A new dawn, a new day, a new year: sunrise at Ballynatray, County Waterford.
The Irish Aesthete wishes all friends and followers the very best for 2016.
Category Archives: Country House
In New Hands
The 15th century de Burgo tower house which forms the core of Tulira Castle, County Galway. This was one of a number of country houses acquired by new owners during the course of 2015, significant others including Bellamont Forest, County Cavan and Capard, County Laois. But many others remain on the market, such as Milltown Park, County Offaly, Newhall, County Clare, Kilcooley, County Tipperary and Furness, County Kildare, all of which have been discussed here on earlier occasions. Let us hope the coming year is kind to them and all of Ireland’s architectural heritage.
Scouting Around for a Saviour
A week ago the national tourist board, Fáilte Ireland, announced that €60,175 in funding is to be made available to Castle Saunderson, County Cavan. Seemingly this money is part of the organisation’s ‘New ideas in Ancient Spaces’ Capital Grants Scheme for attractions within the Ireland’s Ancient East initiative. The latter scheme was launched by Fáilte Ireland’s last April and ‘seeks to build on the wealth of historical and cultural assets in the east and south of Ireland.’ Leaving aside the fact that Castle Saunderson could never be described as being located in either the east or south of the country (north-midlands might be the simplest summary) one wonders what will be the result of this expenditure. According to Fáilte Ireland, the money ‘will be used to enhance the “on the ground” visitor experience and present the story of Castle Saunderson through the ages. This will be achieved through the development of a new “easy to explore” heritage trail – The Castle Trail. Through interpretative displays, visual art and written interpretation, the story will imaginatively portray the dramatic history and transition of this place as part of Ireland’s Ancient East from free land, through conflict, plantation and the divisive advent of Unionism and the Orange Order to the peaceful coexistence of the present day.’ In other words, the money doesn’t appear to be going towards the restoration of a building on the site which has only fallen into dereliction in the past twenty years and which, with a hint more creativity and resourcefulness, could be restored to serve as a splendid base for the aforementioned ‘on the ground’ visitor experience.
Around the middle of the 17th century the land on which Castle Saunderson stands passed into the hands of one Robert Sanderson whose father, Alexander Sanderson, had come to Ireland as a soldier and settled in County Tyrone. Robert Sanderson had been a Colonel in the army of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, and in 1657 served as High Sheriff of County Cavan. On his death in 1675, the estate passed to his eldest son, another Colonel Robert who sat in the Irish House of Commons and married Jane Leslie, a daughter of the Right Rev John Leslie, Bishop of Clogher. The couple had no children and so Castle Saunderson passed to a nephew, Alexander Sanderson. It was the latter’s grandson, another Alexander, who changed the spelling of the family name to Saunderson as part of an ultimately fruitless effort to claim the Castleton peerage of the Saundersons of Saxby, Lincolnshire (the first and last Earl Castleton having died unmarried in 1723). It is his son Francis who is credited with having built the core of the present house. Staunchly anti-Catholic, he is said to have disinherited his eldest son for marrying a member of that faith (or it could have been because she was the daughter of a lodge keeper at Castle Saunderson). So the estate of over 12,000 acres went to a younger son, Alexander. He likewise disinherited his first-born son because he was crippled, and another son who proved rebellious, instead leaving Castle Saunderson to the fourth son, Colonel Edward James Saunderson who, like his forbears, was a Whig politician, and in Ireland leader of the Liberal Unionist opposition to Gladstone’s efforts to introduce some measure of home rule. It appears to have been after the death of his eldest son Somerset Saunderson in 1927 that the family moved out of the house, although they did not sell the property until half a century later.
As has been mentioned, at the core of Castle Saunderson is a classical house built by Francis Saunderson probably around the time of his marriage to Anne White in 1779. In the mid-1830s the building was extensively remodeled in a version of Elizabethan gothic for his son Alexander Saunderson. In December 1835 Nathaniel Clements wrote to Lady Leitrim that he had called by Castle Saunderson where the owner was ‘altering and castellating his house, so I was quite in my element’ The architect responsible for this work is now considered to be George Sudden, who was employed elsewhere in the area, at Lough Fea, County Monaghan and Crom Castle, County Fermanagh, Castle Saunderson displaying certain similarities with the latter (where the original design had been by Edward Blore). This intervention resulted in a bit of a mongrel, the east-facing, two-storey former entrance front retaining long sash windows to either side of a central three-storey castellated tower, its octagonal turrets echoed by lower, square ones at either end of the facade. The north and south fronts are asymmetric, the former having an octagonal entrance tower placed off-centre, the latter featuring a four-bay loggia between two further towers, as well as a substantial service wing at right angles that once incorporated a single-storey orangery. Although unoccupied by the Saundersons, the property was not sold by the family until 1977 when it was bought by a businessman who undertook restoration work. For a period it then became an hotel before being sold again in the 1990s after which fire gutted the house. In 1997 Castle Saunderson and its grounds were acquired by what is now called Scouting Ireland which initially appeared to show interest in restoring the building but eventually chose to construct a new centre elsewhere in the grounds at a cost of some €3.7 million. Meanwhile the old castle has continued to deteriorate: it looks unlikely Fáilte Ireland’s recently-trumpeted initiative will change this situation.
Made Better by their Presents III
A view of the formal gardens at the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham, lying directly below the building’s north face. The hospital’s minutes in 1695 note, ‘The garden walls to be arranged so the garden may lie open to the north part…for the greater grace of the house.’ Although the design here is a 20th century reconstruction, it gives an idea of the style of classical garden once common in Ireland but now rarely seen. A recently published book by Vandra Costello, Irish Desmesne Landscapes, 1660-1740 gives an idea of what has been lost, as well as what remains. She rightly chooses 1660 as her starting date, since that was the year Charles II was restored to the throne and his supporters, including James Butler, first Duke of Ormond, returned from mainland Europe. During their years in exile, these royalists had observed the French fashion for gardening epitomised by the work of André Le Nôtre and in due course introduced these ideas to their own countries. These gardens, as Costello observes, were guided by the principle of utile et dulci: the notion that landowners, in addition to following contemporary fashion and devising idealised landscapes in which to enjoy themselves ought at the same time ‘to make their fruit growing endeavours, timber plantations and parklands economically profitable and sustainable as well as aesthetically pleasing.’ Thus the garden at the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham – the building of which had been initiated by the Duke of Ormond – was expected to provide not just elegant surroundings for the main structure but also produce for its occupants. In the course of her highly informative and elegantly written book, Costello also explodes a few well-cherished myths, such as the notion that the 17th century formal gardens at Kilruddery, County Wicklow, the finest such example remaining in this country, were designed by a Frenchman called Bonnet, possibly a pupil of Le Nôtre himself: this error, she points out, has arisen from confusion over a reference in the papers of Sir William Petty. And she discusses how it was that the classical garden fell out of favour with Irish landowners in the 18th century, noting the process was less attributable to politics – it is often proposed that Tories liked formality while Whigs preferred the ‘natural’ – than to straightforward changes in taste. In her garden at Delville, County Dublin Mrs Delaney, who was unquestionably a Whig, incorporated many elements of the formal style including a bowling green, terrace walk, parterre and orangery. As so often in Irish history, the simple interpretation is rarely correct. A terrific read, and definitely worth adding to every library.
Irish Demesne Landscapes, 1660-1740 by Vandra Costello is published by Four Courts Press, €50.
Still Standing Proud
The free-standing tower at Donadea Castle, County Kildare. Presumably this is the oldest part of the building, erected by the Aylmer family on the site of an earlier mediaeval residence and completed in 1624. Later a larger house was constructed immediately adjacent to the tower, and the whole property Gothicised in the early 19th century (this work is often attributed to Sir Richard Morrison). Now at the centre of a national park, Donadea was unroofed in the 1950s but somehow traces of its former state survive, not least the wooden window frames and shutters. A shame these have never been rescued, rather than being allowed to fall into decay.
An Abandoned Project
The history of Ireland in the later Middle Ages becomes immensely complicated due to the fractious character of Irish families and their habit of forming, and then breaking, alliances with each other. The south-west of the country (now Counties Kerry and Cork) was for a long time dominated by the MacCarthy Mórs, Kings of Desmond under which were three cadet branches ruling over their own territories whenever not feuding among themselves. Following the death of the last of King of Desmond, Donal IX in 1596 leaving only an illegitimate son, a dispute broke out between various members of these septs over who was entitled to claim his position. One of those who sought to become the new MacCarthy Mór was Dermot MacOwen MacCarthy, a descendant of Dermod, the third son of Cormac Fionn MacCarthy Mór (1170-1242), King of Desmond (although for the purposes of his claim MacOwen MacCarthy contended he was descended from Cormac’s eldest son). But at the same time Dermot MacOwen was in dispute with a cousin, Donogh MacCormac MacCarthy for the title of Lord of Duhallow, one of the three subordinate septs of Desmond. Yet in 1598 the two men joined forces to attack Castle Hyde, home of the settler Arthur Hyde, which after a three-day siege was captured and burnt. They then reverted to their earlier quarrel over the Lordship of Duhallow. Under these circumstances, it is no wonder the Irish were so often unable to defeat their common foe, the invading English.
Following the death of Donogh MacCormac MacCarthy during a skirmish in the Clare-Galway region in 1601, Dermot MacOwen MacCarthy became the undisputed Lord o Duhallow and it is likely that around this time (or following his release by the English government in the aftermath of the Battle of Kinsale during which he had been imprisoned) work began on the construction of a his new residence immediately south of Kanturk, County Cork: on a map of Ireland made by John Norden between 1609 and 1611, there is a castle shown at “Cantork” (Kanturk). It is sometimes proposed that Donogh MacCormac was responsible for initiating work on this castle, but given that he died in 1601 that seems unlikely. Seemingly in order to pay for the building’s construction, MacCormac MacCarthy mortgaged large tracts of his territory even though under Gaelic law all such land was deemed communal property. The mortgagee was Sir Philip Percival who had arrived in Ireland in 1579 and by such means was able to amass a large estate for himself. No documentation survives about Kanturk Castle’s construction, but one legend claims it was built by seven stone-masons all called named John: for a time the building was known as ‘Carrig-na-Shane-Saor’ (the Rock of John the Mason). Work on the site seems to have stopped in 1618 after English settlers in the area objected to the castle being too large and too fortified. Accordingly the English Privy Council ordered work be discontinued. It is said that MacCormac MacCarthy was so angry at this instruction that he ordered the blue ceramic tiles on the castle’s roof be smashed and thrown into a nearby stream, which thereafter has been known as Bluepool.
Kanturk Castle, otherwise called Old Court, rises beside the Dalua river, a tributary of the Blackwater. It is constructed of local limestone rubble, with cut stone used for the mullioned and transomed windows as well as the hoods, cornices, quoins and corbels. The same cut limestone can also be seen around entrance doors, and what remain of the chimney pieces on each floor inside the building. The castle is rectangular in form, measuring twenty-eight by eleven metres and rising four storeys with a five storey, twenty-nine metre high tower at each corner. The main entrance is on the western side, a work of Italian Renaissance inspiration with an elaborate entablature above the Ionic columns on either side of the round headed door frame. Since it is located on what would have been the first floor, presumably the original approach was via a flight of steps (on the other hand, given the gun holes on other parts of the building, perhaps the raised entrance served as a defensive device?) To the rear of the castle is another more familiar arched entrance on the ground floor. Inside the floors are all gone. One of the stories about Kanturk Castle is that, after his fit of pique over the Privy Council order, MacCormac MacCarthy never occupied the place. However, given the quality of the remaining chimney pieces (some were later removed to Lohort Castle), this seems unlikely. Whether the building was ever fully completed or thereafter much used remains open to conjecture.
Dermot MacCormac MacCarthy was succeeded by his son, Dermot Oge, who married Julia, daughter of Donal, last O’Sullivan Beare and widow of Sir Nicholas Browne whose father had bought the vast MacCarthy estates in Kerry. Having participated in the Confederate Wars of the 1640s, both Dermot Oge and his son were killed in 1652 at Knocknaclashy, west of Mallow, in the course of battle against a Cromwellian force led by Lord Broghill. Twenty years earlier financial exigency had led him to enter into the aforementioned mortgage agreement with Sir Philip Percival, so the family’s ongoing possession of their land was already vulnerable. In the aftermath of the restoration of the English monarchy in 1660 the Court of Claims denied the MacCarthys Equity of Redemption on the old mortgage. Instead ownership of the Lordship of Duhallow and the manor of Kanturk was awarded to ‘Sir Philip Percival, baronet, minor, grandson and heir of the said Sir Philip the Elder.’ Ultimately Sir Philip’s great-grandson Sir John Perceval became Baron of Burton, county Cork, in 1715, Viscount Perceval, of Kanturk, in 1722 and finally Earl of Egmont in 1733. Although Kanturk Castle appears in the background of a portrait of the second earl and his wife painted c.1759 by Sir Joshua Reynolds (now in Bradford Museum), the family made their residence at Lohort Castle, another former MacCarthy stronghold. In 1900 the seventh earl’s widow presented Kanturk Castle to England’s National Trust, which had only been founded five years earlier, on condition the building be maintained in the condition in which it was received. For much of the last century the castle was the National Trust’s only property in the Republic. In September 1951, it granted the building to An Taisce (a long-established charitable organisation engaged in the preservation and protection of Ireland’s natural and built heritage) on a 1,000 year lease and at a rent of one shilling per annum if so demanded. In 2000 the National Trust officially transferred the title deeds of Kanturk Castle to An Taisce, which is now responsible for the building, a national monument, on behalf of the Irish people.
Pure Folly
This seeming folly closes a vista inside the walled garden of Strokestown Park, County Roscommon. In fact the main feature here, the limestone Venetian window, was originally sited on the first floor of the main house and formed part of Richard Castle’s design dating from the 1730s. When Strokestown underwent modifications around 1819 – the architect on that occasion being John Lynn – the window was removed (presumably because a large Ionic portico was added directly beneath) and put into storage. It only found a new home in the walled garden when this was restored in the 1990s.
People in Glasshouses
The roofline of a greenhouse in the walled garden at Tullynally, County Westmeath. Dating from around 1820, it has been built against a brick wall and facing south. Originally used for growing fruit such as peaches and grapes, the building retains its timber frame and fish-scale glass sheets, now something of a rarity in Ireland.
A Generous Welcome to the World
The generous proportions of the front door in the entrance hall at Ballymacmoy, County Cork. Since the early 18th century the house has been home to successive generations of Hennessys, one of whom Richard emigrated to France where he became an officer in the famous Dillon’s Regiment before settling in the Cognac region and founding the eponymous family firm. The present building dates from the second decade of the 19th century, replacing an older property when its excessively heavy slates caused the roof to collapse, killing a pig and a goose, and injuring a beggar who unfortunately happened just then to call to the door.
Mixing the Orders
One of the series of doors found at the base of the stairs in the south hall at Ballyhaise, County Cavan. While the core of the house dates from c.1730, this part of the building was extensively remodelled and extended early in the following century. The doorcases, with their ribbed pilasters and feathered capitals beneath expansive arched fans, date from that period.
For more about Ballyhaise, see Made to Last For Ever, March 9th 2015.