placenamesBoardmills
An Muileann Adhmaid
Boardmills has a particularly well-documented history of religious division and reunion. Its congregational records also preserve details of schooling, charitable gifts and a small sewing business linked to Belfast’s linen trade.
The name
These Irish name elements are associated with this record in the Logainm glossary.
An element’s translation is a clue, rather than a complete explanation of the name. Its form and meaning depend on local history and the full Irish name.
Recorded forms
- An Muileann Adhmaid · Irish · main form · validated name
- Boardmills · English · main form
Place & story
A dispute over the meeting house
The union of Presbyterian synods in 1840 brought a sharp local dispute at Boardmills. Members who opposed the change took possession of the meeting house, leaving George Hay Shanks and his congregation without their building. The congregational history records intervention by the Marquis of Downshire and a settlement under which the withdrawing members received £350 in return for abandoning their claim. They used the money to build Killaney Secession Church on land donated by John Dunwoody. It opened in 1846, within sight of the church they had left. [2]
Sewing for the Belfast linen houses
Boardmills also participated in the wider linen economy. The congregational history records a small hemstitching factory established in 1888 by Mrs McGahey. Ten people worked with eight sewing machines, principally supplying Belfast’s wholesale linen houses. This compact enterprise illustrates how the finishing of textiles could provide local employment away from the larger urban factories. The account identifies a specific business and workforce, without suggesting that all of Boardmills depended on this one workshop. [2]
Killaney’s changing church dedication
Killaney’s Church of Ireland parish provides another strand of Boardmills history. Its own parish account dates the present church’s consecration to 19 April 1867, originally under the dedication of Saint John the Evangelist. By some time before 1915 the dedication had changed to Saint Andrew. In 1954 Killaney was grouped with Carryduff parish. The present name therefore belongs to a later stage in the building’s history. [3]
Geographic information
- Place type
- Population centre
- County
- Down
- Barony
- Castlereagh Upper
- Civil parish
- Killaney
- Coordinates
- 54.46171, -5.93328 (approximate)
- Logainm ID
- 130047 ↗
Sources & further reading
- Logainm.ie — Boardmills. Place names and geographic record, licensed under CC BY 4.0.
- The Church in the Rolling Hills: Two Hundred and Fifty Years, 1748–1998, section 3 · First and Second Boardmills and Killaney Presbyterian Churches
- Parish Histories: Killaney · Killaney and Carryduff Parishes
Name record retrieved 2026-10-25 · Source record modified 2019-10-08. How this page was prepared.