Bishop Street Courthouse


The Bishop Street Courthouse is a judicial facility in Bishop Street, Derry, County Londonderry, Northern Ireland.

History

The building, which was designed by John Bowden in the Neoclassical style, was fully completed in 1817, though the first hearings were held in 1816. Architectural critic Ian Nairn described it as “Derry’s best Georgian building” in The Listener in December 1961, marking out the white sandstone brought locally from Dungiven to build it. The building was originally used as a facility for dispensing justice but, following the implementation of the Local Government Act 1898, which established county councils in every county, the Bishop Street Courthouse was used to discharge some county council functions. On 19 January 2019 there was a car bomb attack on the Bishop Street Courthouse initiated as part of a Dissident Irish Republican campaign, the first such attack in several years. There were no injuries from the attack.