St Joseph's RC Church, 41 Sheeptown Road, Newry, Co Down, BT34 2LA

St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church

This early 19th-century barn church stands on the east side of Sheeptown Road in a small churchyard. According to the 1836 Ordnance Survey Memoir, it was erected in 1803 by Reverend Doctor Lennan at a cost of £600. The original structure was built of granite with roughcast, measuring 70 feet long and 34 feet broad and capable of accommodating 650 persons. The 1836 Valuation book records dimensions of 74 feet by 28 feet by 17 feet.

The church has a pitched natural slate roof aligned northeast to southwest with overhanging eaves and half-round metal rainwater goods. Gables feature moulded kneelers and painted moulded concrete skews carrying cross finials. The walls are dashed and painted with smooth rendered basecourse.

The principal northwest elevation runs parallel to Sheeptown Road and is abutted at its centre by an entrance porch. The porch itself has walls and roof detailed as the church, with its ridge meeting the eaves of the main building. The northwest gable of the porch contains a Gothic-headed doorway with painted V-channelled quoins and a pair of modern diagonally sheeted doors with decorative iron strap-hinges and door pull, with a modern light fitting mounted above. The left and right cheeks each have a 1/1 sash window in a chamfered architrave. The main façade has two tall Gothic windows on either side of the porch. All are modern Y-tracery windows with painted cills.

The right (southwest) gable features a large central Gothic-headed window of intersecting tracery. To its left is a Gothic-headed doorway with painted architrave containing a diagonally sheeted door with decorative strap hinges and door pull. The rear (southeast) elevation has three equally spaced windows matching those on the façade. All windows to the main church are similarly detailed as modern Gothic openings.

The left (northeast) gable is largely abutted by a lower sacristy with roof and walls detailed as the church but without cross finials. The sacristy gable end has a pair of tripartite windows with the centre one larger, all modern stained timber 1/1 sliding sashes with painted chamfered architraves and cills. The sacristy's right cheek contains a small 1/1 sash window. A lower flat-roof porch adjoins the sacristy's left side. Its front face has a chamfered doorway set left of centre with a modern glazed timber door, and the right cheek contains a small 1/1 window with a timber louvred vent filling the top sash.

The church stands within a small churchyard enclosed by a painted cement rendered wall with pitched concrete coping. Two gate piers with pyramidal copings carry a pair of modern metal gates. The churchyard contains numerous memorials, with occasional 19th-century slate examples and the majority dating to the 20th century.

The building retains few original features and is of limited architectural or historic interest.