Robert Adam in a Presbyterian graveyard
Templetown Mausoleum
Arthur Upton of Castle Upton died at Tunbridge Wells in September 1768. His widow Sarah Cosby commissioned Robert Adam — at the height of his reputation, the architect of Kenwood and Syon and the Adelphi in London — to design a mausoleum to 'perpetuate the memory of an husband she loved and esteemed.' Adam sent designs for a larger temple; Sarah Cosby chose a smaller, plainer one, with the side elevation moved to the front. The result, completed in 1789, is a small triumphal arch in pale stone with Greek urns and classical reliefs, unaltered for two hundred and thirty-odd years. It is one of only a handful of Adam works in Ireland, a Grade A listed building, and stands in the Old Presbyterian Burial Ground beside the parish church. The National Trust has the keeping of it. There is no charge to walk in.
What the M2 did
The commuter village
Before the motorway, Templepatrick sat on the main road from Belfast to Antrim and Derry. The old Antrim Road ran straight through the square and carried every car, lorry and bus that wanted to get north or west out of Belfast. The M2 from Belfast to Antrim was built in stages through the 1960s and early 1970s and lifted that traffic off the village street. What was left behind was a quiet square, two hotels, a primary school, a couple of pubs, and a population that mostly drives somewhere else in the morning. The 2021 census put it at 1,541. The figure has hovered in that range for two decades. The village does not grow much because the green belt holds — but the houses that are here cost what airport-corridor houses cost.
Three centuries on the same demesne
The Uptons of Castle Upton
Captain Henry Upton bought Castle Upton in 1625 from Sir Humphrey Norton and renamed it for his family. The Uptons held it for the next three hundred years. Clotworthy Upton was made Baron Templetown in 1776 — hence Lady Elizabeth Templetown, the eighteenth-century writer and amateur artist whose name was later given to the village hotel. The family commissioned Adam for the mausoleum, the castle remodelling, and Adam Yard, the stable block that still stands. The castle remains privately owned and is not open to visitors. The estate around it has been parcelled into the Hilton golf course on one side and parkland on the other; the mausoleum is the only piece of the demesne the public sees up close.