a secluded rural location, just to the southwest of the church at the south end of the wall, south of Barnfield Road, less than half a mile north of the small village of Milltown and approximately two and a half miles west of Dunmurry.

The front elevation faces roughly west and is asymmetrical. A timber sheeted door is positioned left of centre with a projecting flat roofed surround (too shallow to be termed a porch). To the left of this door is a boarded up window, with another to the right. A further timber sheeted door to the right provides access to a shed section. The gables contain no openings, following true vernacular practice. To the rear there appears once to have been a low level window to the left of centre. The gabled roof is topped with two rendered chimneystacks, one on the north gable and the other to the south of the ridge centre. The walls are finished in roughcast and the gabled roof is slated.

The house is not shown on the Ordnance Survey map of 1832 or recorded in the first valuation of 1835, but appears on the Ordnance Survey map of 1858, indicating it was constructed between these dates. The building is associated with St Patrick's RC Church, which occupies the adjacent site and has medieval origins in land held by the O'Hamill family in the 17th century. The church was burnt in 1744 during disturbances occasioned by threats of invasion by the Young Pretender, rebuilt in 1745 by Reverend McMullan, burnt again during the 1798 Rising, and reopened in 1802. The church underwent complete refurbishment and roof replacement in 1836 at a cost of £100.