Survey Data
Reg No
30329011
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Historical, Social
Previous Name
Letterfrack Society of Friends' Meeting House
Original Use
Meeting house
Historical Use
Court house
Date
1845 - 1855
Coordinates
71091, 257613
Date Recorded
13/08/2008
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Detached three-bay single-storey meeting house, built 1850, on a rectangular plan originally three-bay two-storey. Replacement pitched artificial slate roof with uPVC rainwater goods. Coursed rubble limestone walls on cut-limestone plinth. Square-headed window openings in bipartite arrangement with tooled cut-limestone sills and lintels framing one-over-one timber sash windows.
Appraisal
This small, simple structure is notable for its bipartite windows showing tooled limestone dressings and retaining timber sash fittings. The structure was originally built by James and Mary Ellis of Bradford who settled in Letterfrack in 1849 and set about establishing a meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, however, the meeting was never formally recognised. The vacant meeting house was subsequently repurposed (1857) as a Church of Ireland church and it was later repurposed (1882) as a Catholic church and continued to serve as such until the construction (1925) of Saint Joseph's Catholic Church (see 30329007). The meeting house, originally of two storeys but reduced to a single storey, was afterwards repurposed as a courthouse.