Methodist Church

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Small plain, single storey gabled Methodist chapel of c.1786, but with later simple gothic features and porch to front. The building is located directly off the pavement in Ferry Street and abuts a terraced dwelling to the south. The building was preached in by the founder of Methodism, John Wesley. The building is located at the N end of the terrace on the W side of Ferry Street, at the junction of Cuan Place.

The front elevation comprises of the main hall gable and the gable of the porch, and faces E. To the N face of the porch is a vertically sheeted entrance door, reached by climbing four stone steps. Either side of the porch are single lancet windows each with moulded hoods, stone cills and small diamond pattern leaded coloured glass panes. A larger single lancet window (with details as before) is positioned centrally within the porch gable. There is a small date plaque (marked ‘1780’) with a moulded circular frame, moulded hood and label stops in the main hall gable directly below the apex.

The main N façade has four single lancet windows, with ‘Y’ tracery timber frames and diamond patterned lead and coloured glass. Each window has a small ‘hopper’ metal ventilation opening.

To the S the chapel abuts a house (No.1 Ferry Street) with only the western end (to the rear), exposed, revealing two windows as N.

To the W the building abuts an adjoining wall. The gable is blank and rises slightly (about 2ft) over its single storey neighbour.

The façade is finished in lined render and painted.

The gabled roof is covered with Bangor blue slates. Both gables to the main hall, plus the gable to the porch all have moulded coping stones to their respective parapets. The parapets are also corbelled at the eaves and finished with foliated finials (to the main hall) and a ball finial (to the porch)

Historical information

The Methodist congregation in Portaferry was established in the months immediately following John Wesley’s visit to the Ards in 1778. The congregation’s original place of worship may not have been this building in Ferry Street, however, as the date of 1780 proudly displayed on the front gable of the chapel today probably refers to the foundation of the Methodist Church within the town and not to the actual building itself. Original sources, including the first volume of the Methodist Conferences in Ireland (dated 1786), inform us that in this year Portaferry was given permission to build a church, which suggests that construction took place between 1786 and 1789, the year when Wesley, on his last visit to Ireland, used it to preach to ‘a serious and well- behaved congregation on “Stand Ye in Old Paths”’.

The Ordinance Survey Memoirs of 1833 (which, incidentally, date the building to 1788) state that the structure was given a new roof in 1810 and that there were ‘six seats and a sundry number of forms’ which were irregularly placed and as such made it difficult to estimate the capacity of the building. Other renovations, including the decoration to the roof and original front doorway and, possibly, the building of the porch, were carried out later in the century (though as smaller looking porch [?or steps] is indicated on the valuation map of c.1861). The building we see today, however, owes much to the work of local builder Hugh Beck in 1904, who replaced the windows, ceiling and wainscoting as well as designing and making the pews.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI D.552/B/3/3/1 Savage/Nugent Papers: ‘A Plan or Map of the Town of Portaferry’ by Patrick O’Hare, 1799 [The
Savage/Nugent Papers contain many documents relating to Portaferry and the surrounding area]
2 Linen Hall Library ‘Pigot & Co.’s Dublin and Hibernian Provincial Directory’ (Manchester 1824)
3 'Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland Vol.7: Parishes of County Down II', ed. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams (QUB 1991)
4 PRONI OS/6/3/32/1 OS maps, 1st ed., 1834, Down sheet 32
5 PRONI VAL/1B/37 1st valuation, Ballyphilip, c.1835-38
6 PRONI VAL/1D/3/4 Valuation town plan of Portaferry, c.1838
7 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1846), p.520-23
8 PRONI and Linen Hall Library ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster Directory’ Vols.1-21, 1852-1900, (Belfast, Henderson [1852-65], Belfast News-Letter [1865- ])
9 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s Royal National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1856), p.592-95
10 PRONI OS/8/23/1- OS town plan of Portaferry, 1859
11 PRONI Second ('Griffith's') valuation, 1863 [In print.]
12 PRONI VAL/12E/112/1- Valuation maps of Portaferry, c.1863, with revisions of 1902
13 Linen Hall Library ‘Slater’s Royal National Commercial Directory of Ireland’ (Manchester 1870), pp.341-43
14 PRONI OS/8/23/2 OS town plan of Portaferry, 1874
15 George Henry Bassett ‘County Down Guide and Directory’ (Dublin 1886)
16 PRONI OS/8/23/3 OS town plan of Portaferry, 1900
17 PRONI VAL/12E/112/2- Valuation maps of Portaferry, 1902, with revisions of 1935

Secondary sources
1 G. Philip Bell, C.E.B. Brett, Sir Robert Matthew, 'Ulster Architectural Heritage Survey: Portaferry & Strangford'
(Belfast UAHS 1969)
2 PRONI Portaferry: Sources for Local History (PRONI ?1970s)
3 Sr. Mary Mercy (nee Isobel Cummings), "Memories of Portaferry in the early years of this century" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society, No.10' (1986), pp. 21-24
4 Jack Orr, "The Postal Service in Portaferry" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No. 11' (1987), pp. 2-4
5 R. Oram, "The Buildings of Portaferry" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.16' (1992)
6 Harry Murray, "Ferry Street in the 1990s" in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.18' (1994), p. 10
7 Extracts from 'The Minutes of the Methodist Conferences in Ireland Vol.I', 'The Journal of John Wesley 1789' and Hugh Beck’s account book, 1904 , quoted in ‘Portaferry Methodist Church" by Donald Elliott, reprinted in 'Journal of the Upper Ards
Historical Society No.19' (1995), pp. 3-7
8 Donald Elliott, "Portaferry Methodist Church", reprinted in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.19' (1995),
pp.3-7

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

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

Criteria for listing: historic interest

V. Authorship
W. Northern Ireland/International Interest
Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance

Evaluation

Earlyand simple single storey Methodist Chapel of c.1786, with later gabled porch to front. John Wesley is be believed to have preached in this building shortly after it was built.