Lumen Christi College Chapel

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Attached symmetrical three-storey Gothic Revival Chapel and side wings, built c.1940, to the designs of Ralph Henry Byrne. T-shaped on plan facing southeast with central chapel projecting to the centre flanked by four-bay wings to either side connecting Junior Block (HB01/16/003B) to Senior Block (HB01/16/003C). Located on an elevated site on the west side of Bishop Street within extensive landscaped grounds as part of Lumen Christi College campus.

Pitched natural slate roofs with black clay ridgecomb tiles, copper louvred ventilation panels and cast metal guttering to corbelled sandstone eaves course and cast metal downpipes. Chapel roof set behind SE gable having raised verge and sandstone coping, gableted kneeler stones and stone cross to apex. Hipped slate roof to the chancel with rolled lead ridges. At the crossing is an octagaonal plan copper bell tower with tapered spire and trefoil openings. Random coursed squared schist ashlar walling with Portland limestone ashlar dressings. Pointed-arch lancets to chapel formed in chamfered sandstone surrounds with stone Y-tracery and leaded glass windows. Refrectory block has Portland limestone ashlar window surrounds arranged in pairs, square-headed to the second floor, depressed pointed-arched to the first floor and pointed-arched to the ground floor, all having original hardwood sliding sash windows.

Chapel has a three-sided canted chancel projecting from the front (SE) gable with five-bay nave elevations to NE and SW abutted by flat-roofed side aisles with roll-moulded sandstone coping to parapet. The nave windows have hood mouldings that join continuous moulded string course and Portland limestone ashlar quoins. The three lancets to the chancel have elaborate leaded stained glass windows with storm glazing. Each side aisle has a shouldered door opening to the southeast with stop-chamfered Portland limestone surround and vertically-sheeted hardwood door. Stone steps and walling flank the canted projection at the base of the chancel and lead to lobbed square-headed entrance doors.

The north and south side wings have a pointed-arched recessed mosaic tiled porch to the re-entrant angles with compound moulded arches rising from clustered columns on plinth bases. Each porch has a principal SE facing pointed-arch entrance with vertically-sheeted double-leaf timber doors, plain lintel and timber tracery overlights with leaded coloured glazing, flanked by pointed-arch sidelights all having coloured leaded glass. Further door openings are set at 90 degrees to the main doors within each recessed porch; to the left is a pointed-arch with a sheeted timber door and to the right is a square-headed door with two diminutive square-headed openings directly above. All openings within the recessed porch are dressed in stop-chamfered ashlar Portland limestone.

Southwest side elevation abutted by Junior Block (HB01/16/003B).

Rear elevation is largely obscured by two and three-storey flat-roofed rendered extensions with a rear gable visible, detailed as per chancel gable to front.

Northeast side elevation abutted by Senior Block (HB01/16/003C).

Setting:
Located on an elevated site at the south end of Lumen Christi College campus. Overlooking Foyle River to the south and forming part of a wider collection of nineteenth and twentieth-century buildings set on a northeast-southwest axis. Bitmac parking areas to front and side elevations with enclosed yard to rear.
To the north of the site is a seventeenth-century ruinous rubblestone former tower mill incorporating a later brick vaulted ice-house that is now a scheduled monument (LDY 014:500). The tower mill is enclosed within a walled garden having cast-iron railings on a smooth rendered wall. Adjacent to the windmill is a gabled two-storey single bay rubblestone block (Hartwell), built some time between 1875 and 1904 and most recently used as a caretaker's store. The principal elevation to the latter faces SE with square-headed vertically sheeted timber door to ground floor, offset to the right and a round-arched sliding sash with 1/1 single paned window centred at first floor level. Toothed ashlar stone surrounds to openings and quoins and corbelled kneelers to support raised verge. Lead flashing dressed over coping stones and apex stone set behind gable, surmounted by modest finial. SW elevation is rendered smooth with flush metal plate to double doors. NW elevation as SE, without door. NE elevation has rubblestone wall, with porthole and square-headed windows to GF and segmental arched windows to FF; facing in to walled enclosure to former windmill.
The NE and SE of the site is bound by tall rubblestone walls surmounted by steel railings to the N end. An entrance screen opens onto Bishop Street and comprises two pairs of replacement steel gates hung on octagonal reconstituted stone pillars with rubblestone S-curve screen walls having pyramidal concrete copings.

Roof Natural slate
RWG Cast-metal
Walling Random coursed squared schist / Portland limestone
Windows Original hardwood sliding sash to side wings & original leaded lights to chapel

Historical information

Lumen Christi College, a co-educational Roman Catholic grammar school located on Bishop Street, was originally constructed in phases between 1877 and 1941 and was occupied by St. Columb’s College until 1997. The school chapel, including the side wings, was erected in 1936-41 and was the final major addition to the college.

In the 18th century the grounds of Lumen Christi College was located to the south-west of the Bishop’s gardens. In c. 1784 the Earl Bishop of Derry, the Rev. Frederick Hervey, had a two-storey summer residence (known as the Casino) built next to his gardens on the site of the future school buildings. The Casino was purportedly designed by the Milanese architect Placido Columbani who had supervised the construction of contemporary structures at the Bishop’s estate at Downhill. Calley states that the Casino (now demolished) was ‘a stuccoed building 50 feet in length of Ionic temple form with matching bows on its north east and south west elevations.’ The Earl Bishop made little use of the Casino on Bishop Street and by the mid-19th century it formed the centrepiece of a small park that was owned by the Skipton family (Calley; Seeking the Kingdom; DIA).

The Roman Catholic Bishop of Derry, the Rev. Francis Kelly (1812-89), acquired the plot of land and Casino from the Skipton family in 1869 in order to construct a seminary which would provide education for students wishing to join the priesthood. Kelly had been the driving force behind the completion of St. Eugene’s Cathedral in 1873 and had provided £8,000 of his own money towards the construction of the seminary. The foundation stone of St. Columb’s College (briefly known as St. Columbkille’s Seminary) was laid on 11th May 1877. Rowan states that the seminary originally consisted of the Casino, which was adapted into a chapel, and the three-and-a-half-storey seven-bay block (HB01/16/003B) which was attached to the south side of the converted Casino. The seminary was designed by O’Neill & Byrne, a Belfast and Dublin-based architectural partnership which predominantly carried out work on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church, and was constructed by Mr. Matthew McClelland, a local builder and contractor. The Natural Stone Database notes that the new building was constructed of locally-quarried Derry schist and Barony Glen Sandstone. The school bell was cast by the Dublin-based Murphy Bell Foundry in 1879. The completed buildings cost £10,000 and were officially opened on 3rd November 1879 with the Londonderry Journal describing the seminary as ‘one of the most eligible sites about the city of Derry – elevated, enclosed, and well sheltered with plantations. [The seminary comprised] residences and a dining hall for the professors, study hall, student’s rooms, and a large dormitory for the students of the junior classes’ (Seeking the Kingdom; DIA; NSD).

The Annual Revisions initially set the total rateable value of St. Columb’s College at £150 with the adjoining chapel (exempt from taxation) valued at £10. The seminary attracted a large number of boarders leading to the construction of the north wing of the college (HB01/16/003C) in 1892-93. The next addition to the college came in 1897-98 when the museum, library and recreation hall and bathhouse (HB01/16/003D) was constructed to the south side of the Junior House to designs by local architect Edward J. Toye.

There were few further changes to the layout of St. Columb’s College until after the Partition of Ireland. Madden and Bradley state that the school and its pupils were frequently attacked during the War of Independence and that the school buildings were raked by gunfire in the summer of 1920. The next addition to the school came in 1932 when a large extension, consisting of a dormitory block, refectory and kitchen was added to the rear of the Junior House. The addition was designed by James Patrick McGrath (1875-1948), a local architect ‘who developed a varied practice of commercial, domestic, school and Catholic ecclesiastical work’ (DIA). This was followed by the demolition of the 18th Century Casino and the construction of the current college chapel in its place in 1936-41. The chapel, and three-storey block connecting the Junior and Senior Houses, were designed by Ralph Henry Byrne (1877-1946), a Dublin-based architect who carried out a huge volume of work for the Roman Catholic Church throughout Ireland. The Stations of the Cross within the building were painted by George Collie (1904-1975) of Dublin and the new chapel was consecrated and opened on 5th November 1941. The three-storey connecting block consisted of an oratory, infirmary, isolation room, science rooms and additional classrooms with the construction costing £30,000. The First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57) set the total rateable value of St. Columb’s College at £575 with the new chapel valued at £150.

Following the 1947 Education Act, attendance at St. Columb’s College trebled resulting in the erection of temporary classroom accommodation in the school grounds. The value of the school and its chapel had been increased to £2,584 by the end of the Second General Revaluation (1956-72). Accommodation remained a problem for the Trustees and from as early as the 1950s it was recognised that the school facilities on Bishop Street had become inadequate. The solution was reached by the construction of new school buildings on the Buncrana Road which would be utilised as the Senior School whilst the original buildings on Bishop Street remained in use as the Junior School. The new school building was opened in 1973 and was designed by Frank Corr (of Corr & McCormick).
St. Columb’s College was listed in 1979. The Junior School of the college continued to be sited at Bishop Street until 1997 when the entire school was relocated to the Buncrana Road (following the completion of a new Senior Block at the site in that year). In that year the vacated school was acquired by Lumen Christi College, a co-educational Roman Catholic grammar school (founded in 1997). The NIEA HB Records note that a number of alterations and extensions were made to the original school buildings in 1998 in order to make the buildings ready for Lumen Christi pupils. In 2010 the school’s spire and bell system underwent conservation works. (NIEA HB Records).

References

Primary Sources
1.PRONI OS/6/5/20/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1853)
2.PRONI VAL/12/E/157/1 – Annual Revisions Town Plan (c. 1873-1910)
3.PRONI VAL/12/B/32/11A-Y – Annual Revisions (1860-97)
4.PRONI VAL/12/B/33/3A-3C – Annual Revisions (1898-1929)
5.PRONI VAL/3/C/6/12 – First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57)
6.PRONI VAL/4/B/5/17 – Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956-72)
7.Londonderry Journal (Nov 1879)
8.Ulster Town Directories (1880-1943)
9.First Survey Record – HB01/16/003 (1970)
10.NIEA HB Records – HB01/16/003
11.DOE: HED - Historic Monuments Record for 17th century windmill LDY 014:500

Secondary Sources
1.Bradley, T; Madden, F., ‘Seeking the kingdom: St. Columb’s College 1879-2004’ Londonderry: St. Columb’s College, 2004.
2.Calley, D., ‘City of Derry: An historical gazetteer to the buildings of Londonderry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 2013.
3.Ferguson, W. S; Rowan, A. J; Tracey, J. J., ‘List of historic buildings, groups of buildings, areas of architectural importance in and near the city of Derry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1970.
4.Rowan, A. J., ‘The Buildings of Ireland: North West Ulster’ London: Yale University Press, 2003.

Online Resources
1.Dictionary of Irish Architects - http://www.dia.ie/
2.Natural Stone Database - http://www.stonedatabase.com/
3.St. Columb’s College website - http://www.stcolumbs.com/

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

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

Criteria for listing: historic interest

V. Authorship
W. Northern Ireland/International Interest
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
Z. Rarity
R. Age
S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance

Evaluation

Attached symmetrical Gothic Revival chapel and three-storey side wings, built c.1940 to the designs of Ralph Henry Byrne. This building is the centre-piece of Lumen Christi College within a mature elevated site on Bishop St, Derry. It has group value with a number of 19th and 20th Century buildings owned by the school; the Junior House and Refectory (HB01.16.003B), the Senior House (HB01.16.003C) and the Library (HB01.16.001D). As a collection of buildings they are an important social and cultural asset to the local community. This building replaces the original chapel on the site, built c.1784 and commissioned as a summer house by the then Earl Bishop of Derry before being sold to the Rev Francis Kelly in 1869 on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church; it therefore has historical association with two different religions. Past pupils of St Columb’s College, which occupied the school complex until 1997, include John Hume, Nobel Peace Prize winner and Seamus Heaney, awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. Built in schist stone with limestone dressings, the exterior of the chapel exhibits robust detailing consistent with its style and despite some casement windows and an extension to the rear, the copper bell tower, projecting chancel and Gothic proportions set this building amongst some of the best examples of its type. Inside the plan form is largely intact and the chapel interior is of particular note due to the intricate stained glass, rib vaulted ceiling and ornate reredos. The octagonal pillars, curved gate screen and substantial rubble stone walling along Bishop St, together with the small gabled schilst stone structure known as the Hartwell Block and the former tower mill (LDY 014:500) that are enclosed to the NE of the chapel add significant interest to the setting.