Dictionary of Irish Architects 1720 - 1940

Architect, of Midleton, Co. Cork. John Morrison, the father of RICHARD MORRISON  RICHARD MORRISON and grandfather of WILLIAM VITRUVIUS MORRISON WILLIAM VITRUVIUS MORRISON , was in active practice from 1760 or earlier until at least 1785. According to his grandson Dr John Morrison,(1) he came from Midleton, Co. Cork, and was himself the son of an architect; he was 'as celebrated for his mathematical and scientific as for his architectural abilities' and 'realized a handsome fortune by the exercise of his profession, which however he squandered away with the recklessness which characterized the age and province in which he lived'. The anonymous writer of an anecdotal sketch of Richard Morrison in the Irish Builder,(2) gives a slightly different impression: 'His [Richard's] father also was an architect - John Morrison or Morris or Morrisy - used indifferently by persons in the locality, according to their social position, the son being sometimes known by a different one to his father's, cut on a tombstone. It was thought about Castlemartyr, from which John migrated to Dublin, that he changed his name when he changed his route to his final destination. He had the patronage of his neighbouring magnate, Lord Shannon, who some, uncharitably, thought was paternally related to him.'(3) Dr John Morrison's memoir records that the second Earl of Shannon, and Hon. Frederick Augustus Hervey, Bishop of Cloyne (the future Earl Bishop of Derry) were sponsors at the christening of Richard Morrison, who was born in 1767, and that the Earl later found a position for Richard in the Ordnance Department.

In 1760 John Morrison proposed publishing by subscription 'The Practical Builder's Architect and Workman's Assistant', which was to appear in two volumes. Nothing came of this proposal, but his 'Essay on the Convenience, Strength and Beauty which should be connected in all private and public buildings' was published in the Dublin Magazine of September 1764.(4) According to McParland, Morrison charged fees of five percent or six percent if he had to travel, 'an unusual step in the ambiguous word of contracting and building in provincial Ireland in the 1770s'.(5) Yet although Dr John Morrison claimed in 1843 that 'Numerous specimens of his taste and professional ability still exist' in the south of Ireland, the projects for which documentary evidence has been found, seem to have been largely unexecuted.(6)

 In 1793 and 1794 a person of this name was a subscriber to the Anthologia Hibernica; as Richard Morrison published his 'Observations on the Giant's Causeway' in that periodical in 1793, it seems at least possible that the subscriber was his father.

John Morrison died in 1802, his wife Elizabeth in 1793.  The number of their children is not recorded, but , in addition to Richard, they had at least one daughter, Maria, who died in 1784.   These dates are inscribed on the table tomb of  a James Barry (d. 1766) and his son James (d.1764) in the graveyard of Ballyoughtera Church of Ireland church in the demesne of Castlemartyr House, Co. Cork.(6)   The tomb of early nineteenth-century neo-Classical appearance and the inscription were executed for a son or daughter of John Morrison, very probably for Richard Morrison himself, but the nature of the connection between the Barrys and the Morrisons is not known.

See WORKS and BIBLIOGRAPHY. BIBLIOGRAPHY.



References



(1) John Morrison, MD, 'Life of the late William Vitruvius Morrison' in John Weale, ed., Quarterly Papers on Architecture I (1843), 1-2.
(2) IB 29, 15 Dec 1887, 354.
(3) If there is any foundation for this rumour, John Morrison would presumably have been a son of Henry Boyle, 1st Earl of Shannon (1682-1764) and half-brother of Richard Boyle, 2nd Earl of Shannon (1727-1807).
(4) E. McParland, A. Rowan and A.M. Rowan, 'The Morrisons, architects' in A.M. Rowan, ed., The Architecture of Richard Morrison and William Vitruvius Morrison (IAA, 1989), 2.
(5) McParland, op. cit., 1.
(6) Recently discovered documents appear to indicate that Oliver Grace, not Morrison, was the architect of Mitchelstown College (information From Frederick O'Dwyer). 
(6) Information from Frank Keohane.


15 work entries listed in chronological order for MORRISON, JOHN [1]


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Building: CO. CORK, CASTLEMARTYR, CASTLE MARTYR
Date: 1762
Nature: Drawings and suggestions for gates, for 2nd Earl of Shannon. (Gateway from town described by Beaufort, 1788, as 'lately built in a very bad stile in imitation of Gothick'.)
Refs: Letter from JM to Lord Shannon, Midleton, 16 Nov 1762, in NLI, MS 13300 (IAA, Edward McParland files, Acc.2008/44)

Building: CO. CORK, CORK, HENRY STREET, MAYORALTY HOUSE
Date: 1764
Nature: Unexecuted proposal.
Refs: Elevation in Dublin Magazine (Sep 1764).

Building: CO. CORK, KINSALE, CUSTOM HOUSE
Date: 1770
Nature: Built and/or designed by JM.
Refs: NLI/PRO Cust. 1.112 (IAA, Edward McParland files, Acc.2008/44); site plan, 1890, showing old custom house to be demolished and plan of new building in NA/PRO drawings collection, old ref. B.12.4

Building: CO. CORK, TRACTON ABBEY?
Date: 1771
Nature: JM makes plans for James Dennis (?at Tracton Abbey)
Refs: Letter from 2nd Earl of Shannon to James Dennis, 2 Aug 1771, re JM's plans for Dennis (where?)

Building: CO. CORK, CLONDROHID, CHURCH (CI)
Date: 1771
Nature: New church (proposed), 50 x 24 ft, with Gothic battlements. Estimated cost: £546.
Refs: Estimate for building churches at Ballyhooly, Whitechurch and Clonrohid, Diocese of Cloyne, 1771, in Normanton Papers, Hampshire Record Office. 21M57, B2/2-6

Building: CO. CORK, WHITECHURCH, CHURCH (CI)
Date: 1771
Nature: New church (proposed). 50 x 24 ft. Cost £580, exclusive of steeple, battlements, &c, 'which are omitted by direction of his Grace the Primate'.
Refs: Estimate for building churches at Ballyhooly, Whitechurch and Clonrohid, Diocese of Cloyne, 1771, in Normanton Papers, Hampshire Record Office. 21M57, B2/2-6

Building: CO. CORK, MITCHELSTOWN, KINGSTON COLLEGE
Date: 1771-1776
Nature: JM's plans chosen (but built - or completed? - to design of Oliver Grace).
Refs: MS correspondence re same, May 1775-Apr 1881, in NLI, Limerick Papers, PC 875, Bundles 8/35,37,75, 15/5,8,24, 19/7, 22/4,5,11 (information from Anthony Malcomson); Freeman's Journal, 23-26 Mar 1771; A.M. Rowan, ed., The Architecture of Richard and William Vitruvius Morrison (IAA, 1989), 1-2; F. O'Dwyer, '"A Noble Pile in the late Tudor Style": Mitchelstown Castle', Irish Arts Review 18 (2002), 34(illus.),35;  National Inventory of Architectural Heritage, http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=record&county=CO&regno=20818022 (last visited, Feb 2017); exterior illus. in Claude Costegalde & Brian Walker, The Church of Ireland: an illustrated history (2013), 371.

Building: CO. WATERFORD, LISMORE, BRIDGE
Date: 1771-72
Nature: JM submits 6 plans for same, but bridge designed by Thomas Ivory and built by Darley & Stokes. For 5th Duke of Devonshire. (Three arches of causeway destroyed by flood in Nov 1853)
Refs: Drawings and estimates for 6 alternative schemes (4 in timber & 2 in stone), 1771 and 1772, in Chatsworth archive CW (Curry) MS L/5 Bundle: 1774-1791; Jane Meredith, ''No Small Thing': Thomas Ivory's bridge at Lismore', Irish Arts Review Yearbook 14 (1998), 103 (article based on her History of Art Senior Sophister Thesis of the same title, Trinity College, Dublin, April 1996)

Building: CO. CORK, BALLYHOOLY, CHURCH (CI, OLD)
Date: 1771-74
Nature: New church (proposed). 50 x 24 ft, 'bow chancel omitted by Direction of His Grace'. Estimated cost: £530.
Refs: Estimate for building churches at Ballyhooly, Whitechurch and Clonrohid, Diocese of Cloyne, 1771, in Normanton Papers, Hampshire Record Office. 21M57, B2/2-6;  Mehaul Magner, 'Christ Church, Ballyhooly, & the Bridgetown connection', Mallow Field Club Journal 22 (2004), 132(illus.),137.

Building: CO. WATERFORD, TALLOW, MARKET HOUSE
Date: 1783
Nature: Unexecuted proposals for 5th Duke of Devonshire.
Refs: Site plan and 3 alternative designs for 'a Market or Town House, Designed for the Borough of Tallow in the County of Waterford' in Lismore Castle drawings collection (photocopy in IAA, 38/01-05); A.M. Rowan, ed., The Architecture of Richard and William Vitruvius Morrison (IAA, 1989), 2

Building: CO. KILDARE, SALLINS, HOTEL
Date: 1784
Nature: By 'Mr Morrison', for Grand Canal Co.
Refs: Ruth Delany, The Grand Canal of Ireland, pp.30,130

Building: CO. CORK, MIDLETON, HOUSES
Date: 1784
Nature: Proposal.
Refs: Letter book of Charles Brodrick, NLI microfilm, Pos. 4295 (IAA, Edward McParland files, Acc.2008/44)

Building: CO. CORK, MIDLETON, MARKET HOUSE
Date: 1784
Nature: Proposal.
Refs: Letter book of Charles Brodrick, NLI microfilm, Pos. 4295 (IAA, Edward McParland files, Acc.2008/44)

Building: CO. CORK, COBH, QUAY
Date: 1784
Nature: Proposal for same.
Refs: Letter book of Charles Brodrick, NLI microfilm, Pos. 4295

Building: CO. CORK, CLOYNE, CATHEDRAL OF ST COLMAN (CI)
Date: ?
Nature: Monument to Hugh Lumley.
Refs: A.M. Rowan, ed., The Architecture of Richard and William Vitruvius Morrison (IAA, 1989), 1

Author Title Date Details
Morrison, John 'An Essay on the Convenience, Strength and Beauty, which should be connected in all private and public Buildings' 1764 Dublin Magazine, Sep 1864.