Mallusk Cemetery

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Mid-eighteenth century cemetery, located to the north of the Mallusk Road, accessed through a square plan gatescreen from Park Road to the east. The cemetery is interdenominational and laid out on a grid pattern with ground falling from the elevated north-west corner. The southern side of the site is currently still in use and comprises gravel paths throughout with twentieth century grave markers. The north-west corner of the cemetery is where many of the oldest grave markers can be found, with a wide variety of stone carving and cast iron railings, set within grassed areas and yew trees. To right on entry is an iron lamp holder and small single-storey store building.

The earliest grave markers are those of John Black, son of Joseph Black who died 5 January 1766 aged 23 years. Elsewhere are the grave markers of Mary Templeton who died 9 November 1776 aged 67 years.

Entrance gatescreen with central replacement metal gates with original pedestrian cast metal gate to either side. The pillars are square random rubble basalt with strap pointing and square pointed caps. Pillars are set diagonally abutting random rubble wall.

The site is bound by low dry stone wall and hedges to all sides, with roads to south and east sides and houses to the west.

Historical information

Mallusk Cemetery lies on the site of an earlier 14th or 15th century church with bulluan and souterrain. No foundations of the church survive. Although the first map record of the graveyard is the 1833 OS map, there are stones in the cemetery dating to 1766, suggesting a mid-eighteenth century date.

The graveyard is recorded on the first edition OS map of 1833, with a small rectangular building on the south side. The Townland Valuation (1836) records a graveyard valued at £0.6s.3d. Griffiths records a graveyard and a watchman's house on the site, with the graveyard valued at £0.10s.0d. and the building valued at £2.10.0d. In the notes for OS memoirs in the SM7 files for Ant 056:040, Boyle describes a two-storey house built by committee of farmers c.1830. The lower storey was for occupation by a family of graveyard attendants and the upper storey for watching graves.

Before the Anatomy Act (1832) was passed, a demand for illegally obtained corpses for medical research created the need to safeguard the recently deceased. The robbing of dead bodies was also not uncommon at this time. The Rev. R. R. Cox of St. Bride's Church, Kilbride, (HB21/02/004) wrote of precautions taken to safeguard remains at Mallusk: “Perhaps the crudest, or the least effectual [of a series of local 'corpse houses'], may be seen in Mallusk. This is a lamp standard, erected about the middle of the burial ground. It is an iron rod standing about 7 feet high, and firmly planted in the ground, with a square openwork iron frame to hold a lantern. Apparently there was no shelter for the watchers, and it may be supposed that the light was sufficiently intimidating.” (Cox, 1959, 106-107)

Gravestone inscriptions in the graveyard have been recorded in Rosemary Sibbett’s Mallusk Memorials (1997).

References:

Primary Sources

1. PRONI OS/6/1/56/1 - First edition OS Map (1833)
2. PRONI VAL/1/A/1/56-Townland Valuation Map (1836)
2. PRONI VAL/1/B/123B Townland Valuation Fieldbook (1836)
3. PRONI VAL/2/A/1/56B-Griffiths Valuation Map (1859)
4. PRONI VAL/2/B/1/18 Griffiths Valuation Fieldbook (1859)

Secondary Sources

1. Cox, Robert Roland. History of the Parish of Kilbride (Doagh, Co. Antrim: Self-published, 1959).
2. NIEA SM7 file Ant056:040
3. Sibbett, Rosemary, ed. Mallusk Memorials: Recording the Ancient Graveyard at Mallusk, Newtownabbey, County Antrim (Belfast: People’s Express, 1997).

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

A mid-eighteenth century cemetery, located to the north of Mallusk Road, entered through square plan gatescreen from public road to east. The cemetery is laid out on a grid pattern with ground falling from the elevated north-west corner. The cemetery contains a broad range of grave markers from stone to cast iron to more elaborate monuments spanning the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries.