Success NI

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Detached three-bay two-storey rendered former Meeting House, built c.1855 by Thomas Jackson. Rectangular on plan, facing east with an enclosed former burial ground to the north, renovated and restored c.2008, now in use as a training and development centre.

Hipped natural slate roof with roll-moulded lead ridges and three rendered profiled chimneystacks with octagonal clay pots. Replacement plastic rainwater goods to timber boxed eaves. Painted ruled and lined rendered walling with projecting plinth course, render eaves course and rusticated render quoins, unpainted to north and south side elevations. Segmental-headed window openings with painted masonry sills and single-pane timber sash windows with ogee horns and some cylinder glass.

Symmetrical two-storey front east elevation, five windows wide, with central segmental-headed door opening having architrave surround on plinth blocks and raised cornice above. Original double-leaf timber panelled doors with bolection mouldings and matching side panels forming a quadripartite arrangement with plain overlight and opening onto a concrete step to the street.

South side elevation is built approximately one metre from neighbouring building with a narrow passageway between the two. There are two segmental-headed door openings, that to the easternmost bay having its original timber plank door, with that to the centre having replacement double-leaf hardwood glazed doors and original overlight.

Rear west elevation abutted by later building and not visible.

Two-storey north side elevation, six windows wide, fronts onto former burial ground. All windows as per front elevation with a taller segmental-headed stairhall window to the centre having 2/1 timber sash window. Below the stairhall window is a segmental-headed door opening with replacement timber glazed door.

Setting:
Running along the north elevation is an elevated area containing uniform stone grave markers enclosed by stone kerbing. The remainder of the burial ground has the appearance of a lawn with random stone grave markers and enclosed to the street by a tall rendered wall.

Materials
Roof: Natural slate
RWG: Plastic
Walling: Ruled and lined render
Windows: Timber sash

Historical information

The Friends Meeting House in Lisburn was built in 1853 on a site dating back to the late seventeenth century, housing one of the earliest Quaker meetings in Ireland. The grandeur and presence of the meeting house owes a great deal to the patronage of the Richardson family, prominent Quakers and linen merchants. (Butler, p.164-6; Chapman, p.50)

Quakerism had been founded in England by George Fox in the late 1640s, spreading quickly throughout England during the early 1650s. A soldier in Cromwell’s army, William Edmundson, who had settled in Lurgan after demobilisation, encountered George Fox and other Quakers on a visit to England and established the first Friends meeting in Ireland in 1654. (Chapman, p.2-3)

Following an encounter with William Edmundson in 1655, John Shaw of Lisnagarvey established a Friends’ meeting in his home at ‘Broad Oak’. Lisburn meeting was therefore one of the first to be established in Ireland. After some years a meeting house was built in 1674 on the present site in what was then the orchard of George Gregson, a merchant and prominent Quaker. This site was in continuous use by Quakers until 1995. (Butler, p.164; Chapman, p.4)

The meeting house, having survived the fire that destroyed Lisburn in 1707, was replaced in 1709, perhaps having sustained some damage. The new building was itself replaced in 1795. OS Memoirs note that, “This is a plain, neat, commodious building. The entrance is by a long, confined passage from the main street in the town. The lower part of this building escaped the fire of 1707 and is still remaining”. Elsewhere in the Memoirs is a lengthy description of this meeting house and its history, including the remark that ‘no other congregation in Lisburn [is] more respectable in garb’. This earlier meeting house is listed in the Townland Valuation (1828-40) as ‘Quakers Meeting House’ and valued at £12.12s. It is shown, uncaptioned, on the first edition OS map of 1832-3. (OS Memoirs, p.10, 28)

The present meeting house was built in 1853, to designs by Thomas Jackson and incorporates parts of the former structure. Jackson had earlier designed a Quaker Meeting House in Belfast in 1840, now demolished, which was very similar in appearance. (Butler, p.166)

Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64) lists the ‘Society of Friends Meeting House and Graveyard’ which is valued at £49.10s with 10s for the graveyard. The meeting house has dimensions of 16x26x2 and there is also a shed with dimensions 12x2. A note from James Richardson, a linen merchant and prominent Quaker, appears in the fieldbook “The meeting house and caretaker’s house are all the property of the Society of Friends please [for ever] no rent” The caretaker’s house is listed separately and is occupied by John Graham with a valuation of £7.

James Nicholson Richardson (1815-1899) was the son of the founder of J.N. Richardson Sons & Owden Ltd, linen manufacturers and the founder, with his brothers, of Richardson Brothers & Co. of Belfast, linen yarn merchants. In about 1855 he settled at Lissue House near Lisburn (HB19/10/001) and employed Thomas Jackson, the architect of the meeting house, to remodel Lissue. Joseph Richardson, brother of James and equally prominent at Lisburn Quaker meeting, also employed Jackson to design a new villa for him at Springfield at about the same time. Glenmore and Old Forge were remodelled by Jackson for other members of the Richardson family. The Richardson family, as well as being patrons of the work of Thomas Jackson, were also significant financial sponsors of the new meeting house. (Rankin, p.87-8, 101-4; Chapman, p.50)

There are no significant changes in Annual Revisions, other than the addition of a ‘school house’, which Butler identifies as a mission hall, in 1864. This was situated to the north west of the meeting house and valued at £19 and £1 for the garden. The present hall is a replacement of 1905. A corrugated iron Sunday School was added to the site in 1895 but is not listed in valuation records. (Butler, p.166)

The meeting house was sold in 1995 for £100,000 and is now used as offices by a charity. The Society of Friends moved to a new building in the grounds of Friends School Lisburn in 1996 but continue to own the burial ground next to the former meeting house. (Butler, p.166)

The building has been recently restored and adapted for use by the current occupiers, including the installation of a glazed partition behind the balustrade to the gallery.

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/1/64/1 – First Edition OS Map 1832-3
2. PRONI OS/6/1/64/2 – Second Edition OS map 1858
3. PRONI OS/6/1/64/3 – Third Edition OS Map 1901
4. PRONI OS/6/1/64/4 – Fourth Edition OS Map 1920-1
5. PRONI OS/6/1/64/5 – Fifth Edition OS Map 1920-31
6. PRONI OS/6/1/64/6 – Sixth Edition OS Map 1920-39
7. PRONI VAL/1/B/168 – Townland Valuation (1828-40)
8. PRONI VAL/2/B/1/61C – Griffith’s Valuation (1856-64)
9. PRONI VAL/12/B/8/9/A-T – Annual Revisions (1863-1924)

Secondary Sources

1. Butler, D.M. “The Quaker Meeting Houses of Ireland” Dublin: Irish Friends Historical Committee, 2004
2. Chapman, AG “Quakers in Lisburn, Four Centuries of Work and Witness” Lisburn: Ulster Friends Home Mission, 2009
3. Day, A. and P. McWilliams, eds. “Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland, Volume 8, Parishes of County Antrim II, 1832-8” Belfast: Institute of Irish Studies, 1991
4. Rankin, K “The Linen Houses of the Lagan Valley, The story of their families” Belfast, Ulster Historical Foundation, 2002

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
I. Quality and survival of Interior
J. Setting

Criteria for listing: historic interest

R. Age
S. Authenticity
T. Historic Importance
V. Authorship
X. Local Interest
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance

Evaluation

A symmetrical two-storey multi-bay, mid-nineteenth century, former Meeting House built in 1853 to the designs of the prominent architect Thomas Jackson and located on Railway Street, to the north of Market Square in the centre of Lisburn City. A simply detailed exterior houses a lofty and impressive interior which is almost entirely intact, despite being converted into a modern office in recent years. Of significant historical interest, the site is known to have held one of the earliest Quaker meetings in Ireland. Today the Old Meeting House is of social importance and interest to the local community.