St Cadan’s C of I Church

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A small" planter’s Gothic" church with nave 19½ metres by 8 internally with western tower, shallow chancel, projecting tiny north west vestry built of rubble basalt three bays long and with tall pointed entrance door with a flight of seven steps leading up to it at the west end. The dominating tower is three stages high with shallow clasping buttresses terminating in stepped crenellations, each stage defined by plain string courses. There are three small Y traceried windows decorating the 2nd stage while four large pointed and louvred openings proclaim the belfry. On either side of the tower there are small crenellated blockhouses, one containing the gallery staircase, the other a small store, each punctuated with sandstone trimmed pointed windows, those on the west side blank. The south wall of the nave has three large Y traceried windows broken up with small rectangular glazed panes with railway track astragals at top and widely spaced. On the north wall there are three equivalent blanks with sandstone surrounds except that, at the vestry, this has been built up to allow the latter. The east end of the chancel has a large stone traceried three light window with sparse cusping. The nave and chancel are slated in Welsh slates with two different pitches and a tiny squat minimalist chimney clings to the north end of the nave roof. Barge stones cap the chancel gable.

The church sits lonely on a sloping hillside in the midst of a sizeable graveyard bound by a stone wall. One progresses up a path directly to the west door or the visitor veers off the Duncrun Road down a laneway bereft of trees or shrubs and passes into the graveyard through wrought iron gates between two sentinel-like piers.

Historical information

The name Cadan is probably same as Aidan (see discussion of such in Ordnance Survey Memoirs). In 1784 the present church of St Cadan was built by Lord Bristol to replace the old church of Tamlaghtard, it being in a decayed condition. (see HB02/09/029B). In 1837 the church was in good order and in 1861 the chancel and vestry were added under Ecclesiastical Commissioners architects Welland and Gillespie. It is likely that the gallery was erected at the same time including the crenellated excrescences on each side of the tower.

References:

Parishes & Clergy of Derry and Raphoe by Leslie
Ordnance Survey Memoirs Vol. 11
Topographical Dictionary Vol. 11 by Lewis
U.A.H.S. Buildings of North Derry p. 46
Buildings of North West Ulster by Rowan

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H+. Alterations enhancing the building
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

V. Authorship
X. Local Interest
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance

Evaluation

A good example of a mid-Georgian Gothic church with later Victorian additions and is a good illustration of the use of windows only on the south wall.