Thomastown House, Athlone, Co Roscommon
Mark Bence-Jones. 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. 272. “A three storey seven bay Georgian house with a pillared porch.”
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.
p. 127. A three storey early 18C house. Roof altered in the early 19C when a Doric porch was also added. Demolished 1958.
Walled garden, outbuilding, deer park and former entrance gates and lodge to former Thomastown Park House, built c.1750. Main entrance gates with square-profile, ashlar limestone gate piers with frieze and capping stones with wrought-iron gates flanked by pedestrian entrances with tooled limestone surrounds flanked by quadrant walls. Single-storey gate lodge to east. Large walled deer park to north of former demesne with random coursed stone walls. Walled garden to west of former house site with random coursed stone walls and red brick internal wall to north. Outbuilding to farmyard complex with roughcast rendered walls, corrugated roof and ashlar limestone bellcote to south-east elevation. Segmental and square-headed carriage arch openings with corrugated doors.
Appraisal
Thomastown Park House, built during the mid eighteenth century for the Leggat family and in the ownership of the Bennett family during the nineteenth century, was once a large and important estate within County Offaly. The house even had a private chapel. Though the country house itself is no longer extant, the associated structures of the demesne remain. Notable elements include the large walls which surround what once was a deer park, the finely tooled limestone entrance gates, the walled garden and the outbuilding with ashlar bellcote.
Irish Historic Houses 