Ballyarthur Castle entrance, County Wicklow, photograph by Robert French, Lawrence Photograph Collection, National Library of Ireland.
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. 19. “(Bayley, sub Anglesey, M/PB) A two storey five bay late C17 house, refronted in early C19 with battlements, a battlemented pediment and Wyatt windows. Interior panelling; late C17 painting in dining room. Late C18 drawing room.”
Ballyarthur, County Wicklow, Photograph courtesy of National Inventory of Architectural Heritage.
Ballyarthur House, BALLYARTHUR, Woodenbridge, County Wicklow
Detached five-bay two-storey over basement former hunting lodge, built c.1680. The house, which was re-fronted in the later 19th-century, is finished in render. The replacement panelled door is set within a projecting flat roofed porch with castellated parapet; this is set on a three-bay gabled breakfront. Window openings are flat headed with one over one timber sash frames; some are tripartite. The hipped roof is finished with natural slate and has cast-iron rainwater goods. The roof is partly hidden by a castellated parapet (added in the 19th century). Chimneystacks have plain caps and tall clay pots. Internally much of the original detailing has survived. To the rear there are stable blocks some of which are now derelict. The house is set within a large wooded demesne.
Appraisal
Although recently renovated this small former gate lodge has retained its original front, which matches the adjoining gate. Combined, the pair present a striking and memorable, romantic ensemble.
Detached three-bay one and a half-storey former gate lodge, built c.1840, now in use as a private house. The building is constructed in rubble fieldstone. The large ground floor window has Gothic tracery and is set within a large Tudor-arched recess, while those to the first floor are lancets. The pitched roof is finished with natural slate. It is set close to a roadside beside a large segmental-arched gate with octagonal tower and castellated parapet with machicolations.
Appraisal
Though somewhat marred by later 19th-century “improvements” this late 17th-century house has retained much of its original form and remains one of the most noteworthy buildings in the county.
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. 23. “(Walsh-Kemmis/IFR) A two storey early or mid-C18 house; entrance front of 7 bays with an open-bed pediment and advanced end bays, rather similar to the main block of Landenstown, Co Kildare. Staircase hall with unusual and very bucolic plasterwork on ceiling: shells and wings, circular and octangular panels. Small, low library with alcove on one side of hall, dining room of similar size on other. Large and lofty drawing room in late C18 adition built out at the back of the house, and entered from the half-landing of the stairs; it has an early C19 frieze of foliage. The drawing room addition, which is of two storeys, makes the garden front unbalanced; according to family tradition, a dining room was to be built to balance it, but work was suspended due to 1798 rebellion. The public road from Athy to Stradbally is aligned on entrance front of the house, giving the impression of a long, straight avenue; the vista from the house being closed at the far end by a church of ca 1800, with a Gothic tower. Near the house is an impressive stable yard, with a pediment and facings of ashlar.”
Ballykilcavan is a charming house of c. 1680 near Stradbally in County Laois, in heavily wooded parkland near the road to Athy in County Kildare. Reworked several times over the centuries the house retains its late seventeenth century appearance and is still occupied by the descendants of its original owners who came here early in that century. The mid-nineteenth century owner, Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh employed William Robinson, “a promising local man'” who subsequently became the doyen of Victorian garden designers, influencing a whole school of gardeners by his naturalistic ‘Robinsonian’ plantings.
The estate was acquired in 1639 by Oliver Walsh, from a family long established in County Kilkenny where they rejoiced in the title of Walsh, Lord of the Mountain. Ballykilcavan was probably begun by his son, another Oliver, who died in 1697. The house has full-height wings like flanking towers at the corners of the entrance front while similar towers at the rear of the house are hidden by later extensions. A feature of semi-fortified 17th century houses, these towers lingered on into the early eighteenth century as decoration.
Ballykilcavan consists of a ground floor (unusually just above ground level), an upper floor and an attic storey, where today the dormer windows have been replaced by skylights. Altered and extended many times over the centuries many rooms retrain their late-seventeenth century dimensions, albeit with later decorations. In the mid 18th century Ballykilcavan was given a more Georgian aspect with a ‘floating’ pediment-gable, a fine cut-stone door case and sash windows with thin glazing bars. There is good 1730s plasterwork on the hall ceiling, and even finer work above the staircase and landing, which is actually the house’s finest room and originally extended from front to back as a gallery before the main staircase was installed.
The first member of the family to achieve prominence was Hunt Walsh, who commanded the 28th of Foot at the siege of Quebec and became a general. He was awarded a valuable estate in Prince Edward Island in a lottery of lands after the Seven Years’ War before succeeding his uncle at Ballykilcavan and becoming MP for Maryborough. General Walsh is likely to have commissioned the magnificent 18th century U-shaped stable block. The next owner was the general’s brother Raphael, Dean of Dromore, who began an ambitious remodelling including a new facade at the rear with a classical cornice and parapet, and a suite of south-facing rooms. Unfortunately, work was disrupted by the 1798 Rebellion so he only managed to complete one side of the building, leaving the remainder blank. This provides a single very large drawing room, entered at the half level from the staircase, with a pair of bedrooms overhead. The drawing room is particularly beautiful, with fine late-eighteenth century woodwork, mahogany doors and a finely modelled cornice.
Dean Walsh was succeeded by his sister’s son, a baronet who assumed the name Johnson-Walsh and the estate passed in turn to his two sons. The second Sir Hunt, Rector of Stradbally, was a keen gardener and built a tunnel to his walled garden at the far side of the Stradbally-Athy road. According to family legend his gardener, William Robinson, doused the hot-house fires before quitting his position on a particularly cold winter’s night. Nobody noticed his absence and, by the time the fires were re-lit, precious plants had perished.
The 1700s layout and avenues were rearranged in the nineteenth century when a new road was built from Stradbally to Athy. A distant section of this road is now on axis with the front door, and acts almost as a continuation avenue with the spire of St. Peter’s First Fruits Church as an eye-catcher in distance. Much of the estate is given over to native woodland, with some spectacular specimen oak trees and Spanish chestnuts, and the record Irish black walnut.
Sir Hunt was succeeded by his son and grandson, whose only child Oonagh married a neighbour, William Kemmis of Shaen. They subsequently changed their name to Walsh-Kemmis and their grandson, David, and his wife Lisa, are the 13th generation to live at Ballykilcavan.
Ballykilcavan has full-height wings like flanking towers at the corners of the entrance front while similar towers on the rear of the house are now hidden by later extensions. These towers were a feature of fortified houses of the seventeenth century and lingered on into the early eighteenth century as decorative features. The house is comprised of a ground floor (unusually at ground level), an upper floor and an attic storey, where the dormer windows have been replaced by skylights. It has been altered and extended many times over the centuries but many rooms retrain their late-seventeenth century dimensions though the decoration is later.
Ballykilcavan House, Stradbally, Co. Laois courtesy National Inventory.
Detached seven-bay two-storey house with dormer attic, built c.1740, with gable to centre and projecting end bays. Extended, c.1975, with two-storey projecting bay added to left, two-storey range added to right and two-storey return to rear. Double-pitched and hipped slate and replacement fibre-cement tile roof with skylight to rear on a circular plan with lead-sheeted plinth; rolled lead ridge tiles; nap rendered chimneystacks; cast-iron rainwater goods on brackets. Rendered painted walls. Square-headed window openings with limestone sills and six-over-six timber sash windows. Limestone pedimented doorcase to door opening with glazed timber panelled door. Entrance/Stair Hall with Portland stone-flagged floor; carved timber staircase with scrolled handrail; decorative plaster ceiling, c.1790; Dining Room with alcove having flanking pilasters; Drawing Room with white marble fireplace; Rococo plaster frieze; decorative plaster ceiling to landing to first floor. House is set back from road in own grounds; landscaped grounds to site; tarmacadam drive and forecourt to approach. Group of detached outbuildings to site, one with three-bay pedimented advanced bay having round-headed openings to first floor.
John Allen, dsp; EDWARD JOHN, of whom hereafter; HUNT HENRY, heir to his brother; Olivia.
Mr Johnson was created a baronet, in 1775, denominated of Ballykilcavan.
Sir John assumed, in 1809, upon the demise of his maternal uncle, the Very Rev Raphael Walsh, Dean of Dromore, the surname and arms of WALSH.
He was succeeded by his eldest surviving son,
SIR EDWARD JOHN JOHNSON-WALSH, 2nd Baronet (c1785-1848), of Ballykilcavan, High Sheriff of Queen’s County, 1825, who died unmarried, and was succeeded by his brother,
THE REV SIR HUNT HENRY JOHNSON-WALSH, 3rd Baronet (1787-1865), Rector of Stradbally, who was succeeded by his son,
SIR JOHN ALLEN JOHNSON-WALSH, 4th Baronet (1829-93), who married, in 1859, Harriet Anne, daughter of the Rev Brownlow William Forde, and had issue, a son,
SIR HUNT HENRY ALLEN JOHNSON-WALSH, 5th Baronet (1864-1953), of Ballykilcavan, who espoused, in 1910, Grace, daughter of the Rt Hon Henry Bruen, of Oak Park, County Carlow, and had issue, an only child,
OONAGH JOHNSON-WALSH, who married (William) Frederick Kemmis, of Shaen House.
Thereafter the family name was changed to WALSH-KEMMIS.
The baronetcy expired on the decease of the 5th and last Baronet.
BALLYKILCAVAN HOUSE, near Stradbally, County Laois, is a two-storey, seven-bay house with a dormer attic, with a centre gable and projecting end bays.
It was built about 1680 in wooded parkland just east of Stradbally.
The estate was acquired by Oliver Walsh in 1639 and the house was probably built by his son, also Oliver, who died in 1697.
The house has full-height wings like flanking towers at the corners of the entrance front; while similar towers on the rear of the house are now hidden by later extensions.
These towers were a feature of fortified houses of the 17th century and lingered on into the early 18th century as decorative features.
The house is comprised of a ground floor (unusually at ground level), an upper floor and an attic storey, where the dormer windows have been replaced by skylights.
It has been altered and extended many times over the centuries but many rooms retrain their late-17th century dimensions, though the decoration is later.
In the 18th century Ballykilcavan was given a more Georgian aspect with a ‘floating’ pediment-gable, a fine cut-stone doorcase and sash windows with thin glazing-bars.
There is decorative 1730s plasterwork on the hall ceiling, and even finer work above the staircase and landing.
The landing is Ballykilcavan’s finest room and originally extended from front to back as a gallery before the main staircase was installed.
The first prominent member of the family was Major-General Sir Henry Hunt Walsh GCB, who commanded the 28th of Foot at the siege of Quebec.
He was awarded a valuable estate in Prince Edward Island in a lottery of lands after the Seven Years’ War before succeeding his uncle at Ballykilcavan and becoming MP for Maryborough.
General Walsh is likely to have commissioned the magnificent 18th century U-shaped stable block.
The next owner was the Major-General’s brother Raphael, Dean of Dromore, who began an ambitious remodelling of the house.
He planned a new front at the rear with a classical cornice and parapet, and a suite of south-facing rooms.
Unfortunately, work was disrupted by the 1798 Rebellion, and Dean Walsh only completed half the building vertically, leaving the remainder blank.
This provides a single, very large drawing room, entered at the half level from the staircase, and a pair of bedrooms overhead.
The drawing-room is particularly beautiful, with fine late-18th century woodwork, mahogany doors and a finely modelled cornice.
Dean Walsh was succeeded by his sister’s son, Sir John Allen Johnson-Walsh, 1st Baronet, who assumed the name Walsh and the estate passed in turn to his two sons.
The second son, Sir Hunt, Rector of Stradbally, was a keen gardener and built a tunnel to his walled garden at the far side of the Stradbally-Athy road.
He also employed a promising local man, William Robinson, to oversee his garden and plant collection.
The story is that master and servant fell out and Robinson doused the hot-house fires before quitting his position on a particularly cold winter’s night.
Nobody noticed his absence and, by the time the fires were re-lit, many precious plants had perished.
In Dublin and later in London, Robinson’s career took-off and he became the doyen of late 19th century garden designers, influencing a whole school of gardening with his ‘natural’ plantings.
Sir Hunt was succeeded by his son and grandson, whose only child Oonagh married a neighbour, William Kemmis of Shaen.
They subsequently changed their name to Walsh-Kemmis and their grandson, David, and his wife Lisa, are the thirteenth generation of the family to live at Ballykilcavan.
The 1700s layout and avenues were rearranged in the nineteenth century when a new road was built from Stradbally to Athy.
A distant section of this road is now on axis with the front door, and acts almost as an avenue with the spire of a First Fruits Church as an eye-catcher in far distance.
Much of the estate is given over to woodland, with some spectacular specimen oaks and Spanish chestnuts, and the record Irish black walnut.
Rathbeale Hall, County Dublin, courtesy of Mark Bence-Jones.
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. 238. “Gorges/LG1965; Meredith, Bt of St. Catherine’s Grove/EDB; Somerville, Bt/PB; Corbally/LGI1912) A house of late 1680s, incorporating an old tower-house, given a Palladian front, curved sweeps and wings ca 1751. The house was originally built by Sir Walter Plunkett, son in law of Moyses Hill, MP, of Hillsborough; the subsequent additions and remodelling were carried out for Hamilton Gorges, who bought it 1751 and who was the son, by her and husband, of Nichola Beresford (nee Hamilton), the subject of the famous ghost story [see Gill Hall]. They are in the manner of Richard Castle, who died 1751, so would be by one of his followers. The main block is of three storeys over basement, with a five bay front; segmental headed doorcase; balustraded roof parapet. The curved sweeps are very wide and have pedimented doorways between niches. The front elevations of the wings are two storey; but in their ends, facing each other across the forecourt, are simple Venetian windows. The main block is of brick, but the façade was plastered over in mid-C18 remodelling; at some period it was painted Venetian red, of which only a suggestion remains; so that, in the words of Mr Cornforth, “the house has a marvellously faded, weathered look,” reminiscent of the villas of the Veneto. The hall, which keeps its old colouring of faded blue, which Mr Guinness describes as “magic,” has a chimneypiece and overmantel and a Doric frieze dating from mid-C18; but the staircase, which rises at the back of the hall, and is of wood, with pear-shaped balusters, rather like those at Leixlip Castle, Co Kildare, appears to be late C17, as is the woodwork in the boudoir and the bedroom above it, which are among the very few surviving C17 interiors in Ireland. both rooms are panelled; the boudoir has an elaborately carved Baroque chimneypiece and overmantel, with pairs of fluted Corinthian columns supporting an entablature ormanented with foliage, and a monumental doorcase with more carved foliage; the bedroom has panelling with scrolled mouldings and a chimneypiece framed by two tiers of carved pilasters. The drawing room has a ceiling of simple rococo plasterwork which would have been put in during mid-C18 remodelling. Hamilton Gorge’s son married the heiress of the Meredith family of Dollardstown and assumed the name of Meredith, being subsequently created a Bt; through his daughter, Rathbeale passed to the Somerville family, by whom it was sold in 1832 to the Corbally family, who sold it 1958. After that, it became almost derelict; but was then bought by Mr and Mrs Julian Peck, who restored and furnished it most sympathetically. A few years later, however, it was sold again.”
Coleraine Manor House (formerly Jackson Hall), Coleraine, County Derry
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. 88. “A house of two storeys over a basement with a dormered attic, and six bays, originally built 1680; but enlarged and remodelled 1770s by R. Jackson, who gave it an unusual roof parapet of curving open-work, in the Chinese taste; with what look like miniature open porches, surmounted by ball finials, in front of all the dormers. At the same time, the windows were given octagonal glazing. The house was originally faced in brick, but was cement rendered in 1920s; the windows have mostly been re-glazed and the parapet balustrading has gone. It is now the County Council offices.”
Castle Mary, County Cork, entrance front before late 19C alterations. 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.
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. 73. “(Longfield/IFR) A three storey late C17 and early C18 house with three bay recessed centre and one bay projecting wings, for which the architect Davis Duckart is recorded as having designed a “difficult” roof. Camber headed windows with scrolled pediments. REbuilt as a castle late C19 with a square tower. Burnt 1920, after which the family made a house in the stable quadrangle.”
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 interesting three storey late 17C and early 18C house with a recessed three bay centre flanked by single bay projecting wings. The walls of these wings at ground floor level have a very distinct “batter.” The pedimented doorcase was late 18C with engaged columns having “Tower of the Winds” capitals. The architect Davis Duckart is recorded as having designed a “difficult” roof for the house. The house was much altered in the late nineteenth century, in the “baronial” style. A seat of the Longfields. It was destroyed by fire in 1920. Now a ruin. A good stable court survives.”
The Buildings of Ireland. Cork City and County. Frank Keohane. Yale University Press: New Haven and London. 2020.
p. 24. Also during the first half of the C18, a small group of “towered” houses were built. Glanmire House (now Colaiste an Phiarsaigh) and Mohera House (Castlelyons) have projecting single-bay corner blocks, Annesgrove at Carrigtwohill and the rectory at Schull (1724) have been lost. Unlike in other parts of Ireland, few medieval tower houses continued to be inhabited into the C18 and C19. Exceptions include Castle Mary (Cloyne) and Duarrigle Castle (Millstreet), where the towers were fully incorporated within new houses. At Castle Widenham (Castletownroche) and Castle Salem (Rosscarbery), the new houses took the form of largely independent wings added to the tower.
Detached country house, built c. 1680, altered c. 1740, substantially altered and extended c. 1880. Former five-bay three-storey Georgian house with projecting end-bays, Gothic extension and features later additions. Irregular-plan, comprising two-bay three-storey recessed section with projecting porch, flanked by single-bay three-storey tower with two-storey bay window to east and by stepped single- and two-bay four-stage projecting tower to west. Six-bay three-storey garden elevation with single-bay single-storey flat-roofed porch to east. Now in ruins. Rendered crenellated parapets with rendered cornices and rendered chimneystacks. Cast-iron rainwater goods. Rendered walls with render quoins and plinth courses. Square-headed openings with rendered surrounds, transoms and mullions. Camber-headed openings with render surrounds incorporating projecting and dropped keystone details. Segmental-headed opening to west elevation with render surround incorporating projecting and dropped keystone. Retains doorcase comprising flanking columns with decorative fluted and foliate capitals, architrave, frieze and cornice with dentilated pediment. Red brick walls to interior
Built in the late seventeenth century, renowned eighteenth century architect Davis Ducart worked on the house during one of its phases of renovation. The nineteenth century renovations created a complicated plan and variety of blocks, and it is to this period that the building owes it romantic Gothic appearance. Features such as the crenellations, doorcase, window surrounds and ornament cast-iron, along with the irregular-plan, combine to create the fanciful character. The several gate lodges and extensive outbuildings are indicators of the former importance and influence of this country house.
Former outbuilding complex, built c. 1730, renovated c. 1925 to accommodate use as house. North range comprising three-bay two-storey main block with gabled breakfront to front (south) elevation, and hipped-roofed projection flanked by links and bay windows to north elevation with flanking two-bay two-storey blocks having gablets to south elevations and bay window to north elevation of east block. East and west ranges comprising multiple-bay two-storey blocks with taller central bays having integral carriage arches. South range comprising multiple-bay two-storey block with central taller four-bay block and integral carriage arch. Pitched slate roofs with rendered chimneystacks. Render copings to main block. Rendered walls to main block. Rubble stone walls to other blocks. Camber-headed openings with timber casement windows to south elevation of main block. Square-headed openings to north elevation of main block with fixed pane timber windows. Camber-arched openings to west elevation of east block with red brick block-and-start surrounds, timber casement and plate glass windows. Lunette window above carriage arch with plate glass window and red brick voussoirs. Camber-arched openings to east elevation of west block with red brick block-and-start surrounds, timber casement windows to ground floor and three-over-three pane timber sliding sash windows to first floor. Lunette window to central bay with tripartite three-over-three flanked by fixed pane timber sliding sash window. Camber-headed openings to north elevation of south block with plate glass windows and red brick block-and-start surrounds. Cut stone sills to some window openings. Camber-headed and square-headed openings to east, south and west elevations with timber casement windows and fixed timber windows. Camber-headed opening to south elevation of north range with stepped render surround with keystone detail, timber battened door and overlight. Camber-headed door openings to east, west and south ranges with replacement timber doors. Elliptical-arched integral carriage arches having rubble stone voussoirs.
Substantial group of outbuildings retaining much of original form and fabric, including intact retention of square design around courtyard. Varying rooflines to central bays of ranges and symmetrically typical features of consciously designed outbuildings of era. Other characteristic features are carriage arches and lunette windows. Forms impressive feature on landscape setting, particularly due to projections to north elevation of north range. Forms a group with Castle Mary to north and other demesne structures to south and east. Renovated to accommodate residential use following the burning of Castle Mary.
Irish Historic Houses 