THE VICARAGE

The Department's description

Historical information

The earliest section of the present complex was built in 1820 as the vicarage for Kilbroney (CoI) parish, by Rev. Edward John Evans (c.1791-1861), Vicar of Kilbroney from 1818 to 1860. The ‘Ecclesiastical Register’ of 1820 states that £450 was gifted by the Board of First-Fruits towards the construction of the building, with another £120 given as a loan, although the house itself is described as ‘incomplete’ as of the 5th of January of that year.

In its original form, as depicted on the 1834 OS map, the building consisted of the main three-bay two-storey hip-roofed section, with the porch to the front balanced by the bow to the rear, and, it would seem, small projections to the east and west sides. In the valuation of 1835 the main block is recorded as measuring 50ft x 23 x 20, with a ‘return’ (presumably one of the side projections) of 11 x 5 x 6, ‘porch’ of 10 x 6 x 11, ‘basement storey as servants’ rooms’ of 50 x 23 x 8, another ‘return’ (presumably the other side projection) of 12 x 11 x 6, and a final return (possibly a reference to the bow) of 10 x 6 ½ x 10, whilst two offices, located to the immediate west of the house, are noted as amounting to 19 x 15 x 7 and 37 x 19 x 11½ respectively. The OS Memoirs of the following year describes it as ‘good 2-storey house pleasantly situated in a hollow among ash, sycamore, larch, beech and fir trees.’

The valuation of 1861 refers to the vicarage as a ‘neat little concern…very prettily situated, but [the] view is limited [and the] upper storey low’, and notes the dimensions of the main block as 16yds x 7 x 2[storeys], with the porch 4 x 3 x 1, a return of 7 x 4 x 1 and another (the bow) of 5 x 2 x 2. From these it would seem that the bow must have been raised a storey at some point post-1835, and that the side projections may have been reconfigured, although the plan on the 1860 OS map is as that of 1834.

By 1861 Rev. Guy James Carleton-L’Estrange (c.1827-94) had become Vicar, followed by Rev. William Chichester Barker in 1871, and Rev. Thomas William Ernest Drury in 1904, who in the 1911 census was occupying the house with his wife, Janet, their two infant children and two domestic servants, with the house itself recorded as a ‘1st class’ dwelling with 9 rooms in use. Rev. Edward Dupre Atkinson followed in 1919, Rev. Matthew George Gardiner in 1931, Rev. Arthur Gordon Hannon in 1954 and Malcolm Frederick Graham in 1960.

Both valuation and map evidence show that the building retained its basic 1820s form up until at least 1930. At some point after 1952 the two-storey extension to the east end was added, in place of the smaller single-storey section that had previously stood to this side. This may have been built shortly after 1955, for £1,000 was raised by the parish in that year ‘in aid of the Vicarage repair fund’, and at the same date part of the grounds were put up for sale as building plots.

The single-storey projection to the front, presumably originally a garage, was added between 1969 and 1979, as was a further extension to the west side. These were probably built in 1974, when the building was converted by the Dromore Diocese for use a residential centre - ‘Kilbroney Centre’. Since then the western extension has been enlarged and additional freestanding structures have been built to the west of this.

References - Primary sources
1 ‘The Ecclesiastical Register…’ ed. John C. Erck, (Dublin, 1820), p.37
2 OS map, Co. Down sheet 54, 1834
3 PRONI VAL1B/361 (1835-36)
4 Day, Angelique and McWilliams, Patrick ed. ‘Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland…vol.3’ (QUB, 1990), p.35 (1835-36)
5 OS map, Co. Down sheet 54, 1860
6 PRONI VAL2B/3/61B (1861)
7 PRONI VAL12B/19/21A-F (1865-1929)
8 Census of Ireland, 1901, 1911 [http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie, accessed 2020.06.09]
9 OS map, Co. Down sheet 54, 1902
10 OS map, Co. Down sheet 54, 1919
11 OS map, Co Down sheet 54, 1930
12 OS map, Co Down sheet 54, 1952
13 ‘Northern Whig’, 12 September 1955, p.4
14 ‘Belfast News-Letter’, 4 November 1955, p.2
15 OS map sheet 277, 1979