Congregational Church, Cornaig

The Congregational Church in Cornaig was built in 1856 to replace an earlier thatched-cottage church. It’s important to the religious history of Tiree as one of only two surviving Congregational churches built by the Rev. Archibald Farquharson, a significant figure in the island's history. The church is a small, simple rectangular building with a plan arranged around two bays in the nave, featuring plain gabled ends. It is constructed of squared rubble stone, primarily whinstone, with large whinstone quoins and pink Mull granite lintels above the openings.

Entry is through a raised doorway in the centre of the south gable, accessed by three stone steps to ground level, with a timber-boarded door. The north gable is largely plain, with evidence of a blocked-up small window or alcove at the gablehead, topped by a small stone plinth with a slate cap. Two evenly spaced window openings are set close to the eaves on each side of the nave. The granite lintels contrast with the rubble walls, with only a course of rubble separating them from the wallhead, where a slated roof overhangs. Iron fixings remain on the window margins, indicating the windows were once shuttered. Large, square holes are visible beneath the right-hand window on both nave walls, likely to have allowed drainage and ventilation beneath a raised, wooden raft-type floor.

The interior was extremely dilapidated in 2005, but the original form is still partly visible. The church had a timber-boarded floor and walls up to cill height, with the upper walls rendered and whitewashed. The roof was also timber-boarded and coomed, including wide timbers running from north to south, and a single former air vent in the centre. Fixed wooden pews once filled the church, with brackets for them still visible on the walls, although most of the pews have disappeared or rotted. A central, raised pulpit is located at the north end of the church. It features a timber-boarded front panel framed by square timber newels with ball finials, and capped by a moulded timber balustrade. Behind the pulpit platform, the remnant of a three-peaked timber backboard reredos is visible in the whitewash. Internal inspection reveals roof timbers with both a tie beam and a collar beam, with rafters returning directly onto the rubble wallhead.

The church is built using random rubble, roughly coursed, with some snecking, set in lime mortar, and includes a lime harl sacrificial coating. It also features whinstone rubble quoins, pink granite lintels, stone skews, and a pitched, grey slated roof. Remnants of 18-pane timber sash and case windows remain.