Chapel, Mourne Grange, Newry Road, Kilkeel, Newry, Co Down, BT34

Chapel at Mourne Grange

A small barn church with a south transept, vestry and porch, situated within the grounds of Mourne Grange House. The building was completed in 1911 and dedicated on 5th April that year by the Archbishop of Armagh.

The chapel has a natural slate roof with blue clay ridges and raised gables coped in limestone. Overhanging eaves feature exposed rafter tails supporting cast iron rainwater goods. The walls are wet dashed and painted with limestone dressings. On the north wall, the projecting gabled porch is the most decorative feature. The porch gable has limestone copings with a moulded ridge and kneelers, and is naturally slated with a crested ridge. Forty-five-degree buttresses with limestone copings occupy each corner. Two stones above the door are engraved 1910. The door case is early English Gothic in style, with a modern outer door, a granite threshold, encaustic tile paving inside, and a sheeted ceiling.

The nave windows have limestone dressings and trefoil heads, with chamfered reveals and flush cills. Vestry windows are Gothic shaped with plaster dressings. The west gable contains a granite trefoil and below it three lancet lights with plaster dressings. South wall nave windows match those on the north, while the transept has Gothic shaped windows with plaster dressings and a modern bargeboard to its roof. The east gable is similar to the west.

The chapel was donated by Mrs Montgomery of Rokeby Hall, Co. Louth, the mother of a pupil at Mourne Grange Preparatory School. She offered the Gothic doorway, stonework and windows from her private chapel. The building was dismantled in 1910 and rebuilding was complete by November that year. The school eventually closed in 1971 and the premises subsequently became Mourne Grange Village Community.