Memorial Orange Hall

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A symmetrical three-bay two-storey red-brick Orange Hall, dated 1914 and built to designs by William Larmor; located to the north side of Springvale Road northeast of Banbridge. Rectangular plan with two-storey return and small single-storey abutments to rear.

Pitched natural slate roof with terracotta ridge tiles and moulded stone verges to gables; two red-brick chimneystacks, having three clay pots, to rear. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods on moulded eaves course. Walling is Flemish-bonded red-brick on a chamfered plinth with decorative moulded string course between floors and under eaves; continuous sill course to first floor. Windows are metal casements (boarded to ground floor) with projecting stone sills to ground floor.

The principal elevation faces southeast and is three openings wide to each floor, divided by brick lesenes. To centre at ground floor is doorway (covered with steel security gate) surmounted by square-headed overlight and hood mould and accessed via three stone steps. Carved terracotta tiled plaque above door reads “Dr. KANE MEMORIAL/ ORANGE HALL /TULLYLISH 1914”. Red sandstone foundation stone to south corner above plinth reads “THIS FOUNDATIONS STONE / WAS LAID BY / MASTER RICHARD FORSTER RUTTLEDGE UPRICHARD / ON THE 4TH DAY OF APRIL 1914”.

The southwest elevation has oculus to apex; two windows to first and ground floor with dividing lesenes.

The northwest (rear) elevation is three bays wide divided by two projecting chimneystacks; window to first floor centre and left; window to left of centre at ground floor. Abutted at right by the two-storey pitched roof return (lower) having window to apex and further abutted by a single storey return to left; right cheek has door to left and window to right (both boarded); left cheek entirely abutted by a single-storey lean-to with door to left and window to right (both blocked up). single storey return comprises three diminutive square-headed bricked up openings at ground level of gable; right cheek has a diminutive window to right: left cheek has a door to left.

The northeast elevation has oculus to apex; two windows to first and ground floor with dividing lesenes.

Setting

Situated in a rural
setting on an elevated site; gravelled avenue to southeast, tree-lined to south side, leads to gravelled concourse. Bounded to all sides by mature hedgerow and accessed from Springvale Road to southeast by a set of original steel gates on roughcast rendered square gate piers. Curved roughcast rendered entrance wall topped by random stone coping.

Roof: Natural slate
Walling: Brick
Windows: Metal casements
RWG: Cast-iron

Historical information

The Dr Kane Memorial Hall at Tullylish was named after Richard Rutledge Kane (1841-1898) a native of Newtownstewart in County Tyrone who was the Church of Ireland rector at Tullylish between 1873 and 1882. Kane was a vehement opponent of Home Rule and a strong supporter of the Orange Order, becoming a Grand Master in Belfast after moving there in 1882 to take up the incumbency of Christ Church. He was a fiery orator who toured Ireland and England denouncing Home Rule, at times using violent imagery, and for a decade was regarded as ‘the dominant personality in the political life of Belfast’. However, his personality was complex and he was also a patron of the Gaelic League and a supporter of the Irish language. (Dictionary of Irish Biography)

The Irish Builder invited tenders for the building of the hall in June 1913, stating the architect to be William Wright Larmor. (Irish Builder) Larmor was engineer to Banbridge County Council (1898-1934) and assistant county surveyor for County Down (c.1907-1934/5) and, aside from a number of causeways and bridges, is known to have designed several manses and medical officer’s residences. (www.dia.ie) The Hall was built on land belonging to the Quaker Uprichard family and is first shown on the fourth edition OS map of 1903-20 captioned ‘Orange Hall’ The Hall enters valuation records in 1915 at a valuation of £5. The secretaries of the lodge are noted to be Henry Russell in 1913, S Cruickshanks in 1925 and James Nelson in 1934.

In the First General Revaluation of the early 1930s the occupiers were the Trustees of Tullylish Orange Hall and the secretary was S Cruickshanks. The property was leased from H A Uprichard and comprised a Hall, caretaker’s apartments, and garden. The building was revalued at £10 and the accommodation described. On the ground floor was an entrance hall, small meeting room, a room containing sink and stove and an earth closet. Living accommodation for the caretaker comprised a kitchen and two bedrooms. On the first floor was a large meeting room and store room with a small loft over the back portion. The rent was a nominal 1d per week. The valuer commented that the hall was ‘substantially built in 1914’. A plan and dimensions are given showing the living quarters of the caretaker on the ground floor, the scullery to the rear and earth closets leading off the scullery.

The building remains in use as an Orange Hall.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/3/26/4 Fourth Edition OS Map (1903-20)
2. PRONI VAL/12/B/16/25A-D Annual Revisions (1864-1929)
3. PRONI VAL/3/D/4/3/V/4 First General Revaluation
4. Irish Builder 21st June 1913, p416

Secondary Sources

1. McGuire, J and Quinn, J, eds “Dictionary of Irish Biography” Cambridge: Cambridge University Press and Royal Irish
Academy, 2009
2. www.dia.ie

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

A symmetrical three-bay two-storey red-brick Orange Hall, dated 1914 and built to designs by William Larmor; located to the north side of Springvale Road northeast of Banbridge. Simply detailed and proportioned, constructed entirely of red-brick and of local interest the Hall is an example of an early twentieth-century rural Orange Hall by a local architect but not of special architectural or historic interest.