Historic Building Details

HB Ref No:
HB10/04/003

Address :
St Eugene's Church of Ireland Church Ardstraw Parish Church Main Street Newtownstewart Co. Tyrone BT78 4AA

Townland:
Newtownstewart

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Survey 2:
B1

Date of Listing:
15/04/1981 00:00:00

Date of De-listing:

Current Use:
Church

Former Use
Church

Conservation Area:
Yes

Industrial Archaeology:
No

Vernacular:
No

Thatched:
No

Monument:
No

Derelict:
No

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OS Map No:
104-2

IG Ref:
H4003 8566

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Owner Category

Church - C of I

Exterior Description And Setting

A rendered Church of Ireland church, dated 1724, located on the west side of Main Street. Rectangular on plan, facing west, later chancel to east, modern lean-to vestry to south, four-stage tower with spire to west flanked by lean-to porch to north (raised to two stories) and lean-to single-storey former vestry to south. Roof is pitched natural slate, blue/black angled clay ridge tiles, dressed stone verges, ogee-profile uPVC gutters. Walling is roughcast over a chamfered smooth-rendered plinth. Windows are round-headed stained glass casements in stepped stone surrounds surmounted by hoodmould with label-stops; stone sills. Tower has pointed-arched-headed openings throughout. West gable is abutted by tower to centre, porch to left and former vestry to right. Exposed section is blank. Tower has dressed stone stringcourse and moulded cornice; pointed arch-headed double-leaf timber sheeted entrance doors with ironmongery in painted masonry surround; stage two and three each contain louvred opening to east elevation; stage four is blank and is surmounted by octagonal dressed stone spire with pinnacles. Porch and vestry are roughcast. Vestry has single modern casement at south. Porch contains replacement casements to west, pointed arch-headed door with ironmongery in painted stone surround to north . North elevation is two-windows wide; quoins at left. East gable is abutted by chancel, exposed section is blank. Chancel has stone quoins and contains central pointed-arched-headed decorated tracery window with flush sill. Dressed stone date plaque serif-inscribed “1724” below sill. South elevation is three-windows wide and is abutted by modern vestry to right end. The church is situated in a graveyard with numerous eighteenth- and nineteenth-century gravestones, graveslabs, table tombs and chest tombs on an elevated site terraced with roughcast boundary walls to the west of Main Street, accessed via T-plan stairs, square dressed stone gate piers with ball finials flanked by cast iron double gates, modern cast-bronze roundel 1995 plaque erected by the Newtownstewart Development Association; churchyard to west by random rubble wall with cast iron gates, bordered by mature trees to south, former model school (HB10/04/008) to north. Roof: Pitched natural slate roof, blue/black angled clay ridge tiles Walling: Roughcast over a chamfered smooth-rendered plinth Windows: Windows are round-headed stained glass casements, stone sills RWG: Ogee-profile uPVC

Architects

Welland & Gillespie

Historical Information

The church appears, rectangular in plan, on the 1833 OS Map. The tower, although in existence at this time, is masked in plan due to the presence of a vestry and porch to south and north of the tower. By the 1854 Map these had disappeared and the tower becomes briefly visible. By the 1905 map the vestry and porch have been rebuilt. On the 1898 Annual Revisions Town Plan a new vestry is marked to the east of the south elevation. However, this was rebuilt in the 1970s. A chancel was added to the east elevation in 1909. The church and graveyard are valued at £25 in the Townland Valuation Records (1828-40) and there are no major changes in subsequent valuations. OS Memoirs record, “The church, a plain rectangular building with a square tower and spire 93 feet long and 31 feet broad, is situated at the south western end of the Main Street. It contains a gallery on the north side and is lighted by 7 windows, 2 of which are on the north side, 3 on the south, 1 at the east and 1 small one at the west…it was rebuilt in the year 1727 by Dr John Hall, then rector of this parish and previously vice-provost of Trinity College, Dublin.” (p.7) However, a datestone below the east window of the chancel records the year 1724. A previous church was erected on the site in 1622 by Sir William Stewart. (Gebbie 1946) The Diocesan History notes that, “The parish was founded by St Eugene who lived in the middle of the 6th century. Ardstraw was for a period the seat of a bishop before the see was transferred to Derry. The area was planted by the Stewart family. The present church, which dominates the town of Newtownstewart, was built around 1735. The parish was amalgamated with Baronscourt in 1976 and with Badoney Upper and Lower and Greenan in 1986” (p.39). The History states that the spire was added to the tower in 1806 (p.100). Rowan adds that the church was “altered inside in 1858 [and] in 1867 by Welland and Gillespie” (p.442) According to the late Rev. John Hewitt Gebbie, the church historian and former canon, the church was ceiled with Carolina pine in 1897. The church was redesigned and refurbished between 1906 and 1910. The chancel with its ornate floor tiles was erected in 1909 and its oak panelling was donated in 1938. The communion rails are modern. (Ferguson, etc., p.77 and 78, and Gebbie, 1946). Rowan also notes stained glass by Heaton, Butler and Bayne, and Clokey (1952) and monuments to the Rev John Hall dated 1735 and Katherine, daughter of Sir William Stewart Kt, 1634. (p.442) References: Primary Sources: 1. PRONI OS/6/6/17/1 – First Edition OS Map (1833) 2. PRONI OS/6/6/17/2 – Second Edition OS Map (1854) 3. PRONI OS/6/6/17/3 – Third Edition OS Map (1905) 4. PRONI VAL/1A/6/17 – Townland Valuation Map 5. PRONI VAL/1B/637A-F – Townland Valuation Records (1828-1840) 6. PRONI VAL/2/D/6/10 – Griffith’s Valuation Town Plan (1849-1869) 7. PRONI VAL/2/B/6/40B – Griffith’s Valuation Records (1858) 8. PRONI VAL/12/E/160/1 – Annual Revision Records Town Plan (1898) 9. PRONI VAL/12/E/160/2 – Annual Revision Records Town Plan (1908) 10. PRONI VAL/12/B/42/27A-F – Annual Revision Records (1860-1929) Secondary Sources 1. Gebbie, John Hewitt. “Ardstraw Parish Church, Newtownstewart: Year Book and Blotter, 1946.” Newtownstewart, Co. Tyrone: Self-published, 1946. 2. Gebbie, John Hewitt. “Ardstraw (Newtownstewart): Historical Survey of a Parish 1600-1900.” Omagh: The Strule Press, 1968. 3. Ferguson, G. Eric, June Cochrane, John Dunbar, Joan Ferguson, Victor Laughlin, Lily Loughlin, Carol McKelvey, eds. “The Changing Years in the Grouped Parishes of Ardstraw, Baronscourt and Badoney Union. Omagh, Co. Tyrone: Graham Printers, 2001. 4. Rowan, Alistair. “North West Ulster: Londonderry, Donegal, Fermanagh, and Tyrone.” Buildings of Ireland Series. Dublin: Penguin Books, 1979.

Criteria for Listing

Architectural Interest

A. Style B. Proportion C. Ornamentation D. Plan Form H-. Alterations detracting from building I. Quality and survival of Interior J. Setting

Historic Interest

V. Authorship W. Northern Ireland/International Interest Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance Z. Rarity

Evaluation

A rectangular plan rendered Church of Ireland church, dated 1724, located on the west side of Main Street. Despite an early-twentieth-century chancel and a Victorian remodelled interior, this substantial early-eighteenth-century church and tower with an early-nineteenth-century spire possesses a remarkable number of significant wall-mounted memorials, a variety of high-quality twentieth-century stained glass windows, and connections to a number of notable influential historical individuals of regional interest. The church has a number of influential ties to Trinity College, Dublin, and to the prominent families of the area, including the eponymous Stewarts and Galbraiths of Clanabogan, Omagh (HB11/05/001). Notable twentieth-century stained glass by artists Heaton, Butler & Bayne, Clokey of Belfast, Caldermac Studios, and C.W.S. Design Stained Glass Studio of Lisburn.

General Comments

Date of Survey

02 April 2009