Survey Data
Reg No
12402502
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Archaeological, Architectural, Artistic, Social
Original Use
Church/chapel
Date
1765 - 1770
Coordinates
266888, 151082
Date Recorded
12/11/2004
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Freestanding two-bay single-storey single-cell Church of Ireland church, adapted 1766, on a rectangular plan. Dismantled, 1871. Now in ruins. Pitched roof now missing with no rainwater goods surviving on cut-granite eaves. Roughcast rubble stone battered walls with concealed rough cut granite flush quoins to corners. Destroyed window openings with no fittings surviving. Interior in ruins. Set in overgrown grounds with piers to perimeter having rounded capping supporting wrought iron double gates.
Appraisal
A church representing an important component of the ecclesiastical heritage of County Kilkenny. NOTE: Powerstown Church is not illustrated on the Down Survey of "Powerstown Parrish [sic]" (1655-6) nevertheless it was described (1873) by James George Robertson (1816-99) as 'ancient...but this fact does not readily appear, as the old masonry is concealed by many a coat of dashing... Although the mullions and jambs of door and windows are all gone, the thick walls speak for themselves, and then, on entering the Church, we find the basin of a splendid early English font...fluted and closely resembl[ing] those at Saint Canice's Cathedral and Saint Mary's Church' (Journal of the Royal Historical and Archæological Association of Ireland 1873, 256). The date the church was adapted for use by the Church of Ireland is not yet known, however, the altar was inscribed 'The gift of RALPH GORE Esqre. to the church of Powerstown 1766' (Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica IV 1884, 244).