Boundary Post near 3 Temple Hill Road Newry Co Down BT34 2LR

Granite boundary stone, believed to date from 1871-72, set into a niche in rubble walling on the west side of Temple Hill Road near number 3, approximately 0.8 kilometres east of Newry town centre. The stone is oblong in section, roughly 0.4 metres in height, with a dressed finish to the front face, rock-faced sides, and a pointed arch top. Although now enclosed within the niche, its three-dimensional form remains clearly discernible. The front face bears incised letters reading "M B", presumed to stand for "Municipal Boundary".

This boundary stone is one of 14 largely identical markers originally set along Newry's former municipal limits, and one of the most complete sets of such features in the whole of Northern Ireland. These stones mark the town's growth and regional importance during the mid to later Victorian period.

Following the establishment of local government in Newry under the Lighting of Towns (Ireland) Act of 1828, a municipal boundary was eventually agreed upon, with the area of the town stated to have been fixed by special act in 1865. However, these boundaries appear to have lacked official status until 1871, when following the passing of the Newry Improvement and Water Act, the Town Commissioners were formally incorporated as a municipal body and the settlement's limits were laid down, seemingly along those established in 1865. This same boundary was later readopted by the Newry Urban District Council, which succeeded the Commissioners after local government reform in 1898.

Whether Newry possessed boundary markers prior to 1871 is uncertain. The absence of any reference to such objects in local newspapers before that date—when such features were often cited as location points in incident reports and property notices—suggests they may not have existed. This is supported by the fact that in October 1871 the Commissioners appointed Mr. Robert Beard to furnish eighteen cut granite stones for borough boundary marks according to specifications. Only from mid-1872 do references to "boundary stones" become frequent in the local press. Most of the granite markers visible today are likely those supplied by Mr. Beard (probably Robert Baird, a stone cutter recorded as having a yard in Mary Street in the 1880s) and therefore date from approximately 1871-72. It is possible, however, that some are later, or that more than the 18 mentioned in 1871 were commissioned, as at least 20 stones are marked along the Urban District Council boundary on various Ordnance Survey maps for this area between 1903 and 1939.

The stone near 3 Temple Hill Road appears on the large-scale 1903 Ordnance Survey map and is likely to have been one of the series of markers put in place in 1871-72 to delineate the jurisdiction of the newly incorporated Town Commissioners. It was presumably originally freestanding, though map evidence makes this difficult to determine with certainty. The wall structure to the north of the marker appears to be of recent construction, but part of that to the south may be older, suggesting this side of the stone may always have been backed against it.