Albert Hall (aka Shankill Mission Hall)

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A symmetrical five-bay, three-and-a-half-storey red-brick and ashlar sandstone former Mission Hall in the Queen-Anne Revival-style with commercial units to ground floor; dated 1898 and built to designs by William J.W Roome; extended in 1923. Located to the south side of Shankill Road in west Belfast. Rectangular front block and a three-storey rear block with semi-circular recess at south wall; large double-height gabled extension to rear (of no interest).

Pitched natural slate roof with blue/black angled ridge tiles and raised sandstone verges to gables; pyramidal roof to central gable; flat roof to rear block (covering not visible) with domed lead roof to centre. Red-brick chimneystacks with moulded caps. Cast-iron half-round rainwater goods on projecting eaves or concealed behind parapets. Walling is English garden wall-bonded red-brick at upper floors with sandstone dressings; ashlar sandstone to ground and first floor north, channel-rusticated on a chamfered granite plinth at ground floor; painted smooth render to rear; partially cement rendered to east and west elevations. Windows are a variety of replacement uPVC diminishing with each floor and with two timber dormer windows to attic; second floor and attic windows in plain brick reveals with sandstone plat band to lintel level and projecting sandstone sills; first floor windows are segmental-headed in moulded sandstone reveals with flush sills (canted uPVC windows to left and right of central bay); multi-paned semi-circular window with alternating red-brick and sandstone flush inset voussoirs to second floor of central bay.

The principal elevation faces north and is symmetrically arranged, ten windows wide at first floor. Boarded shop-fronts span ground floor and extend to east and west via corner bays. Far left and right bays are gabled, each with two windows at each floor. Central entrance bay rises to segmental-headed gable, having three windows lighting attic, semi-circular arched window to second floor and two windows at first floor. The three gabled bays are flanked by brick pilasters to upper storeys (chamfered at second floor) on a sandstone corbelled plinth to first floor. Ground floor shop-fronts divided by channel-rusticated piers with impost mouldings and carved circle motif to heads. Tall round-headed central archway flanked by pilasters, with voussoirs and decorated keyblock inscribed “1898”; corbelled cornice and a decoratively carved stone fascia above reads “SHANKILL ROAD MISSION”. Original decorative wrought-iron gates to arch and recessed replacement double-leaf timber-sheeted doors with vertically-lined side panels. Corner bays each have second floor canted oriel window on a sandstone corbel, over segmental-headed entrance in a chamfered reveal with modern metal shutters.

The east elevation comprises gabled bay to right (as described at north). East elevation of rear block has a variety of window openings (five windows wide at first floor), all segmental-headed with sandstone arch-heads forming continuous string-course.

The south elevation has semi-circular recess to centre; five segmental-headed windows to second floor and one tall window to first floor right: abutted at ground floor by the gabled double-height hall.

The west gable has two windows to attic; three to second and first floor; ground floor is cement rendered and blank. Variety of window openings to west elevation of rear block at right (some timber boarded).

Setting

Street-fronted and situated to the south side of Shankill Road opposite Shankill Women’s Centre (HB26/35/010) and west of the Shankill Road Leisure Centre. Concrete alley to west leads to rear parking area.

Roof: Natural slate
Walling: brick and sandstone
Windows: uPVC
RWG: Cast-iron

Historical information

The Shankill Road Mission hall, known as ‘Albert Hall’, was built in 1897-8 to designs by William J W Roome for Rev. Henry Montgomery. The hall was built on the site of terraced housing in the Shankill Road and is first shown on the third edition OS map of 1902. The upper red-brick storeys were added later, in 1923. Larmour notes that Roome made use of the ‘recessed oriel’ in this building as at his Mountpottinger YMCA, a window-type favoured by Norman Shaw and exponents of the Queen Anne revival (Larmour).

The Belfast Town (‘City’ from 1895) Mission was founded in 1827 as an interdenominational organisation concerned with the spiritual wellbeing of the large numbers of labouring men and women coming into the town to seek work in the textile industries. The poor were visited in their homes and invited to attend church and ‘stations’ were established which were visited by clergy twice weekly for bible reading and tract distribution. After 1843 the Belfast Town Mission became a Presbyterian organisation and in the 1850s the Albert Street congregation was established and a church built as a result of its work. Albert Street was located in one of the most troubled areas of late nineteenth century Belfast and anti-home rule riots in 1886 saw the area particularly badly affected. The minister of the church at this period, Henry Montgomery, was anxious to provide spiritually for the labouring poor, warning that ‘if we do not reach the masses, the masses will reach us, and in a way some may not like’. (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography).

Having visited the Shankill area one Sunday evening and found conditions of extreme poverty, disease, drunkenness and promiscuity, Montgomery held a public meeting in the Ulster Hall at which it was decided to begin an evangelical mission in a way that had become traditional in Ulster, by putting up a tent. A tent was erected in 1896, followed by a temporary wooden structure a year later and money was raised to build a permanent Mission Hall on the site (Watson). The foundation stone of the hall was laid on 23rd October 1897. The central feature of the building was to be a large hall seating 2,000 (now gone) which was to be furnished with ‘all necessary conveniences for aggressive evangelisation work’. At ground floor level the building was to be let out to shops at the front, with a medical mission and dispensary to the rear and a soup kitchen. On the upper floors were offices for letting, a recreation department and a residential training home for Christian workers. A large central entrance hall was to be carried up the height of the building and terminate in a tower. The material used was to be Scrabo stone, with upper storeys of brick, and the final cost was estimated at £13-14,000. The contractors were McLaughlin and Harvey, with steel construction undertaken by Moreland & Son of London. The wrought iron entrance gates are by J Crooks of Mountpottinger (Belfast Newsletter). The architect, William J W Roome, was not only the designer of the mission hall, but was also closely identified with its work, writing a history of the Mission, which was published in 1898 (Roome). Roome was involved in a number of philanthropic projects in Belfast and ultimately gave up his architectural practice to become a missionary in Africa (www.dia.ie).

The Mission was particularly concerned to reach those who were ‘victims of drink’ and a mens’ reading room was to be provided as a ‘haven of refuge’ in the evening for those who otherwise might be tempted into the public houses. The mission was to reach those who were outside Church influence, a number estimated at 75,000 at this period (Belfast Newsletter). The building was formally opened on 25th November 1898 and in 1910 the mission was raised to the status of an organised congregation with Montgomery as its minister (Belfast Newsletter; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; Kirkpatrick)

The Mission established trips to the seaside at Bangor where a ‘Fresh Air Colony’ was built with playing fields, pavilions and sports facilities. Support was provided for local people through the First World War, the influenza epidemic of 1918-19, the sectarian violence of the 1920s and the rising unemployment which followed. When Montgomery died in 1943, thousands lined the streets to pay tribute to a man known as the ‘Shankill Shepherd’ (Watson).

The Mission continued to operate until the financial crisis of 2009 when it became unviable and was closed by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland (Watson).

References

Primary Sources

1. 3. PRONI OS/6/1/61/4- Third Edition OS Map (1901-2)
2. 4. PRONI OS/6/1/61/6- Fourth Edition OS Map (1931)
3. Belfast Newsletter 25th October 1897
4. Belfast Newsletter 26th November 1898

Secondary Sources

1. Kirkpatrick, L “Presbyterians in Ireland” Booklink, 2006
2. Larmour, P “Belfast, An Illustrated Architectural Guide” Belfast: Friar’s Bush Press, 1987
3. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
4. Roome, W J W “A Brighter Belfast, being the story of the Shankill Road Mission” Wm Strain & Sons, 1898
5. Watson, F G “Building over the Centuries – A History of McLaughlin and Harvey” Belfast: Nicholson and Bass, 2010
6. www.dia.ie

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
H-. Alterations detracting from building
I. Quality and survival of Interior

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Y. Social, Cultural or Economic Importance
V. Authorship
X. Local Interest

Evaluation

A symmetrical five-bay, three-and-a-half-storey red-brick and ashlar sandstone former Mission Hall in the Queen Anne Revival style with commercial units to ground floor; dated 1898 and to designs by William J.W Roome; extended in 1923. Much historic fabric and detailing survive including fine stonework, although compromised by modern shopfronts. This is a robust example of a public building in this style reflecting the ongoing expansion of the City in the early Twentieth century and widespread philanthropy in the cause of poor relief at that time. It is one of many similar institutions that developed during the Victorian era and into more recent times and the work of an architect of note.