Castlestewart Mausoleum, Ballyclog Old Churchyard opposite St Patrick's Church of Ireland Church, 125 Coagh Road, Stewartstown, Dungannon, BT71 5LL

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A graveyard containing a ruined 17th century church with an 18th century mausoleum built on to it, as well as a freestanding mausoleum and other memorials.

It stands in a very rural area set back from the public road within a graveyard surrounded by fields.

The roofless church ruin is of rectangular plan and takes the form of two gables with longer side walls, aligned approximately east to west, with a later square tower and a lower porch projecting from the west gable.

The main entrance faces north located in the western porch.
The walls of the main body of the church are constructed of grey field stones and grey whinstone and red sandstone rubble, with roughly squared quoins, and red and grey dressings to some window openings. Both the side walls have a slightly battered profile.

The north elevation contains two rectangular windows, both two-light, consisting of coupled round-headed lancets constructed of chamfered cut stone set in a flat-arched opening.
Near the west end of the wall is what appears to be a built-up doorway of rectangular shape. At the left hand extremity of the wall there is a large fracture in the wall from top to bottom, the east gable having almost detached itself from the north wall.
The east gable has two large buttresses, constructed of rubble masonry and some squared stonework, one at each extremity. The gable contains a large segmental arched window opening bereft of dressings or tracery. In the angle between the gable wall and the northern buttress is a sizeable remnant of earlier roughcast render, or harling.

The south elevation contains two rectangular windows which are lacking any dressings or tracery, but have timber lintels, presumably inserted during repair work to the walls in the 1970s.

The west gable contains more red sandstone than the other walls and some of the masonry is roughly coursed. Projecting from the centre is a tall square tower built of roughly coursed red sandstone with a belfry stage in brickwork above a projecting grey sandstone stringcourse. The brickwork is mainly of old handmade bricks, now eroded in places, with some newer brick repairs. The belfry contains a Gothic arched opening in each face, and is surmounted by a plain projecting grey sandstone cornice with a tall pyramidal sandstone finial at each corner. The bottom of the tower on the west face contains a semi-circular red brick arched opening now walled up with rubble.

Projecting from the west gable further out than the tower and clasping its north-west corner is the flat-topped porch, constructed of roughly squared red sandstone blocks, containing in its north face a Gothic arched doorway. The vaulted roof of the porch carries part of the tower.
Inside the main walls of the church, which are of exposed rubble stonework and fieldstones, the windows have splayed jambs. At the west end of the north wall is a now blocked up doorway which has a flat arched head of red sandstone rubble carried on a timber lintel.

In the east end of the south wall is a small rectangular recess with a roughly dressed stone surround. Now close to the ground it probably appeared slightly higher up the wall originally when the floor level was lower.
In the west wall is an elliptically arched doorway, arched in brickwork over a timber lintel with rubble filling between. To the left of this doorway below ground level is a doorway to a burial vault outside. This doorway consists of a rectangular sandstone surround, rusticated to the sides, with a segmental brick relieving arch over it. The opening is blocked up with modern red brickwork, and is approached by a flight of steps, bordered by rubble stone walls with sandstone copings. The ground level of the church is covered with grass which is spreading down the partly filled up steps.

Projecting from the base of the tower outside, and from the south side of the west gable, is a long partly stone walled and partly cement rendered mausoleum, with grass growing on its flat top behind parapet walls. The base or plinth is smooth rendered, lined and blocked, partly spalled in places to reveal red brickwork, with a moulded sandstone stringcourse above which is a parapet of ashlar sandstone carrying a moulded sandstone coping.

Castlestewart Mausoleum.
Standing in a central position on top of it is a tall rectangular two-stage stone plinth, of ashlar sandstone with panelled faces, surmounted by a concave or swept sandstone pyramid and ball finial. Neither it or the base carries any inscriptions but it is reputed to be the Castlestewart mausoleum.

Bell Mausoleum
Freestanding to the east of the church stands another mausoleum built of ashlar sandstone, which is currently much hidden by overgrowth. It contains a rectangular classical style doorway with keystone surround, now bricked up, on the east side, reached by a short flight of steps down to it, with an iron railed enclosure on top. Although no inscription is visible this may be taken to be the mausoleum for the Bells of Belmount in Stewartstown as referred to by Lewis in 1837.

The graveyard contains a number of headstones, some which appear to be of the 18th century but none of special interest.

The gateway to the graveyard consists of a pair of old iron gates with pointed tops to the vertical rails, with two rails missing, set between a pair of bulky circular roughcast piers which have an overhanging flat circular sandstone cap surmounted by large sandstone ball finials with flat projecting circular bases. Attached to the northern pier is a small ironwork pedestrian gate in a cement rendered alcove attached to one of the curving screen walls which flank the recessed gateway. The screen walls are of rendered finish with weathered rendered copings.

SETTING: The boundary to the graveyard is formed partly by wooden fencing and partly by hedges, with a number of mature trees running along it. The graveyard and surface is grassed, and humped in parts and rising up to the church.

Historical information

The church dates from the 17th century, and was described as "in building" in a survey of 1622. It was in use until 1868 when a new church was opened on the opposite side of the road.
The precise dates of the Stewart and Bell vaults are not known but stylistically they appear to date from the 18th century. The Castlestewartstewart mausoleum may be compared with similarly concave pyramidal capped monuments in the Stream Street Presbyterian churchyard at Downpatrick, Co Down, and in Ballee, Co Down.
The precise date of the gateway is not recorded but stylistically it may be supposed to date from the 18th century.

References - Primary Sources
1. OS Map of 1833-4.

Secondary Sources
1. S. Lewis, A topographical dictionary of Ireland (London, 1837), Vol 1, p 129.
2. J.B. Leslie, Armagh Clergy and Parishes (Dundalk, 1911), p 128.
3. A.J. Rowan, The Buildings of Ireland: North-West Ulster (Harmondsworth, 1979), p 118.
4. DOENI, Historic Monuments of Northern Ireland (Belfast, 1983), p 57.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

The Castlestewart mausoleum, which is connected to the scheduled church ruin and has its now blocked entrance within it, is an 18th century structure that is well proportioned and a finely built example of its period. It is of unusual shape, and forms part of a small series of concave pyramidal topped mausolea in various places in Northern Ireland. It is set within the setting and scheduled area of an early 17th century church ruin which is important for displaying two rare examples of complete windows of the period.

Nearby in the Bell mausoleum, which stands alone to the east of the church ruin, is an 18th century structure of interest as a finely constructed example of its type, which displays a doorway surround of classical type.

The gateway to the graveyard which may be assigned to the 18th century is a structure of handsome appearance and somewhat uncommon form, which provides a pleasingly formal approach to a site which contains other classicised elements but within a site of irregular form.

Together the various structures of ruined 17th century church with its rare window survivals, and the two mausolea and entrance gateway of the 18th century, demonstrate an historical development on the same site, and provide a crucial visual link with the past in the Stewartstown area, as well as offering a variety of interesting architectural elements in an unspoiled and picturesque setting. Their value is also enhanced by a close visual connection with the new church of the 19th century on the opposite side of the road, which as an overall group of structures demonstrates continuity and tradition in the locality.