The current building was commissioned to replace an earlier market house, financed by Sir William Cole, who was closely involved in the Plantation of Ulster, and completed in around 1618.[2] In the late 19th century, after the market house became dilapidated, civic leaders decided to construct a new town hall on the same site.[2][3]
The foundation stone for the new building was laid by Lady Enniskillen on 2 May 1898.[4][5] It was designed by William Alphonsus Scott of Drogheda in the Renaissance style, built in limestone with Dungannonsandstone dressings at a cost of £13,000 and was officially opened by the Countess of Erne on 6 January 1901.[5] The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with five bays facing onto the Townhall Street; the central bay, which slightly projected forward, featured a Doric orderportico with heavy oak doors and a fanlight; there was a balcony and a French door on the first floor with two pairs of Corinthian orderpilasters supporting an entablature and a pediment with a coat of arms in the tympanum. In the north western corner of the building there was a six-stage tower with a copperdome.[2] In the third stage of the tower there were niches containing stone statues of soldiers from two local-raised regiments: the 6th (Inniskilling) Dragoons and the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers.[6] Internally, the principal room was the council chamber.[7]
The building served as the headquarters of Enniskillen Borough Council[8] until it lost its administrative functions to Fermanagh County Council in 1967.[9] After the eastern part of the building had been partitioned into offices in 1980,[10] it went on to become the meeting place of Fermanagh District Council.[11][12]
^"County Fermanagh (Transfer of Functions) Order (Northern Ireland) 1967". Retrieved 17 May 2021. The order provides for the transfer on 2nd June, 1967, of the functions, liabilities, property and staff of the borough and rural district councils to a reconstituted county council. ... The rural district councils will, in fact, be abolished. But the borough council, consisting in future of the 12 county councillors representing the area of the borough, will remain to exercise the ceremonial functions of the borough.