Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall, 33 Urbal Road, Coagh, Cookstown, Co Tyrone

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

This building was demolished March 2008

A two-storey inter-war rendered hall with a neo-Georgian classical style three-bay frontispiece but very plain appearance to the side and rear elevations.

It stands within the built-up area of the village facing a public road but set back slightly from it within its own plot.

The main entrance faces south-east, and stands in the centre of a symmetrical front which is divided into three bays by rusticated strips of two-storey height to the extremities, and a pair of Ionic pilasters to the first floor which rise from the ends of a slightly projecting surround to the main entrance on the ground floor.
Above the quoins and pilasters are short dentil cornices surmounted by four projecting blocks and a cornice to the parapet which breaks up in the centre bay to form an open pediment which has a dentil cornice. The blocks over the pilasters are ornamented with an unusual stylised leaf design while the central field of the pediment contains raised datestone and letters proclaiming 'Coagh Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall AD 1920'.
Wallling is of smooth cement render, with projecting plinth, stringcourses, and cornices.
The main entrance contains a rectangular timber sheeted door set in a segmental arched recess. Across the front face of the door is an original wrought iron expanding lattice-work grill gate. Above in the first floor is a central segmental arched recess with a moulded surround and keystone with a pair of narrow sidelights in stop-chamfered reveals containing what look like fixed lights of two panes each.
The outer bays each contain a window to each storey, of rectangular timber divided into two fixed lights with plain glass and two top-hung vents filled with decorative leaded lights. The ground floor windows are partly boarded over.

The south-west elevation is of plain appearance in smooth cement render, lined and blocked, except for the end bay containing the frontispiece which has two strips of rusticated quoins. There are three three-light windows in the main hall block and one two-light window in a smaller block to the rear of the building.
Windows are of rectangular timber divided by mullions and transoms and containing plain glass, with leaded lights to the top vents of the main hall.
Roofs are of hipped form but now lacking any covering over the timbers. There is a circular metal ventilator or foul-air extractor on the ridge, and one chimney which is smooth cement rendered between the main hall and rear block.
There are a few sizeable cracks in the wall.
Guttering appears to be of upvc.

The rear or north-west elevation is of similar character to the south-west but with a roughcast texture to the walling. Windows are of the same type as previous and also of vertically hung sliding sash type, one over one, with horns. There are also two smaller blocks projecting from the rear wall, one with a parapet roof and the other a corrugated iron lean-to roof.

The north-east elevation is of similar character and materials to the south-west, but also includes an opening, now boarded over, into the main hall and one into the rear block.
Windows are as previous to the main hall, with two timber sashed windows, as previous, in the rear block.
Rainwater goods are of upvc and cast iron.

SETTING:
The grounds are enclosed by cement rendered walls to the sides and rear, with a set of four original piers, with wrought iron gates and railings across the front. The front part of the plot appears to be laid with a hard surface on which grass now grows, while the rear part is an overgrown garden with some trees.

Historical information

This hall was built in 1920-21 ‘In proud and grateful memory of those who left this district to fight in the cause of liberty and justice, and who laid down their lives in the great war, 1914 – 1919’, and officially opened, by Lady Craig, the wife of Sir James Craig, the following year. Designed by James Sherrif Kennedy. Built to seat 400. It is first listed in the valuation book in 1924 as a memorial hall, run by the ‘Trustees [for the] Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall’ and valued at £7. Originally the local Masonic Lodge occupied a hall located ‘1st floor in rere’, which was valued separately at £3. Built of Roosky granite. Builder: Lennox & Charters, Knockloughrim, Co. Antrim.

The hall appears to be only one of two First World War memorial halls within Northern Ireland, other erected at Ballinderry, County Antrim.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI VAL/12B/37/4G Annual valuation revision book, Coagh ED, 1913-29
2. Irish Builder Vol 62, 27th Marchg 1920, p186,
3. Irish Builder Vol 63, 30th July 1921, p518.

Secondary sources
1 Information gathered from www.ulsterwarmemorials.net (November 2007)

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

This is an inter-war building with a neo-Georgian classical style frontispiece of some visual charm but no particular merit as a work of architecture, the handling of the classical style being comparatively clumsy and unsophisticated. It has fallen into a advanced state dereliction which suggests that its social value has also diminished greatly since the period when it was first built and was fully functioning.