The Freemason's Hall

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Detached symmetrical multi-bay three-storey over basement stuccoed former Bishop’s Palace, built c.1750. Rectangular on plan with pair of advanced end bays and a central portico. Facing southeast onto Bishop Street Within with a single-storey over basement accretion to the south side elevation and a bitmac car park to the rear and side elevations.

Hipped natural slate roof with black clay ridge tiles, painted rendered profiled chimney stacks having painted octagonal clay pots and cast-iron guttering on iron drive-through brackets and cast-iron downpipes. Painted rendered walling with rusticated rendered soldier quoins, deep moulded drip cornice to the eaves and channel-rusticated walling to the basement level forming a raised plinth course. Square-headed window openings with patent rendered reveals, painted masonry sills and largely replacement timber sash windows with convex horns.

Symmetrical front elevation is five windows wide with advanced end bays and three central recessed bays with a raised colonnaded portico to the recess. 6/3 timber sash windows to the second floor, 6/6 to the remainder. Aediculated window surround to the central first floor, opening onto the flat roofed portico with blind parapet wall. The portico comprises a dentilled entablature supported by a bracket to either end and two pairs of Doric columns rising from a panelled balustrade set on channel-rusticated plinth. A central round-headed door opening houses a replacement double-leaf hardwood door with diamond-faced panels and glazing, flanked by Doric pilasters supporting a stepped lintel cornice and plain fanlight with architrave and keystone. The door opens onto a raised platform and concrete steps opening onto the street via an iron pedestrian gate.

Multi-bay south side elevation has randomly placed window openings abutted by a single-storey over basement accretion.

Symmetrical rear elevation has a pair of shallow breakfronts to either end bay. To the ground floor of both end bays is a tripartite timber sash window with slender pilasters. A single square-headed door opening to the north provides access to the basement.

Symmetrical north side elevation is five windows wide with a central shallow breakfront, three windows wide. At first floor level are five leaded stained glass windows with storm glazing.

Roof Natural slate
RWG Cast-iron
Walling Painted render
Windows Timber sash

Setting:
Set on a prominent elevated site to the southwest of The Diamond and standing opposite the Courthouse (HB 01/19/002). Bitmac car park encircles the building enclosed to the street by a rubblestone wall with replacement steel gates.

Historical information

The Masonic Hall, a three-storey five-bay Georgian building located on Bishop Street, is the earliest surviving building on the street. It was originally constructed in 1753 as the Bishop’s Palace before being substantially altered in the early-19th century and acquired for use as a Masonic Hall in 1945.

According to early-17th century plans of Londonderry, the building was erected on, or near to, the site of the medieval Augustinian Abbey known as the ‘Dubh Regles’ (Black Abbey). Following the construction of the walls in 1613-18, the abbey found itself located in the south-western quadrant of the city between the current Bishop Street and Society Street (Raven’s plans of Londonderry 1622-25; Ó Baoill). The Ordnance Survey Memoirs (1837) record that as part of the settlement of Londonderry, a manse was erected for the local clergy on the current site ‘by the Corporation of London immediately after the plantation at an expense of £500.’ Colby, the author of the memoir, suggests that this building continued to stand until the erection of the Bishop’s Palace in 1753. The current building was constructed under William Barnard (1697-1768), Bishop of Derry from 1746 and described by the OSM as ‘a man of distinguished piety and virtue’ and ‘a great benefactor to the see of Derry’ by the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Robert Simpson in his Annals of Derry (1847) records that the 1753 Bishop’s Palace was almost entirely rebuilt under Frederick Hervey who was Bishop of Derry between 1768 and 1803 but Rankin suggests that ‘there is little evidence for [a] substantial rebuilding. Indeed only three accounts are known to have survived, of which one was for cleaning the palace for the painters in 1787. Earlier that year a number of small repairs had been carried out – “stuff and carpentry work,” window sashes, coach house doors, brass works for window curtains … but this is all’ (OSM; Oxford DNB; Rankin, p. 9).

Hervey (1730-1803), who was known as the Earl Bishop, was the 4th Earl of Bristol and was appointed Bishop of Derry by his brother the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. According to Lacey, the Earl Bishop was an ‘eccentric and bizarre character’ who chiefly resided at his estate in Downhill but also frequently resided at the Bishop’s Palace and his summer residence on Bishop Street Without (see Lumen Christi – HB01/16/003). Hervey’s greatest contribution to the city was his unstinting support for the erection of the first wooden bridge across the River Foyle (built in 1789). In the late-18th century the Earl Bishop’s visits to Londonderry became increasingly rare and the Bishop’s Palace was converted into a Barracks whilst the gardens to the rear were opened onto the city walls and utilised as parade grounds; that section of the walls continues to be known as ‘Grand Parade’ (Simpson; Lacey).

Following its tenure as a military barracks, the Bishop’s Palace was repaired and returned to domestic use by William Knox who succeeded Hervey as Bishop in 1803. Rowan suggests that the ‘distinctly Regency’ appearance of the Palace dates from Knox’s restoration and may have been the work of John Bowden (d. 1822) a Dublin-based architect who was also responsible for the design of the Court House (HB01/19/002) opposite in 1813-17 (Rowan, p. 393). In 1832 the Townland Valuations set the total rateable value of the Bishop’s Palace at £311 4s. 8d. And noted that the gardens to the rear of the building included a number of outbuildings including a garden house, coach house, cattle shed and servants quarters to name but a few (all now demolished). The contemporary Ordnance Survey Memoirs described the Palace as a ‘substantial and commodious building, but has no pretentions to architectural beauty’ (OSM, p. 107). The total rateable value of the Bishop’s Palace had been lowered to £230 under Griffith’s Valuation and remained at that level until 1919 when it was further lowered to £140.

The general layout of the Bishop’s Palace does not appear to have been discernibly altered since the late-18th century. Porter’s 1799 map of Londonderry depicts the building along its current layout, consisting of a square-shaped block possessing a wing extending towards Bishop’s Gate. The first and second edition Ordnance Survey maps (1830; 1853), as well as the detailed c. 1873 Town Plan of Londonderry, also depicted the Palace along this same layout. The town plan does show that the entrance portico had not been constructed by the late-Victorian period. According to Calley the ‘entrance portico with slender paired columns and asymmetrically placed steps below the parapeted roof’ was added in the 20th century. Photographs of Bishop Street dating from the late-Victorian and Edwardian periods show that the entrance was altered between c. 1890 and c. 1906. The photographs also show that the single-storey caretaker’s residence (extending from the Palace towards Bishop’s Gate) was also constructed during this period. The 1911 Census described the Bishop’s Palace as a 1st class dwelling that consisted of 40 rooms and possessed a number of outbuildings including three stables and coach houses and two cow houses (all demolished by the 1970s).

Under the First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57) the value of the Bishop’s Palace was increased to £178. The building continued to be utilised as residence for the Bishop of Derry and Raphoe until 1945 when the building was sold to the Freemasons and converted into a Masonic Hall. According to Simpson (1847) Londonderry’s Masonic Hall was formerly located in Magazine Street near Butcher’s Gate in a building that possessed a ‘neat tetrastyle portico’ and possessed a ‘large dining room, a ball room and a grand council room’ (Simpson, p. 245). Following its conversion into a Masonic Hall, the former Bishop’s Palace continued to be valued at £178 but this was increased to £400 by the end of the Second Revaluation (1956-72).

In 1970 the UAHS guide for Londonderry noted that all the original outbuildings to the rear of the Masonic Hall had been demolished in order to convert the former garden into a car park. The Masonic Hall was included in the Historic City Conservation Area in 1977 and was subsequently listed in 1979. The building continues to be utilised by the city’s local Masonic orders and recently underwent a refurbishment to the external facades in 2010. An Ulster History Circle Blue Plaque located on the Bishop Street façade records that the Bishop’s Palace was the former residence of Cecil Frances Alexander (1818-95), wife of the Rev. William Alexander (Bishop of Derry and later Archbishop of Armagh) and a famous hymn writer who wrote ‘Once in Royal David’s City,’ ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ and ‘There is a Green Hill Far Away’ (Ulster History Circle).

References

Primary Sources
1. Raven’s Plans of Londonderry (1622; 1625)
2. Porter’s Map of Londonderry (1799)
3. PRONI OS/6/5/20/1 – First Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1830)
4. PRONI OS/6/5/20/2 – Second Edition Ordnance Survey Map (1853)
5. PRONI VAL/12/E/157/1/14 – Annual Revisions Town Plan (c. 1873)
6. PRONI VAL/1/B/547E – Townland Valuations (1832)
7. PRONI VAL/2/B/5/16C – Griffith’s Valuation (1856)
8. PRONI VAL/12/B/32/11A-11ZD – Annual Revisions (1860-1897)
9. PRONI VAL/12/B/33/5A-5C – Annual Revisions (1898-1929)
10. PRONI VAL/3/C/6/10 – First General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1936-57)
11. PRONI VAL/4/B/5/13 – Second General Revaluation of Property in Northern Ireland (1956-72)
12. Robert Simpson’s ‘Annals of Derry’ (1847)
13. Ulster Town Directories (1852-1918)
14. Census of Ireland (1911)
15. First Survey Record – HB01/19/006 (1970)
16. First Survey Image – HB01/19/006 (No Date)
17. NIEA HB Records – HB01/19/006
18. Foyle Civic Trust – Living City Project (Bishop Street)

Secondary Sources
1. Calley, D., ‘City of Derry: An historical gazetteer to the buildings of Londonderry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 2013.
2. 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.
3. Lacey, B., ‘Siege city: The story of Derry and Londonderry’ Belfast: The Blackstaff Press, 1990.
4. Ó Baoill, R., ‘Island City: The archaeology of Derry – Londonderry’ Belfast: Northern Ireland Environment Agency, 2013.
5. Rankin, P., ‘Irish building ventures of the Earl Bishop of Derry’ Belfast: Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, 1972.
6. Rowan, A. J., ‘The Buildings of Ireland: North West Ulster’ London: Yale University Press, 2003.
7. ‘Londonderry Historic City Conservation Area Booklet’ Department of the Environment, 1977.
8. ‘A Design Guide for the Historic City Conservation Area’ Department of the Environment, 2012.

Online Resources
1. Dictionary of Irish Architects - http://www.dia.ie
2. Ulster History Circle website - http://www.ulsterhistory.co.uk/cecilfrancesalexander.htm

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
U. Historic Associations
W. Northern Ireland/International Interest
R. Age

Evaluation

Detached symmetrical multi-bay three-storey over basement stuccoed former Bishop’s Palace, built c.1750 with entrance portico added in the early 20th century, set on a prominent elevated site to the southwest of The Diamond, overlooking City Wall to the rear (North West). Among its residents were Frederick Hervey (1730-1803), who was known as the Earl Bishop, (he was 4th Earl of Bristol) appointed Bishop of Derry by his brother the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Hervey’s greatest contribution to the city was his unstinting support for the erection of the first wooden bridge across the River Foyle. Although the use of this building has changed, the continuation of an institutional function has resulted in much of its original internal detailing having survived whilst the exterior retains its original façade composition and refined presence in the street. Sited opposite the Courthouse (HB01/19/002), this impressive structure constitutes an important part of the ecclesiastical and architectural history of Londonderry within its historic walls.