Former Rectory, Dromara House, 50 Banbridge Road, Dromara, County Down, BT25 2NE

Dromara House is a detached, two-storey-over-basement, three-bay symmetrical Georgian dwelling, formerly the rectory for the nearby St John's Church, with which it has group value. It was built around 1820–1821, possibly designed or built by James McBlain or Charles Lilley, and is situated on the south side of the Banbridge Road on the outskirts of Dromara.

The house is L-shaped on plan. It has a hipped natural slate roof with blue/black angled ridge tiles and rendered, centred chimneystacks with terracotta pots. Replacement cast-iron rainwater goods are fitted. The walling to the principal elevations is painted smooth render with raised quoins and band rustication to the ground floor of the facade; the rear is finished in roughcast render. Windows are mainly 6/6 timber-framed sliding sash with horns, some of which are replacements. To the ground floor, decorative voussoirs rise from a platband at window-head level, forming a slight recess to the ground floor windows. The ground floor windows to the south elevation are set into chamfered surrounds with segmental arches.

The principal elevation faces east and is symmetrical, three openings wide. At its centre is the original timber entrance door of six flat panels, accessed by three stone steps and surmounted by a large segmental fanlight with decorative timber lattice-work; this pattern is repeated in the sidelights, which have projecting painted masonry sills. The south elevation has two windows to each floor including the basement; at the centre of the ground and first floor there is a blind window. The west elevation has a window to the left and a stairwell window to the first floor; at ground floor there is a window to the far left, abutted by an L-shaped flat-roof extension at the angle with the return. The return to the right has a replacement glazed timber door with transom light. There is also an original segmental-headed stairwell window to the rear. The north elevation has three small windows to the first floor and is abutted by a modern single-storey gabled extension. A further single-storey modern flat-roof extension has been added to the rear.

Although the interior has been much altered during a refurbishment, the building retains its original central stairwell, which is one of the few surviving original interior features.

The house is set in mature grounds set back from the main Dromara to Banbridge road, accessed by a curved driveway with a modern entrance wall, gate piers, and large electronic gates, with mature trees and hedgerow enclosing the property on all sides. To the rear stands a large two-storey rubble stone and roughcast outbuilding with a natural slate roof and original timber-sheeted carriage doors; this original roughcast outbuilding is intact and contributes to the setting, forming a group with the main house. The rear yard is enclosed to the north by a painted masonry wall with replacement wrought-iron gates and piers with ball finials, with a small gatehouse to the right. The south gable of the outbuilding extends to enclose the yard to the south.

The building first appears on the 1833 Ordnance Survey map as a large square building with an L-shaped outbuilding extending towards the road, recorded at that time as a Glebe House. The contemporary Townland Valuation assessed the Glebe as a first-class dwelling worth £24 2s., which included the main house, two major returns, and six out-offices. It was then occupied by the Reverend Hannington Elijah Boyd, incumbent of the parish church — known as St John's Church after 1896 — which stood a short distance to the east. The Ordnance Survey Memoirs for Dromara record that the glebe lands were in the possession of the Established Church and that the glebe, consisting of 20 acres, was rented from the Marquis of Downshire together with the house. The Memoirs also note that in the 1830s there were no gentlemen's seats in the Dromara area with the exception of the Glebe House and Curacy.

According to S. E. Long, a late Rector of St John's Church, the Glebe House was built in 1821 and leased to Reverend Boyd with a gift of £100; a loan of £1,125 was granted by the Board of First Fruits to construct the property. There is little discernible alteration visible on the second edition Ordnance Survey map of 1859, and Griffith's Valuation of 1861 records the building's value at £25. Reverend Boyd resided at the Glebe House until 1881, when he was replaced by Joseph H. Chapman, who complained that the rateable value was too high; valuers examined his claim and reduced it to £21. Following the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland in 1870–71, the Glebe became known as the Rectory and is recorded as such on the third edition Ordnance Survey map of 1903. That map also shows that an extension had been built to the Rectory, attaching it to the L-shaped outbuilding visible on earlier maps; it is likely that this extension was built during repairs carried out in 1874. The Church vestry had feared that the Glebe and its lands would be sold following disestablishment in 1870–71, but these fears were not realised.

In 1900 the Reverend W. Falkner occupied the Rectory and resided there until 1922, when the Reverend J. Armstrong came into possession. The Rectory was bought outright by the Church Representative Body in 1913. The 1901 Census records that Reverend Falkner, born around 1848, lived in the Rectory with his wife, children, and two servants, and that the building was recorded as a first-class dwelling of 15 rooms. The out-offices in the L-shaped extension at that time included a stable, coach house, harness room, cow house, calf house, piggery, two fowl houses, a potato house, and a shed.

From 1939 the Rectory was used for some evening services, as it was easier to black out its windows than to darken the church itself during the threat of Luftwaffe attack; in 1940 further repairs and redecoration were carried out, possibly to accommodate this new function. The Vestry eventually concluded that the upkeep of the Rectory was a considerable drain on church resources, and a decision was made to sell the property in 1952. A buyer could not be found until 1958, when it was purchased by a Lieutenant Colonel Cunningham for a sum of between £5,000 and £7,000. A new, cost-effective rectory was built in 1960 for £5,000.

According to Brett, part of the house — specifically the stone outbuildings at the rear — was originally used as a manor court house, owing to the fact that a former Rector also served as the local Justice of the Peace; a so-called "black hole" used to detain offenders is said to still exist in the basement. The outbuildings to the north of the house are still standing and are currently used by the owners as farm buildings. The rear extension was added in 2001. The former rectory was listed in 1993.