Old Parish Church Tower, Old Church Yard Entry, Church Street, Ballymena, Co. Antrim

Old Parish Church Tower, Church Street, Ballymena, Co. Antrim

This is an early 19th century Gothic Revival tower, built in 1822 as part of the Church of Ireland parish church by William Dean for the Board of Works at a cost of £320. It now stands free, the main body of the church having been demolished at some point before 1933, leaving only the tower and the west gable wall still attached to it. The structure is one of only three surviving towers from the original seven that once gave rise to the epithet 'Ballymenagh of the Seven Towers', a phrase reputedly coined by Sir Alexander Shafto Adair, whose family were long-time owners of the Ballymena estate. The other two surviving towers are those of the present Church of Ireland church and the Roman Catholic church in the town.

The church itself had a long history before demolition. It was originally built in 1707 and consecrated in 1721, used as a barracks in 1798, and in 1822 — the same year the tower was added — a gallery was inserted. The church was enlarged again in 1826 but held its last service in 1855, the congregation having moved to a new church in Castle Street that year. By the time of the Ordnance Survey Memoirs of the 1830s, the building was described as "a plain edifice 66 feet long and 27 feet wide, and has a plain square tower 40 feet high at its western end. It contains (including the gallery) 55 seats and would accommodate 380 persons [elsewhere reported as 330 persons]….There is a small organ."

The tower is a two-stage structure of roughly coursed basalt rubble, built in diminishing stages with chamfered sandstone dressing to a projecting plinth, a plain sandstone cornice to the lower stage, and a moulded sandstone cornice to the upper stage. At the top, a moulded cornice projects on a sandstone corbel course and is surmounted by a rubble stone crenellated parapet with plain sandstone copings and square piers at each corner in coursed basalt, each topped with ashlar sandstone pinnacles.

On the west elevation, the lower stage contains a two-centred Gothic arched opening with shaped basalt voussoirs, resembling an original doorway but later closed up with rubble. A later cast iron downpipe projects just above plinth level. Above this archway is a wide elliptical opening, also with shaped basalt voussoirs, later closed off with tongued and grooved timber sheeting. The upper stage contains a tall, narrow Gothic arched lancet with shaped basalt voussoirs and a plain projecting sandstone sill, fitted with horizontal timber louvres. The north elevation is similar to the west, except that there is no Gothic arched opening at ground floor level.

The south elevation largely mirrors the west, but here the Gothic arched opening at ground level forms the active doorway, containing a tongued and grooved sheeted timber door or panel set in a chamfered timber frame, later boarded over up to the level of the arch springing. Some of the walling around the ground floor on this side has been crudely repointed with smeared mortar.

The rear or east elevation comprises a stepped gable of rubble basalt with old brickwork to the extremities, the central section being surmounted by the upper stage of the tower, which matches the design and materials of the other elevations. Shaped sandstone copings step up each side of the brickwork gable, with a plain sandstone string course. In the centre of the gable is a lower elliptical archway, now closed up and partly broken through by later infill of rubble and brickwork. Above it is a tall Gothic arched opening, also closed up with basalt rubble and brickwork. These former central openings now contain a recessed wall plaque and memorials, all in poor condition. To each side of the central opening at low level are projecting stone wall memorials; above these is a pair of semi-circular arched recesses with rendered reveals and inner faces.

To the left of the tower, set back to its rear face, extends a gable wall of basalt rubble with roughly squared basalt quoins; the gable carries brickwork steps surmounted by sandstone copings, and the top portion of the main wall just below the steps contains an arched opening, now closed. An equivalent gable wall of similar design and materials extends to the right of the tower. In the angle between the north wall of the tower and the north end of the gable wall is a small burial plot enclosed within iron railings.

The tower stands in an old grass-covered churchyard and faces the main street, positioned on axis along a tree-lined avenue from the entrance gateway. That gateway comprises a pair of tall iron gates combining a lower series of spear-headed railings with an upper tier of fleur-de-lys finial-headed railings, set between a pair of tall square piers of coursed Tardee granite with ashlar sandstone capstones and moulded cornices and projecting basalt plinths. Short lengths of snecked basalt screen walls extend to each side. The gateway is set well back from the main street, reached up a slightly inclined entry flanked on each side by street-front buildings and surfaced with small modern paviours. From the gateway, a tarmac driveway flanked by low basalt rubble retaining walls with sandstone copings leads up along a pathway lined by tall trees. The tarmac avenue continues as a path around the base of the tower and gable, and extends a short distance to the east.

The churchyard is grassed and contains a number of 19th century headstones and other memorials, some with ornamented cast iron railings, but most in a state of disrepair and others derelict; none is of any special architectural or art-historical interest. Of minor historical interest is a recumbent cross-slab along the south boundary wall commemorating Ensign John Dyas, who died in 1860 and was a figure of some fame in the annals of the 51st Foot under the Duke of Wellington at Badajoz in 1811 during the Peninsular Wars. There are also some 18th century headstones along the southern part of the western boundary walls, including those of Susansa Courtney (died 1797), Florence McBean (?) (died 1756), Elizabeth Edmonston (died 1764), and Barbara Ferguson (died 1734). The southern boundary is formed partly by a basalt rubble wall and partly by a rendered wall; the eastern boundary is similar; the northern boundary is formed by a basalt rubble wall and the gable of an adjacent building; and the western boundary is similar.