Buttevant Castle, Buttevant, Co. Cork – ruin
Bence-Jones, Mark. A Guide to Irish Country Houses (originally published as Burke’s Guide to Country Houses volume 1 Ireland by Burke’s Peerage Ltd. 1978); Revised edition 1988 Constable and Company Ltd, London.
p. 51. [Anderson, Bt. of Fermoy; Lloyd 1912]. One of the old fortifications of the town of Buttevant, made into castellated house early in C19 by the enterprising army contractor, John Anderson, who laid out the town of Fermoy. A tall and narrow building, with a round tower at one side and a curved end at the other. Gothic windows. Subsequently owned by the Lloyd family.
The Buildings of Ireland. Cork City and County. Frank Keohane. Yale University Press: New Haven and London. 2020.
p. 13. [An] architectural innovation which the Norman colonists introduced was the use of stone for domestic architecture. Examples are found throughout Cork, mostly of two basic types: the castles or fortresses built by Norman magnates during the late C12 and C13, and the tower houses built by both Anglo-Norman and Gaelic families during the C15 and C16. The Archaeological Survey has identified 17 castles and 110 tower houses, with a further 119 castle sites.
The next distinctive Norman castle type is seen in the early C13 round great towers or donjons found at Buttevant and Inchiquin (Killeagh), no doubt inspired by the keep at Pembroke in Wales, given the familial ties to that place.
In Blake, Tarquin. Abandoned Mansions of Ireland. Collins Press, Cork, 2010.
http://landedestates.nuigalway.ie/LandedEstates/jsp/property-list.jsp?letter=B
Originally a castle of the Barry family, Earls of Barrymore, sold by them in the early 19th century to John Anderson of Fermoy, who restored it as a castellated house and gave it to his eldest son Sir James Anderson. Sir James lived there until the mid 1840s. William Roche occupied the building valued at £37 in the early 1850s. He held the property from Viscount Doneraile and D.R. Browning held a house, flour mill and offices valued at £120 from Roche. The castle had various occupants in the later 19th century and was last occupied in the early 20th century. It is now a ruin.
https://www.castles.nl/buttevant-castle
Buttevant Castle, locally also known as Barry Castle, lies on the edge of the old medieval town of Buttevant, in County Cork in Ireland.
Buttecant Castle was built around 1200 by the Norman Barry family. It was built at the edge of the town, on a hill above the swift-flowing Awbeg river, overlooking the town’s mill and weir. In 1317 the town was enclosed with a strong wall and the castle became part of the town’s defenses.
In 1461, a Morrogh O’Brien over-ran the province of Munster, and damaged or took the town and castle of Buttevant. In 1555 Lord Barry was created Viscount Buttevant.
In 1790, Buttevant Castle and town were sold by Richard Barry, Earl of Barrymore, to a John Anderson of Fermoy. He restored the castle as a castellated house and gave it to his eldest son Sir James Anderson. Sir James lived there until the mid 1840s. In 1850, the castle was occupied by a William Roche. The castle had various occupants in the later 19th century and was last occupied in the early 20th century.
At present Buttevant Castle stands on private grounds and can not be visited, too bad, because it’s a very nice castle ruin.
Listed in Vanishing Country Houses of Ireland by The Knight of Glin, David J. Griffin and Nicholas K. Robinson, published by The Irish Architectural Archive and The Irish Georgian Society, 1988.
“An early 19C conversion for John Anderson of part of the fortification of the town of Buttevant into a private house. Now a ruin.”
https://theirishaesthete.com/2025/05/16/coming-to-a-bad-end/
Coming to a Bad End
After Monday’s tale of Barryscourt Castle, here is another property that formerly belonged to the once-mighty Barry family: Buttevant Castle, County Cork. Thought to date back to the early 13th century, this would have been one of their first strongholds but in due course they moved their principal residence elsewhere and Buttevant fell into decline. As indeed did the Barrys. In the late 18th century the penultimate Earl of Barrymore, a close friend of the Prince of Wales, was a notorious rake, gambler and bare-knuckle boxer. His wild ways gained him the nickname of Hellgate while his younger brother Henry, who inherited the title after his sibling’s death at the age of 23, had a clubfoot and accordingly was called Cripplegate. Meanwhile, the third sibling Augustus, despite being an Anglican clergyman, became so addicted to gambling that he was known as Newgate, supposedly because this was the only debtors’ prison in which he had not spent time. And the trio’s only sister, Lady Caroline Barry, swore with such frequency and proficiency that she was called Billingsgate, after the foul-mouthed fishwives of that market. Between the four of them, they managed to dissipate their once-great estates in Ireland, including the extensive lands around Buttevant Castle, which was bought by Scottish entrepreneur John Anderson, whose son gave the building its present appearance around 1810. Occupied until the start of the last century, it was then abandoned and has since fallen into a ruinous state.
Irish Historic Houses 