The Old Town Hall is a municipal building on the north side of The Square in Portsoy, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The structure, which is used for religious gatherings, is a Category C listed building.[1]
History
The building was commissioned as an events venue in the late 18th century.[2] It was designed in the neoclassical style, built in brick with a harled finish and was completed in 1798.[1] The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with five bays facing onto The Square. The central bay, which projected forward, featured a sash window with a pediment, and a date stone in the centre of the gable above, which was itself surmounted by a chimney. The bays on either side of the central bay were fenestrated with plain sash windows while the outer bays contained doorways with architraves and square-shaped fanlights. The sash windows and fanlights all featured a distinctive bordered glazing pattern.[1]
The building, which was remodelled in 1892,[3] was used for recruitment meetings at the start of the First World War[4] and then briefly served as a drill station for the local platoon from A company of the 6th (Banff and Donside) Battalion, The Gordon Highlanders, before the battalion was deployed for service to the Western Front in November 1914.[5][6][7] After the war, the burgh council established itself in a new hall in Seafield Street which had been built as a church and completed in 1875.[8][9]
Following its own recruitment campaign, the local branch the Salvation Army acquired the building in The Square in 1923.[10] The Salvation Army enjoyed a revival of its activities in 1949 but, after its numbers dwindled, the hall closed in 1990.[11] The building was subsequently used by the local branch of the Jehovah's Witnesses and was designated the local Kingdom Hall.[12] In 2015, the building was transferred to the management of a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO) known as the "Portsoy Community Church", which leased the former Salvation Army Hall from Aberdeenshire Council.[13] Organisations which subsequently chose to use the building included the local branch of the Destiny Church, which is a PentecostalCharismatic Christianity group served by a local pastor.[14]
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