Ballygally Castle, 274 Coast Road, Ballygalley, Larne, Co Antrim, BT40 2QZ

Ballygally Castle is a 17th-century tower house built in 1625, traditionally attributed to James Shaw of Greenock, who had obtained a lease of a considerable estate under Randal, 1st Earl of Antrim. It is Northern Ireland's only complete example of a Scottish-style tower house, one of the rarest surviving examples of 17th-century building still in active use in Northern Ireland, and the most notable architectural feature on the Antrim Coast Road. It now operates as a hotel.

The castle stands within the village of Ballygalley at the landward side of the Coast Road on a corner site, within a now incomplete bawn. Its garden is partly bounded by a stone wall and partly by a stream, with a tarmac area to the main road front. It overlooks a car park on the opposite side of the coastal road and commands unobstructed views over the sea.

ARCHITECTURE

The tower house rises four storeys on an L-shaped plan, the main rectangular block having a square projecting stair tower which also contains the original entrance. Walls are approximately five feet thick, built of stone with a rendered wet-dash finish containing crushed stones, with some dry-dashed portions; original stonework is exposed in places where render has come away. Roofs are slated in Bangor blue slates laid in regular courses. Three corners of the top floor are fitted with conical-roofed bartizan turrets projecting on moulded corbelling of fine quality. Windows range from narrow defensive slits to larger rectangular openings. The original entrance doorway, which faces south-west, is now enclosed within a later porch roofed in green slates, distinguishing it from the original tower.

Attached to this outer porch is a modern three-storey hotel wing with white-painted walls, initially designed in a style alluding to the Scottish origins of the tower house, but subsequently extended in a more variegated form that has lost its earlier coherence. The effective entrance front now faces north-west, where the main entrance leads directly into the modern porch.

ENTRANCE FRONT (NORTH-WEST ELEVATION)

The north-west elevation presents a tall, narrow central entrance bay to the modern porch, with the stair tower of the original castle forming a tall four-storey gabled projection to the left, and a three-storey gabled projection belonging to the modern hotel wing to the right. The entrance bay is one window wide, with one window to each floor above the new main entrance. The door is a rectangular ledged timber door with a moulded surround painted white, surmounted by a modern sign reading "Dungeon Bar." Windows above are rectangular timber fixed lights painted black with small panes. The walling is rendered in dry-dash of crushed stones and the roof is slated in green slates appearing to be of the Westmorland type, in regular courses.

Behind the entrance bay rises the steep-pitched roof of the main block of the original tower house in Bangor blue slates, extending between two gables with chimneys. The modern gabled projection to the right has white-painted rendered walls in wet dash with a green-slated roof; it has a gabled dormer to the side wall, two rectangular windows similar to those of the entrance bay, and a projecting bay at the base with an angled slate-hung parapet and a small rectangular window.

The projecting stair tower to the left of the entrance bay is gabled to both its front and rear faces at the top storey, each gable apex surmounted by what appears to be a short plain chimney without pots, rendered to match the rest of the wall. The roof between gable copings of shaped stone blocks — resting at their bases on shaped kneelers — is of Bangor blue slates. The pitch of the front gable is interrupted on the left-hand side by a circular bartizan turret at the corner, carried on corbel courses, rendered to match the tower, and conically roofed in Bangor blue slates capped with lead. There is a small rectangular four-pane timber fixed light to the ground floor set in a plain undressed recess without a cill, with a diminutive deep-set fixed light immediately above it in a similar opening and two further similar windows at intervals above. A comparable window appears in the front gable, and another in the landward face of the top storey of the stair tower, alongside a smaller blocked-up rectangular opening.

At the base of the stair tower, a short screen wall extends to the left, linking with the boundary wall to the main road. This screen wall contains a Gothic-arched doorway, probably of 1930s construction.

SEAWARD SIDE ELEVATION (NORTH-EAST)

The north-east elevation, overlooking the main road, comprises the gable of the main block to the left and the stair tower to the right. The apex of the main gable is surmounted by a large chimney with a projecting block cornice and two pots. The pitch of the gable is interrupted on the left-hand side by a circular bartizan turret similar to the others, but here the moulded corbel courses are unrendered and the conical roof is surmounted by a ball-like finial. Fenestration on this elevation includes a small rectangular timber window to the right-hand corner of the attic; two larger four-pane windows to the third floor; a larger rectangular small-paned window of three-over-nine lights with a top-hung vent over a fixed light, set in a raised white-painted surround, to the second floor, with a diminutive slit window alongside; and a larger rectangular three-over-nine window detailed similarly to the second floor, to the first floor, with a diminutive slit window to its right. The stair tower contains three diminutive slit windows.

REAR ELEVATION (SOUTH-EAST)

The south-east elevation, overlooking the garden, is four storeys high and two windows wide, with circular bartizan turrets at the corners at third-floor level. Much of the wall is covered with creeper. The steep-pitched roof, slated in regular courses, extends between two gables with chimneys, its eaves line broken by two gabled dormers — one with an ogee curved pediment, the other with a triangular pediment. Both pediments are ornamented with relief carvings, now much weathered and painted, and are crowned by eroded and painted finials. Each dormer contains a rectangular timber window with top-hung vents and fixed lights of two-over-two lights, deep-set in a chamfered opening. Cast-iron gutters and downpipes are present.

To each floor there are two large rectangular windows, irregularly spaced, with raised white-painted surrounds. At the second floor these are small-paned with top-hung vents and fixed lights of three-over-nine lights, replacements for earlier four-over-four sashes. At the first floor there are twelve-pane fixed lights, also replacements for earlier sashes. At the ground floor, the right-hand window has top-hung and fixed lights of six-over-six, and the left-hand window is a vertically hung timber sliding sash of one-over-six with horns. The garden level in front of this elevation has been raised so that it is level with the bottom of the ground-floor windows.

LANDWARD SIDE ELEVATION (SOUTH-WEST)

The south-west elevation shows the gable of the main block of the tower house, much covered with creeper. This gable is similar to the seaward gable, with a chimney to the apex and a bartizan turret to the right-hand corner. Rectangular timber windows of similar character to those elsewhere include two small windows to the attic storey; two slightly larger to the third floor; one at second-floor level, a later 20th-century insertion; and one very small window to the ground floor to the left of steps rising to a first-floor doorway. This doorway has a rectangular timber small-paned and panelled door set in a chamfered raised surround painted white, representing a later 20th-century remodelling of a doorway of at least 19th-century date.

Returning forward from the left-hand corner of this gable is the three-storey gable of the 20th-century hotel wing with white-painted walls.

BOUNDARY WALLS, PIERS, AND FLANKER TOWERS

Large sections of the original 17th-century bawn wall survive, distinguishable by their use of boulder masonry, though there have been later additions, insertions and demolitions. The internal levels of the bawn may have been altered during garden landscaping. The features of the boundary, described from right to left as seen from the entrance front, are as follows.

Extending from the left-hand corner of the original building is a short screen wall of rubble roughly smeared with cement, containing a Gothic-arched doorway with blackstone voussoirs and some brickwork to the jambs, fitted with a ledged timber door. This screen wall abuts the boundary wall to the Coast Road. The boundary wall to the Coast Road is of basalt rubble, erected in its present form in the 20th century, and has a square dressed-stone pier with a ball finial at its right-hand end — a pier of 18th-century appearance that has been relocated from its previous position near the left-hand end on the corner with Cairncastle Road. That corner is now occupied by a circular garden house identified here as the front flanker turret.

The front flanker turret is of 20th-century date, built of blackstone rubble with a conical roof of green slates capped with lead and surmounted by a turned finial, with overhanging eaves. Its outer face has two Gothic-arched lancet windows with blackstone voussoirs and timber Gothic-arched fixed lights with small panes. Entrance is from the garden side only: a ledged timber door painted black in a Gothic-arched opening with blackstone voussoirs. Above the doorway, to each side just under the eaves, are two pigeonholes with projecting cills formed from quarry tiles.

Returning to the left from the front flanker turret, the boundary wall runs along Cairncastle Road. It is of similar construction to the Coast Road boundary wall and has a pair of square dressed-stone piers with ball finials similar to those already described, mounted with modern timber gates, and a large sign affixed to the wall reading "Ballygalley Castle Hotel." The wall continues to the left to another circular garden house identified here as the rear flanker turret.

The rear flanker turret is built of rubble, probably largely of 19th-century date, but rises from a base of boulder masonry that is probably the original 17th-century foundation. It is supposed that the original flanker turret of the 17th century was rebuilt here as a 19th-century garden house. It has a conical roof of Bangor blue slates capped with lead and surmounted by a turned finial, with overhanging eaves in poor condition. Its outer face has two Gothic-arched lancet windows with blackstone voussoirs and timber fixed lights with small panes, in derelict condition. A Gothic-arched doorway with blackstone voussoirs at a lower level has been closed up with modern concrete blockwork. Entrance is from the garden side only: a ledged timber door in a Gothic-arched opening at high level, tucked under the eaves and reached by five stone steps.

The boundary wall continues to the left of the rear flanker turret, viewed from the outer face, in boulder masonry that is presumably part of the original 17th-century bawn wall. It is breached by a roughly formed gateway containing a pair of modern vertically-slatted timber gates. Within the garden, abutting the rear flanker turret just to the right of the doorway and running at right angles to the Cairncastle Road boundary, is a garden wall of basalt rubble overgrown with creeper. This wall contains a Gothic-arched opening with blackstone voussoirs near the turret and, beyond a break, continues and includes another similar archway to the north-west.

OTHER GARDEN FEATURES

There are further runs of rubble walling within the garden, at least some of which are of 17th-century date, including stretches at the south-west and north-west boundaries near the stream. These have suffered significant demolition in places, some of it in 1990 to allow access to the river bank. There is also a free-standing Gothic archway with blackstone voussoirs and raking supports of rubble masonry, presumably the remnant of a more extensive wall, standing to the rear of the hotel wing.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The castle was built in 1625 by a Scotsman, traditionally believed to be James Shaw of Greenock, who had some years previously obtained a lease of a considerable estate under Randal, 1st Earl of Antrim. It remained in the ownership of the Shaw family until 1820, when it was sold to James Agnew of Kilwaughter. In the 18th century, alterations included the enclosing of the original front door in a porch and the addition of a north wing. In the 1830s the building was modernised and became a coastguard station, from which period the larger windows in the tower are presumed to date. The north wing was subsequently rebuilt twice, around 1901 and again in 1938. In the later 19th century the castle was occupied by the Reverend Classon Porter and family, and was then taken over by the Moore family, in whose ownership it was when it was scheduled as an ancient monument and placed under Ministry of Finance surveillance in 1932.

In 1938 — apparently under Lord Antrim — the building was converted to a hotel. Datable to this conversion are the long three-storey hotel wing with dormers, the ceiling plasterwork of the first-floor parlour known as the "1625 Room," the present porch enclosing the original front door, and the creation of the front flanker turret. The castle was sold to Cyril Lord in the early 1950s, who added a garden lounge to the hotel wing in 1956. It is now owned and operated by the Hastings Hotel Group. The castle was an ancient monument (no. ANT35:15) but was descheduled in 1976 and listed in its place.