Dundermot, Ballintober, 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. 115. “(O’Conor Don/IFR; Kelly/LGI1958) A three storey C18 double gable-ended house of three bays with two storey two bay wings almost as high as the centre. Regency ironwork porch’ ironwork balconies in front of ground floor windows of wings. Tall and massive chimneystacks on gable ends of centre block. The seat of a branch of the O’Conor Don family; afterwards the Blake Kelly family.”
Detached three-bay three-storey country house, built c.1750, with central block flanked by two-bay two-storey wings almost as high as main block. Single-storey extension to rear. M-profiled slate roof with rendered chimneystacks. Pebble-dashed walls. Square-headed window openings with replacement uPVC frames and stone sills. Tooled limestone door surround and replacement timber panelled door. L-plan outbuildings to rear yard built 1861. Hipped and pitched slate roofs with limestone chimneystacks. Cut limestone walls with ‘1861’ date plaque to keystone over doorway. Segmental-headed carriage arch openings with tooled limestone surrounds. Square-headed window and door openings with tooled limestone surrounds. Walled garden to northeast of house with one wall removed. Two-stage corner tower to walled garden. Ashlar gate piers to main entrance with acorn finials flanked by sweeping walls and terminating in ashlar piers. Three-bay single-storey former gate lodge to roadside opposite entrance gate, no longer in use.
Dundermot House is a well-proportioned and symmetrical country building. Its situation on a slightly elevated site, with its front site sweeping down to a wide expanse of the River Suck, enhances the form of the house. The river at this point forms a border between counties Roscommon and Galway. The form and scale of this early to mid-eighteenth-century house are striking and are underlined by the absence of lavish external decoration or embellishment. The ancillary structures to the site add to the setting of the main house. The outbuildings to the rear yard dating to 1861 and the walled garden with its two-stage tower are both architecturally significant in their own right. The elegant entrance gates with the finely-carved acorn finials are an expression of wealth and allude to the grandeur of the house enclosed within.
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A branch of the O’Conor Don family who resided at Dundermot for 2 generations in the 19th century. In 1683 Hugh O’Connor was granted over 1,800 acres in county Roscommon, including the castle of Ballyntobber and lands at Laraha and Ross. At the time of Griffith’s Valuation, Patrick O’Conor held land in the parishes of Kilcroan and Kilbegnet, barony of Ballymoe, county Galway, and in the parishes of Oran and Drumatemple, barony of Ballymoe, Lissonuffy, barony of Roscommon, county Roscommon. Some of this land was held from the Blakeneys and some of the land in the parish of Oran was offered for sale by the Brownes of Castlemagarrett, county Mayo in May 1852. His brother Roderic also held land in the parishes of Oran and Drumatemple. In 1851 some of Roderick O’Connor’s land in the parish of Drumatemple was advertised for sale in the Encumbered Estates’ Court by his assignee Christopher Hume Lawder. From 1853 Patrick O’Conor held Laragh and Ross, which adjoined the demesne of Dundermot, from Arthur Irwin Mahon. Mahon advertised these lands for sale in May 1856. Patrick O’Connor and Charles O’Connor also held extensive lands at Rathconor and Tonlegee, parish of Kilbride, barony of Ballintober South at the time of Griffith’s Valuation, previously part of the Croghan estate. In the 1870s Hussey records that the late Patrick Hugh O’Conor of Dundermot owned 2,435 acres in county Roscommon and his brother Nicholas O’Conor owned 810 acres. Nicholas O’Conor, a prominent British diplomat, sold Dundermot. The estate of his daughter Fearga O’Conor was vested in the Congested Districts’ Board in March 1915.
A Blakeney property, built circa 1750.Taylor and Skinner note is as occupied by Owens esquire in 1778. In 1786, Wilson refers to it as the seat of Samuel Owens Lee. It was the residence of Richard Kelly in 1814 and held by Patrick O’Connor at the time of Griffith’s Valuation when the house was valued at £36. In the 1890s it became the home of the Blake-Kellys, although Nicholas O’Conor is recorded as the occupier in the valuation lists for 1906. Still extant and restored in the early 21st century.
Irish Historic Houses 