Tag Archives: Irish Castle

Looking Back




Looking back over posts during 2025, the Irish Aesthete seems to have featured a lot of castles. Some of them are the real thing, dating back to the Cambro-Norman period, such as those above: Castlecarra, County Mayo (see Difficult to Locate without a Guide « The Irish Aesthete), Greencastle (see A Noble and Commanding Appearance « The Irish Aesthete)and Dundrum Castle (see Boldly and Picturesquely Seated « The Irish Aesthete), both County Down.




Some of them while commonly named castles, are actually tower houses from the late-medieval period, such as Balief Castle, County Kilkenny (see Beyond Balief « The Irish Aesthete) and Ballinlough Castle, County Offaly (see A Picturesque Eye Catcher « The Irish Aesthete) and Synone Castle, County Tipperary (see In Circles « The Irish Aesthete).




Some of them have been repaired or are undergoing restoration, like Barryscourt Castle, County Cork (see Reopened « The Irish Aesthete), Bremore Castle, County Dublin (see A Work in Progress « The Irish Aesthete) and Drimnagh Castle, Dublin (see Showing What Can be Done « The Irish Aesthete).



And finally, some are 19th century reimaginings of an ancient castle, such as Castlewellan, County Down (see A Somewhat Institutional Air « The Irish Aesthete), Johnstown Castle, County Wexford (see This Magnificent Building « The Irish Aesthete) and Belfast Castle (see Time for a Makeover « The Irish Aesthete). Are there further examples to be discovered and investigated in the year ahead? Without doubt, the answer is yes and the Irish Aesthete looks forward to doing so in 2026…

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In Circles



Synone Castle is another cylindrical tower house found in County Tipperary, not unlike that at Balief (see Beyond Balief « The Irish Aesthete) and Ballynahow (see Encircled « The Irish Aesthete). Surrounded by the remains of a bawn wall (within which stands a relatively new residence) and rising some 50 feet, the building is of four storeys with small openings on each floor and three machiolations at the top. There appears to be little information about the castle, said to have been built by the Butler family. 



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One of the Prettiest and Most Striking Objects to be seen on the River Lee


‘About half-past two o’clock on Tuesday morning, Blackrock Castle was observed to be on fire, and in a few minutes presented a very imposing sight. The waters were illuminated, and the surrounding hills completely lit, presenting more the appearance of noon-day than of a dark night. Immediately after the cupola blazed with the greatest splendour, the heavy leads caught fire and sent to the river a liquid body of burning lead, the concussion between the red-hot lead and water sending forth a crash resembling the noise of artillery; the rain which fell about the time on the burning lead roof, yielding a noise like the fire of musketry. The whole presented a grand and awful sight, and continued burning with unabated fury for upwards of three hours. The roof has completely disappeared, and the timbers in the wall were burning this morning at seven o’clock. Fortunately, the inmates escaped unhurt. Had the wind been in another direction, the surrounding houses would probably have been destroyed. The fire is supposed to have been caused by a slate having broken the glass of the river light which is kept on Blackrock Castle for the use of ships, and the fire caught the roof.’
Dublin Morning Register, March 2nd 1827. 





Located on a limestone outcrop in the river Lee to the immediate east of Cork city, Blackrock Castle was originally built in the early 1580s and maintained by the local burghers according to a contemporary document, ‘to resist pirates and other invasion’ (it should be remembered that as late as 1631, the coastal village of Baltimore, further to the west was sacked by pirates and more than 100 of its residents carried off into slavery in Algiers). The first castle was little more than a watch tower which also served to help guide ships into Cork harbour. However, in the early 17th century, Ireland’s Lord Deputy Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy caused the building to be enlarged and reinforced, with walls over seven feet thick and the main circular tower having a diameter of some 34 and a half feet. Returned by James I to the citizenry of Cork in 1608,  this structure held artillery intended to repel any would-be invaders venturing up the river. In 1722, the castle was damaged by fire and, according to Charles Smith’s Ancient and Present State of the County and City of Cork (1750), the corporation spent £296 refurbishing the building, this work including the creation of ‘a very handsome octagon room, from whence is a delightful prospect of the harbour, from Passage to Cork.’ Here, according to Smith, ‘the mayors of Cork hold an admiralty court, being, by several charters, appointed admirals of the harbour.’ In addition, on the first day of August each year, the mayor and corporation held an ‘entertainment’ in the building, ‘at the charge of the city.’ Such remained the case until February 27th when a serious fire, as described above in the Dublin Morning Register, largely destroyed the old castle. 




In December 1827, Cork Corporation voted a sum of £800, and the Harbour Commissioners a further £200 towards the cost of rebuilding Blackrock Castle. The job was entrusted to architect siblings James and George Pain, both pupils of John Nash,  who had each come to Ireland during the previous decade and established thriving practices. As designed by the Pains and completed within two years, Blackrock Castle looks like a medieval fortress, its dominant feature being a large circular tower to which is attached a much more slender and somewhat taller turret: the latter continued to have navigation lights on its roof to aid shipping. Around the tower, a series of battlemented walls enclose a courtyard, helping to confirm the image of a romantic gothic castle. Despite being described in the Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaeological Society in 1914 as ‘one of the prettiest and most striking objects to be seen on the river Lee’, the building thereafter suffered from neglect for much of the last century,. It was leased to a professor of botany in the 1930s and then sold in the 1960s to a group of local businessmen, after which it served as a bar, a restaurant,  commercial offices and, for one period, as a private residence. In 2001 Blackrock Castle was bought back by Cork Corporation for IR£825,000 and a programme of restoration was undertaken. For almost 20 years, the building has housed an observatory run by Munster Technological University and laboratories staffed by astronomical researchers from the same institution. Although open to the public and hosting exhibitions, because the castle always served practical purposes, internally there is little of decorative interest, other than a fine limestone chimneypiece from the second quarter of the 17th century and originally in a since-demolished house called Ronayne’s Court. Better to rejoice in the handsome exterior, with the waters of the river Lee washing against a sequence of towers and turrets.


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The Remaining Third




As its name indicates, Threecastles in County Wicklow was once the site of three fortified buildings, only one of which still survives, at least in part. While the history of this tower house is unclear, it is believed to have been constructed in the early 16th century when this part of the country came under the control of Gerald FitzGerald, eighth Earl of Kildare who was Lord Deputy of Ireland in the years until his death in 1513. Faced in local granite, the battlemented upper section of the three-storey building is missing, as is a substantial portion which once extended to the west.




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A Glebe House and a Castle



After last Monday’s post about the former 19th century rectory outside Rathkeale, County Limerick (see A Glebe House and a Castle « The Irish Aesthete) here are some images of its predecessor, located to the immediate west of Holy Trinity Church and to the south of the river Deel, on the outskirts of the town. A four-storey, late-medieval tower house, the building is now called Glebe Castle, thereby indicating its original function which presumably it retained until the new clerical residence was constructed in 1819. But seemingly it was also known as Chancellor’s Castle, since the rector of Rathkeale was also Chancellor of the Diocese of Limerick. By the time that Samuel Lewis published his Topographical Survey of Ireland in 1837, Glebe Castle had become home to the Rev. CT Coghlan, rector of the neighbouring parish of Kilscannel. At some unknown date, a single-storey block was added to east side of the castle, but more recently the present house has been built here. 



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This Magnificent Building


The Irish line of the Esmonde family is believed to be descended from Geoffrey de Estmont of Lincolnshire, one of the thirty Norman knights who accompanied Robert FitzStephen to land at Bannow, County Wexford in 1169. Seemingly, Estmont built a motte and bailey at Lymbrick in the Barony of Forth in Wexford, where his son Maurice constructed a castle on the same site. Following the latter’s death in 1225, this building was abandoned, his son John erecting another castle on a new site, which came to be named Johnstown Castle and which survived until 1945. The property remained in the possession of the Esmondes until the mid-17th century when, as members of the Roman Catholic Confederate alliance, they suffered expulsion: Oliver Cromwell is said to have spent a night here immediately prior to his forces sacking Wexford town in early October 1649. Johnstown Castle was subsequently granted to one of his troops, Colonel John Overstreet, but eventually in 1692 it was bought by John Grogan whose descendants lived there until 1945: in the early 1800s, the Grogans were the largest untitled landowners in Ireland, with estates running to some 20,000 acres. Presumably they occupied and perhaps enlarged a house already on the site, but no evidence of it is immediately apparent today, so thorough was the reordering of the building in the second quarter of the 19th century. Before then, one member of the family, Cornelius Grogan, became involved in the 1798 Rebellion, being made commissary-general of the local rebels;’ army. Whether he assumed this role voluntarily or under compulsion has remained open to question: at his trial, Grogan pleaded that he had been forced to take a nominal lead but had committed no overt act of treason. However, this was insufficient to stop his being hanged and beheaded, and for the Johnstown estate to be escheated by the British authorities: on payment of a substantial fine, it was recovered by the former owner’s youngest brother John Grogan.





As seen today (and visited on a singularly miserable, wet day), Johnstown Castle is largely the creation of John Grogan’s son Hamilton Knox Grogan-Morgan who in 1836 commissioned designs for both the building and its gardens from Daniel Robertson, although in Home Sketches (1852), Thomas Lacy wrote that the now-lost main staircase had been the work of English-born Thomas Hopper. Meanwhile, at Johnstown, Robertson appears to have been assisted by Wexford architect Martin Day, who signed many of the preparatory drawings for the building. A late exercise in fanciful Gothick, most of the castle is constructed of local shale, with the Carlow granite employed for quoins, and dressings around windows, doors and archways. The aforementioned Thomas Lacy devoted several pages to enthusing over the transformed castle, summarising it as ‘this magnificent building.’ Despite claiming that he dared not attempt a detailed description of its ‘elegantly furnished rooms, the ceilings, the rich and gorgeous papering, the magnificent curtains and drapery in general,; the mantlepieces and articles of vertu that ornament them; the splendid mirrors, the vases, the candelabra, the tables, chairs, sofas, ottomans, and the other indescribable articles,’ somehow Lacy managed to wax lyrical for several pages. The main hall, for example, he wrote ‘presents a massive and truly characteristic appearance; so much so, that if an intelligent person was brought thither in his sleep, he would, upon awaking, be at once convinced that he was within the hall of some grand castle or stately palace.’ In the library, ‘The furniture of this grand apartment is in keeping with its character; the chairs, sofas, tables and bookcases are all of the choicest and best description; this is such a room as Bacon, Newton, Locke or Walter Scott, would like to call his own.’ Of the dining room he declared, ‘oak panelling and carving can be seen; the darkness of the oak is finely relieved by the rich gilding of the ceiling and the other parts of the chamber. This room has a really gorgeous appearance, and reminds one of the House of Lords, which, in some measure, it resembles both in form and decoration.’ And so, despite protestations of inability to attempt an adequate description, Lacy goes on, room after room after room. 





Following Hamilton Knox Grogan-Morgan’s death, his widow Sophia married Sir Thomas Esmonde, so that, at least temporarily, the Johnstown estate reverted to the original family. The property was then inherited by the Grogan-Morgan’s elder daughter Jane, married to George Forbes, seventh Earl of Granard. In turn, Johnstown passed to the couple’s younger daughter Adelaide, wife of Lord Maurice FitzGerald, a younger son of the fourth Duke of Leinster. Following her death in 1942, the estate was inherited by her grandson Maurice Victor Lakin. Two years later, the contents of the castle, running to 1,187 lots, were sold at auction over a period of five days by Jackson, Stops & McCabe. Some 114 of the items on offer, about one-tenth of the total, were bought by the Office of Public Works, not least because in certain cases there were few other potential purchasers. For example, according to a contemporary report in the Irish Press, ‘It was hard to find bidders for some of the massive oak furniture. An oak side table on carved pillars, 7ft long, brought only £5 and the same sum bought the carved oak pedestal sideboard.’ Happily the majority of these lots can be seen in the building today. In 1945 the Johnstown estate was given to the Irish State by Maurice Lakin in lieu of death duties. The castle itself was taken over the the Department of Agriculture and initially served as an educational college, before becoming a centre for agricultural research, with laboratories established on site. Since 1976, an agricultural museum has operated in the yards. Less hearteningly, during the second half of the last century some serious losses occurred, not least the medieval tower attached to the front of the building: a residue from the original Esmonde era, it stood to the immediate left of the porte-cochère but was swept away soon after the property passed into state hands. Inside the castle, the greatest loss was the demolition of the magnificent Imperial staircase, a confection of neo-Gothic carving, cleared out to make way for a library for the college. Today, while the building is owned by Teagasc, Ireland’s Agriculture and Food Development Authority, it is managed by the Irish Heritage Trust which for the past decade has been gradually undertaking restoration work here, as funds permit. In addition, the IHT, which opens the castle to the public, has been refurbishing some of the main rooms, thanks to a mixture of purchases, loans and gifts, with some pieces now returned to their original home. A happier story than has often been the case for Irish country houses. 


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A Picturesque Eye Catcher




After Monday’s post about Loughton, County Offaly, here is an earlier dwelling found within the demesne. Standing on raised ground to the immediate south of the main house and evidently retained as a romantic eye-catcher, this is a four storey tower house likely dating from the early 17th century when constructed for the then-dominant O’Carroll family. Circular bartizans remain at the top of the building on the south-west and north-east corners, with an internal staircase beginning on the east wall before turning 90 degrees and ascending up the north. A large fireplace opening also remains on the east side of the now-roofless castle.




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A Noble and Commanding Appearance


‘The history of Mourne is associated with that of the Castle of Greencastle – one of the finest specimens of Anglo-Norman architecture military architecture in the County of Down – which constitutes such an important feature in the scenery of that coast, from every point of which it presents a noble and commanding appearance. It was erected by the early English invaders to guard the entrance to the Lough of Carlingford and to secure a line of correspondence between the Pale and their outlying possessions in Lecale.’
From An Historical Account of the Diocese of Down and Connor by the Rev. James O’Laverty (Dublin, 1878)




‘Greencastle, situated in the barony of Mourne, County Down, province of Ulster. It stands upon a gut or inlet of the sea and was reputed a strong castle, fortified by the Burghs, earls of Ulster and lords of Connaught. It was remarkable for two eminent marriages celebrated here in 1312; one between Maurice Fitzthomas and Catherine, daughter to the Earl of Ulster, on the 5th of August, and the other between Thomas Fitz-John and another daughter of the said earl, on the 16th of the same month. It was destroyed by the Irish, A.D. 1643, but soon after repaired and better fortified. Green Castle and the Castle of Carlingford, appear by a record, 1 Henry IV, to have been governed by one constable, the better to secure a communication between the English pale of the County Louth and the settlements of the English in Lecale and those northern parts; and Stephen Gernon was constable of both, for which he had a salary of 20l. per annum for Green Castle and 5l. for Carlingford. In 1495, it was thought to be a place of such importance to the crown, that no person, but of English birth was declared capable of being constable of it.’
From An Improved Topographical and Historical Hibernian Gazetteer, by the Rev. H Hansbrow (Dublin, 1835)




‘The castle stands upon an elevated rock, about a quarter of a mile from the sea. The walls are double, and the outer ones is looped at regular distances for archers, with passages to each floor. The central building is strengthened and protected by four square flanking towers at the corners, with a spiral staircase in each. Upon gaining the battlements, a beautiful view of the Lough scenery is obtained; the most striking object, however, is the Castle of Carlingford, which looks to great advantage from this point.
Green Castle rendered important services in the rebellion of 1641. It served not only to protect the Protestants of the district, but exercised considerable influence in keeping the insurrection in check. A part of this old Castle is now in occupation, and the rest turned into out-offices for cattle.’
From Tours in Ulster: A Handbook to the Antiquities and Scenery by J.B. Doyle (Dublin, 1855)


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Guarding the Pass of the Shannon


‘In 1140 the ancient town of Athlone was just as important a military post as it is today. The ancient Castle, still guarded jealously and fortified in modern fashion; the frowning batteries with guns all looking towards Connaught, speak clearly of the invasions expected from that quarter. Seven hundred years ago, a Celtic dun of earth rose on the very same spot where now stands the Castle raised by the ancient spot by King John’s ecclesiastico-warrior architect, John, Bishop of Norwich. The Castle of Athlone has ever guarded the pass of the Shannon, and has seen many a hard fight for its possession down to the last great struggles when De Ginkle defeated St. Ruth and destroyed the hopes of the Stuarts.’
From Ireland and the Anglo-Norman Church by the Rev.G.T. Stokes (1897)





‘The castle, which occupies a spur or offset from the higher grounds on which a part of the town is built, was erected in the reign of John, and enlarged and strengthened by Elizabeth. The ancient keep is in the centre of the court or area of the castle, and is used as a barrack. The buildings, which have been erected on the platform, next the lower side of the town, are occupied by the officers of the castle, the walls of which rising above those which sustain the mound, add to their imposing appearance on the outer side. In other parts the platform is surrounded with modern works mounted with cannon, calculated to command not only the approaches from the Connaught side, but to sweep the bridge itself.’
From A Handbook for Travellers in Ireland by James Fraser (1844)





‘This castle saw many changes in Ireland. It was sometimes held by the Irish, or by rebellious noblemen like the Clanricardes, specially during the Wars of the Roses, when Ireland was left to mind itself. In Queen Elizabeth’s time the Castle was made a seat of the Presidency of Connaught, with a Chief Justice and an Attorney-General for Ireland…Under Cromwell, the Castle was the seat of the Court of Claims, which regulated the lands assigned to the proprietors transported into Connaught. In 1690-91, the Castle was held by Colonel Grace for James II. He was killed in the Siege, June 20th 1691, and was buried in St Mary’s Church, where a monument formerly used to stand to his memory…The Castle has been adapted to modern warfare; but still the ancient keep, curtain walls, and water-gate can plainly be traced. Sir H. Piers in his History of Westmeath, written in 1682, describes the Castle thus, “In the centre of the Castle is a high raised tower which overlooketh the walls and country round it. On the side that faceth the river are the rooms and apartments which served always for the habitation of the Lord President of Connaught and the Governor of the Castle; the middle Castle being the storehouse for ammunition and warlike provisions of all sorts”.’
From The Proceedings and Papers of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland, Vol. I, Fifth Series (1892)


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Showing What Can be Done


Forty years ago, in 1985, the artist and architectural historian Peter Pearson got in touch with the Congregation of Christian Brothers, a religious order which had come to own Drimnagh Castle, once surrounded by forest but by then almost lost in Dublin suburban housing. In John D’Alton’s History of the County of Dublin (1838), the building is described as occupying ‘a spot of much romantic beauty, overlooking at the east the city and bay, and at north, the Park, Castleknock and Clondalkin, while towards the south the view is bounded by the mountains of the county of Dublin, presenting a dark and solemn aspect, congenial to the decaying splendour of the edifice.’ Alas, the same romantic views are no longer to be found today. The building’s history dates back to 1215 when the lands of Drimnagh and Terenure were granted by King John to Hugh de Berneval and when the latter died without issue, these grants were passed to his brother Reginald, whose descendants, their name eventually becoming Barnewall, came to be one of the most significant families in this part of the country: Raymond Barnewall, 21st Baron Trimlestown died last year and, having no known heirs, so ended one of the oldest Irish titles, dating back to 1461 (see Fallen Out of Use « The Irish Aesthete). The Barnewalls remained in the castle until the first decade of the 17th century when Elizabeth Barnewall, heiress to the property, married a cousin, James Barnewall of Bremore (see A Work in Progress « The Irish Aesthete) after which Drimnagh was let on a 99-year least to Sir Adam Loftus, nephew and namesake of the Archbishop of Dublin who had been responsible for building Rathfarnham Castle just a few miles to the south-east (see A Whiter Shade of Pale « The Irish Aesthete). A century later, however, Drimnagh Castle – like Bremore Castle – was sold to Henry Perry, Earl of Shelburne and so passed into the ownership of the Marquesses of Lansdowne. Both buildings were let to a succession of tenants, in the case of Drimnagh Castle until 1904 when it was bought by a successful dairy farmer and Dublin City councillor, Joseph Hatch. He undertook considerable restoration work on the property, used by his family as a summer residence until the 1950s when it passed into the possession of the Christian Brothers. While the order initially used the castle as a school, they subsequently moved into a purpose-built establishment on the land. As a result, the old building was left unoccupied (except for a collection of fowl kept there by one member of the religious community) and gradually fell into disrepair. Its future looked uncertain and, like so many other old properties in the greater Dublin region, Drimagh Castle might have been lost had not Peter Pearson intervened. 






The evolution of Drimnagh Castle from its origins into what can be seen today is complicated and, on more than one occasion, unclear. As was so often the case, the building likely began as a wooden structure, this in due course replaced by stone. The oldest part of the castle is a stocky keep access to which is through a single, low Gothic door on the east side with a typical murder hole directly above. This entrance leads to an undercroft, notable for retaining reedmarks on its vaulted ceiling; analysis of these might be able to confirm a date for when the keep was constructed. In the 18th century, this space was converted into a kitchen, with the insertion of a number of ovens and a large open fireplace. Stone steps at the north and south ends of the undercroft lead to the great hall immediately above. To the immediate north and rising one storey higher, the tower and gatehouse are thought to have been added in the 16th century. Further substantial changes occurred during the 18th century when many of the building’s windows were made larger so as to bring more light into the rooms. On the east side an external stone staircase was added giving direct access to the great hall through a cut-limestone doorcase. It may be that the moat, a parallelogram and something of a rarity among surviving Irish castles, similarly dates from the 18th century when the property was responsible for a number of mills in the area, their mechanism driven by the water which then fed into the river Camac. In one corner of the grounds is a little square battlemented folly, again likely an addition from the Georgian period: its west face overlooking the moat incorporates a late medieval window and later granite doorcase with arched light above, both of which appear to have come from elsewhere. When the Hatches took over the castle in the early 1900s, they made further changes to the buildings, not least inserting brick pediments above many windows and doors, as well as taking out many of the 18th century sash windows. They also converted a 17th century barn into a set of stables and rebuilt the coach house on the opposite side of the rear courtyard, giving its roofline the same curved gables seen on the castle roofline.






When Peter Pearson first approached the Christian Brothers 40 years ago about undertaking work on Drimnagh Castle, the building was in a pitiful state and looked unlikely to have any viable future. Nevertheless, thanks to a grant of £3,000 from Dublin Corporation and assisted by a number of state and charitable agencies as well as a voluntary local committee, work began on the site in 1986. Writing in the Irish Arts Review three years ago, Pearson has described what followed as employing the Italian concept of restauro: ‘which implies both conservation of existing structure and appropriate replacement of elements beyond repair. It implies an artistic rather than a moralistic approach to giving old buildings new life and it means that there has to be an element of compromise if historic buildings are to live on with new uses.’ It is unlikely that were such a project to be initiated today that such an approach would necessarily be permitted, but had it not been adopted at the time, then most probably Drimnagh Castle would no longer stand today. Inevitably, compromise meant not all features of the building’s history could be represented. The best example of this is the great hall which, in the 18th century, had been split into two reception rooms reached via a panelled staircase. The inevitable question arose: ought this later intervention be retained or should the space be returned to what was believed to have been its original appearance? The latter option was chosen, but this meant a degree of conjecture since so little of the material fabric survived. What can now be seen is to a large extent new, not least the hall’s roof entirely constructed of green Irish oak and assembled on site by trainee carpenters. The same was true of the carved gallery running around the upper level of the gallery; here can be admired portrait effigies of many of those involved in the enterprise (including Pearson) which serve as trusses for the roof. The floor is covered in tiles made for the space and based on original medieval tiles found at Swords Castle, County Dublin (see Palatial « The Irish Aesthete), while the window glass was all made for the hall. Outside, in what had been an empty, neglected area of ground at the back of the site, a formal garden with parterres of box was laid out. Today on lease from the religious order and still dependent on voluntary support for its daily maintenance, Drimnagh Castle is an outstanding example of what can be achieved by persistence, dedication and imagination. As so often, much remains to be done around the building and its grounds, but 40 years after Peter Pearson first proposed the property’s rescue, it continues to deserve accolades and amply repays a visit. 

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