Our History

The early seventeenth century in Ireland has been described by the Presbyterian historian Scott Pearson as an era of “Prescopalianism”. The established church was legally-speaking Episcopalian but some of the Bishops and Ministers observed communion and offered public worship that was essentially Presbyterian in form. In the long-established Parish of Billy, approximately two miles south of the present-day town of Bushmills, this ecclesiastical-hybrid of the day had a further personal dynamic. The Rev Jeremiah O’Quin who was ordained there in 1646 was a Presbyterian in terms of theology, ministering in a denomination that was Episcopalian, having been born into a family who were Roman Catholic! In fact, Mr. O’Quin was the first Irish-born Presbyterian minister, all previous Presbyterian ministers in Ireland having been Scottish. His conversion to the Reformed Faith led him to study arts and theology at Glasgow University before he was licensed by the Army Presbytery which had been established in Ulster in 1642. Mr O’Quin was a controversial if well-loved pastor during turbulent times. After a Presbytery trial concerning his doctrine found him innocent, this fluent Irish-speaker faced further troubles in 1649 when he refused to read the Presbytery’s condemnation of the execution of King Charles I.

The ruins of the Parish Church at Billy where Mr O’Quin ministered are in the present old graveyard, where the Latin epitaph of Mr. O’Quin’s headstone still bears witness to the esteem in which he was held. The tombstone inscription may be translated thus:
‘The elegy of the Reverend Pastor, Jeremiah O’Quin. O’Quin, a gentle pastor, rests in this urn, but his soul is in heaven beholding the Divine nature. By the use of that Word he had soothed the lambs of Christ. Now he drinks water from the living stream. He died on the last day of January 1657.’

Sometime after the death of Mr. O’Quin, the Presbyterians left Billy Parish and moved west of the River Bush, to the location of the present-day Dunluce Presbyterian Church. There, in a meeting house with a thatched roof, a series of ministers served. The political and religious turbulence of the times is reflected in the fates of many of Mr. O’Quin’s successors, as a necessarily brief synopsis illustrates:

The Rev’d Gabriel Cornwall, 1657 to 1691
The Rev’d Adam White, 1692 to 1708
The Rev’d Robert Leckie, 1711
The Rev’d John Porter, 1713-1738
The Rev’d John Logue 1746-1756
The Rev’d Samuel Moore 1760-1776
The Rev’d Hugh Moore 1779-1780
The Rev’d William Douglass 1783-1794
The Rev’d Daniel McKee 1796-1820

All in all, those church leaders who kept the lamp of faith burning in the North Antrim area in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries faced the most difficult and unsettled of times.

Following the uncertainties of the first hundred and fifty years of its existence, there followed a calmer period for the congregation, with settled ministries and sustained progress during the nineteenth century. Much of what is familiar in the Bushmills congregation of today can be traced back to this period. The Rev’d Mr. Hamill began the careful record of births and marriages which continue to be consulted by relatives and visitors, many from overseas.

In 1827 Mr. Hamill recorded in the minute book of the Church Committee that there were 262 families in the congregation who were seatholders and another 77 who were not seatholders but expected ministerial responsibilities. He also noted that:

‘The Meeting House being in that time in such a state that it must be rebuilt, or that a very large sum must be expended to repair and make it comfortable as a place of worship.’
It was unanimously decided to rebuild the church building and on 27th June 1829, at a cost of £560, a new meeting house was officially opened. Three months later the congregation had cleared their debts. It would, with some modification, continue as the congregation’s meeting house until the extensive renovations of 2005.

Not long after arriving in Bushmills, Mr. Hamill purchased a piece of land in the townland of Eagry (on what is today the Straid Road) of some nine acres upon which he built a dwelling house. Prior to this, there is no substantiated record of a Manse for the minister of Bushmills. Upon his death, Mr. Hamill’s widow enacted his long-held wish that the house and land at Eagry be made available for future ministers of Bushmills in perpetuity. You can read further details on the development of the Manse here.

With the Victorian era in full-swing, Bushmills town was enjoying considerable growth. Ordnance Survey Memoirs record that the population increased from 65 in 1821 to1,072 some 70 years later and that the number of houses grew accordingly from 15 to 251. The congregation also grew during this period, as Presbytery visitations suggest, to a peak of some 300 families in 1844.

It was during The Rev’d Mr. Boyle’s ministry that the present church hall was constructed. The hall, which is of impressive construction to the extent that it is often mistaken by visitors as being the church, was opened on 22nd August 1897, at a cost of £1,000. The piece of ground on the north side of the church on which the hall stands was purchased from Mr David McNeill at a cost of £155. Each stipend payer was asked, on average, to donate the equivalent of one year’s stipend. The congregation decided to name the hall “The Hamill Hall” in memory of Mr Boyle’s predecessor, the Rev’d Hugh Hamill. Portraits of both reverend gentlemen were hung in the new hall, of which only that of Mr Hamill now remains. The Hamill Hall was an ambitious project in its day and was to become the focus not only for church activities, but as the largest venue in the town, as a community resource for many years to come. Generations of children and adults have benefited from the hall’s facilities which continued to be updated throughout the twentieth century.

The Rev’d Hugh Hamill, M.A. 1820-1864
The Rev’d James Boyle 1864-1902

It seemed almost as if the long reign of Queen Victoria that came to an end in 1901 correlated historically with the ending of two long ministries in Bushmills. Between them, the Reverends Hamill and Boyle had served Bushmills for eighty-two years. The marble memorial plaques on either side of the windows in the present church continue to bear witness to a longevity of service that is unlikely ever to be repeated. In 1902 Mr. Boyle died. He was to be succeeded by men of no less calibre perhaps, but whose tenure would be considerably less.

The Rev’d Francis James Paul, M.A., D.D. 1902-1911
The Rev’d Joseph Fisher Anderson, B.A. 1912-1918
The Rev’d Samuel McCully, B.A. 1919-1928
The Rev’d David Maybin, B.A. 1928-1949
The Rev’d Samuel Eaton, M.A., H.C.F. 1950-1959
The Rev’d John William Patrick Lowry, B.A., B.D. 1959-1969
The Rev’d Hugh Barkley Wallace, M.A 1970-2000

Numerous enhancements were made to the church property during The Rev’d Hugh Barkley Wallace‘s, ministry. In 1977 considerable renovations took place involving the Hamill Hall, including the provision of a platform. In 1979 the Manse was extensively refurbished. In 1988 a new church kitchen was installed, provided by the ladies of the P.W.A. and in 1993 the Minor Hall was constructed, incorporating some of the buildings from the old stables adjoining the church.

During Mr Wallace’s ministry a number of special services were initiated which celebrated the Christian Year, all of which have continued to flourish. In 1971 a Good Friday service took place for the first time, which subsequently became a service incorporating the Lord’s Supper. In 1979 an early morning service was held for the first time at the Giant’s Causeway on Easter Sunday, followed by breakfast in the Hamill Hall. In 1991 the first Christmas Eve service took place. Evening communions, held in February and September, have been celebrated since 1977 and are appreciated by many who benefit from the quiet reverence of such occasions.

The First Bushmills Boys’ Brigade Company, affiliated with Bushmills and Dunluce congregations, closed down in 1997, following the similar disbanding in the 1980s of the Girls’ Auxiliary. In 1998, however, a Youth Fellowship was established. Originally meeting monthly, in later years the Youth Fellowship would flourish and develop into a weekly ministry for young people.

In 1996 the congregation celebrated its Three Hundred and Fiftieth Anniversary, with special services to mark the occasion. Mr Wallace wrote a short history of the congregation, entitled Bushmills Presbyterian Church 1646-1996. It is a fine piece of work, to which the writer of this present concise history is greatly indebted.