Kilteragh, Foxrock, Co Dublin – burnt 1923 

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. 177. “(Plunkett, sub Dunsany, B/pb 1970) A house built 1905-7 for Sir Horace Plunkett, the great Irish agricultural reformer, to the design of a Swedish architect named Caroe, though rather under the influence of Norman Shaw…Plunkett’s own bedroom was on the roof, and open to the elements – with a mechanical device enabling him to turn his bed towards the sun and against the wind. Burnt 1923.” 

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. 60. “A large gabled house built 1905-7 for Sir Horace Plunkett to the design of William D. Caroe. Burnt in 1923. Partly rebuilt.”

Featured in Irish Country Houses, Portraits and Painters. David Hicks. The Collins Press, Cork, 2014. 

p. 47. Plunkett, who was born into wealth and privilege, sought to use his position for the betterment of others, especially poor Irish farmers. His contribution to Ireland is often overlooked and forgotten, but his development of the cooperative movement and better practices of production had a profound effect on agriculture in Ireland. Kilteragh, his home, was an imposing example of the Arts and Crafts movement in Ireland, designed at the dawn of a new century. 

The house, which was created to look to the future, became a focal point for those who were at the forefront of anation on the cusp of change. It was unfortunate that it was burnt down by people who were focused on Ireland’s past. Kilteragh was rebuilt and survives today: once surrounded by expansive green fields and gardens, it is now hidden in the forest of suburbia tht has grown up around it in later years. 

Horace Plunkett was born in Oct 1854 at Sherborne in Gloucestershire, England. Sherborne was the mansion belonging to his mother’s family. He was the third son and sixth child of the 16^th Baron Dunsany of Dunsany Castle in County Meath, to where the family moved in the 1860s. Plunkett was well connected: his mother was the daughter of the second Baron Sherborne; his cousin was George, Count Plunkett. of Ballymascanlon House in Co Louth. [George Noble Plunkett (1851-1948) great grandfather was George Plunkett (1750–1824), son was Joseph Plunkett of the Easter Rising]. Another cousin, Lord Fingall, had a neighbouring estate to Dunsany and his wife Daisy, Lady Fingall, remained a lifelong friend of Plunkett. [Lord Fingall the 11^th Earl of Fingall and Daisy, nee Elizabeth Margaret Mary Burke] The early years of Plunkett’s life were tinged with sadness. His mother died in 1858 when he was only four, his younger brother died when he was ten and his sister when he was 12. They all died from the same disease, tuberculosis, which would haunt Plunkett all his life. He was educated at Eton, followed by Oxford where he read Modern History. After his formal education, he went ranching in Wyoming in 1879 at the age of 25, as he believed the climate there would be better for his health; [p. 48] he suffered from tuberculosis among other ailments. From 1883 he returned on occasion from Wyoming to Ireland in order to help his elderly father manage the family estate and business interests after the death of his older brother, Randall, who also died from TB. One year later he also had to help his recently widowed sister run her estate at Kilcooley in county Tipperary [his sister Mary Sophia Elizabeth, who had married Chambre Brabazon Ponsonby]. After the death of his father in 1889, it was necessary for him to return to Ireland on a full-time basis and take over the management of the Dunsany estates in Ireland and Wales, coalmines in Northumberland and boatbuilding in Hampshire. 

Plunkett’s father had left his a sizeable inheritance but he was not content to live the life of a rich man. [his brother John William became 17^th Baron Dunsany and died in 1899]. He began to tackle and reform the vested family holdings. Accounts were scrutinised and reforms were implemented, especially on the Dunsany estate, which paid dividends. In 1889, Plunkett started a cooperative store on the estate. He believed that Irish farmers should not rest their hopes on the abatement of their rents being pursued by the Land League, and that they should study modern farming methods to be responsible for their own prosperity. [p. 49] In 1889 the first creamery cooperative was established in Ireland at Drumcollogher in County Limerick and Plunkett became involved in the establishment of the second creamery at Ballyhahill in 1891. At this time he became a member of the Congested Districts Board and would visit parts of the country on his yacht Granuaile. He saw the terrible conditions in which a large amount of the rural population of Ireland lived and became acutely aware of the importance of the cooperative movement in helping the poor of Ireland. The cooperative creameries allowed milk to be processed, marketed and sold, allowing farmers to get [p. 50] the best price for their produce. In 1892 Plunkett was elected as Unionist MP for Dublin South and two years later, in 1894, founded the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society to manage the 33 dairy cooperative societies, or creameries, which had become established. In 1895, Plunkett suggested that the leading political figures in Ireland should come together to discuss the development of agriculture and other industries in Ireland. This Recess Committee looked at the involvement of the state in agriculture and industry and other countries and produced a report that led to the establishment of a specialised department in Ireland. In 1897 Plunkett became a member of the Irish Privy Council which passed an Act in 1899 establishing the government body that eventually became today’s Department of Agriculture. 

p. 51. As a result of the success of teh cooperative movement, in November 1899 Queen Victorian approved Plunkett’s appointment to the Vice-Presidency of the Department of Agriculture and  Technical Instruction for Ireland. In 1900, as a result of his work, Plunkett was believed to be on too-friendly terms with the Nationalist movement. He was viewed with distrust by his own Unionist party who thought he had leanings towards Home Rule and they decided to field another candidate in the forthcoming election. As a result the vote was divided and Plunkett lost his seat but retained his Vice-Presidency of the Department of Agriculture until 1907. His rehabilitation of the agricultural sector in Ireland was noticed on an international stage and his ideas were adopted by the President of the United States. In Nov 1908 he was invited by President Roosevelt to discuss the advances made as a result of his involvement with the Department of Agriculture in Ireland. In a public letter in 1909, President Roosevelt thanked Plunkett for his contribution to the organisation of agriculture in the US and for helping to formulate policy. Plunkett was eventually forced to give up his post with the Department of Agriculture. On his departure, a number of people wished to honour his work. A group was set up to raise funds and 84 Merrion Square in Dublin was purchased for £3,000. It was presented to Plunkett and the 18^th century house became the headquarters of the Irish cooperative movement, and was named Plunkett House. 

Plunkett was an enthusiastic motorist and became the first president of the Irish Automobile Club which was formed in 1901. In 1903, at the time of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra’s visit to Ireland, their motor car broke down in Connemara but it was quickly repaired by Plunkett’s chauffeur, who cared for his De Dion-Bouton. At the end of teh tour the King made Plunkett a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Empire for his “unselfish loyalty to the weak and distressed” and from then on he became known as Sir Horace. The success of teh cooperative movement was evident by 1914 as there were over 800 co-ops in the country. 

In 1905, Sir Horace, now in his 50s, commissioned a house to the design of William Douglas Caroe. Sir Horace sought many opinions with regard to various elements of the project. A gentleman from the Botanic Gardens was brought on board to advise solely on the grounds that would surround the house. Sir Horace had many reasons for wanting a home at this time: the ancestral seat of Dunsany Castle had now become the home of his nephew, causing Sir Horace to [p. 53] remark that “I am tired of being homeless at home.” [his nephew was Edward John Morton Drax Plunkett, 18^th Baron Dunsany, whose father died in 1899. Edward married in 1904, so this could have been the biggest reason for the move]. After viewing many sites and locations around Dublin he decided on Foxrock, which he declared to be the healthiest part of the city, The idea of building a house in this area had begun in 1903 when Sir Horace rented a house there called The Barn, a small wooden bungalow, for two summers. As he grew to like Foxrock he decided to build a new house which would be the centre of a 90 acre farm. 

As Sir Horace was preoccupied with various projects such as the cooperative movement and the newly founded Department of Agriculture, he delegated the project to [p. 54] a friend, Jim Power to ensure it was kept on track. The custodian of the project was not as focused as Sir Horace and as a result the proposed house grew to nearly twice the size originally planned. Daisy, Horace’s friend and wife of his cousin the Earl of Fingall, noted that Mr Power also took an extravagant approach to every project in which he was involved. She recorded that the mundane drains of her home, Killeen Castle, were fashioned by Mr Power into an elaborate and expensive project. The house, which would became known as Kilteragh, was fan-shaped and designed to take full advantage of the path of the sun. The garden front had large windows and large glazed areas while the north entrance front had small windows and largely blank facades. These northern facades were punctured only by the windows that served the staircase, bathrooms and pantries. Inside the house there was a large drawing room that ran the whole width of the structure. The bow windows in this room were so positioned to take full advantage of the vistas surrounding the house; one focused on the sea and another on the mountains. Window seats were built in, on which guests would recline and spend a summer’s day admiring the views. The room was dominated by a large open fireplace of ornamental brickwork above which hung a simple St Bridget’s cross given to Sir Horace by Shane Leslie. Daisy, Lady Fingall, though the architect’s choice of furniture too severe and convinced Plunkett to purchase more traditional furniture. [p. 55] She and other friends scoured auctions and sales to secure furniture that they thought more beautiful and also a lot cheaper. For the main hall ofthe house, which had very good acoustic with a warm, resonant quality, they purchased a grand piano around which friends would often gather for a sing-song. Daisy did allow Horace to decorate his own study, although she exclaimed that “it was the only ugly room in the house.” In the dining room a guest would enjoy a hearty meal while admiring wonderful frescoes painted by A.E. (George William Russell). 

An outdoor bedroom was constructed at the top of the house on the roof. A bed with a canopy was equipped with a mechanical device that allowed it to be turned to follow the sun. The location was chosen by Sir Horace as he believed it helped relieve his health problems. His bed was covered by a shelter but mostly exposed to the elements and Sir Horace slept up there in winter and summer, leaving his guests to wonder if he might die from exposure. Those hardy enough in the winter months to venture up onto the roof to talk with Sir Horace wore extra layers of clothing. Despite the cold, the view from his outdoor bedroom was impressive, taking in Dublin Bay and the Irish Sea. Sir Horace had his makeshift bedroom placed here in 1911 after spending many weeks in a nursing home. An indication of the isolatino that Kilteragh enjoyed in Foxrock in the early 1900s is evident by the telephone number of the house, which Plunkett’s personalised stationary at the time records as “Foxrock No. 1.” The telephone was not the only modern convenience to be installed in the house: Kilteragh also boasted central heating, its own electricity generator and a mdoern sewerage system. Expansive gardens and a mini-golf course overlooked by a large terrace surrounded the house. In the grounds Sir Horace established a 90 acre model farm in order to develop and understand the agricultural practices that he recommended to others.  

p. 56. Sir Horace welcomed many guests over the years, always greeting them with a smile from the steps at the front of Kilteragh. This tradition of hospitality began in July 1906 when he welcomed guests to stay with him in the unfinished house which was still occupied by over thirty workmen. Each signed the guestbook, which survived the fire of 1923 and now resides in the library of Trinity College Dublin. The completed house was comprised of a drawing room, library, sitting room and dining room on the ground floor wiht all the necessary kitchen and ancilliary facilities for the servants. Guests were accommodated on the upper floors where there were four bathrooms to supply the needs of the household when it expanded, which was at most weekends. The house was constructed from granite rubble with brick reveals and the exterior was pebble-dashed with cut granite quoins on the corners. In 1906 Horace Plunkett recorded in his diary an ambition to use his new residence as a place where he could “bring Irishmen togehter to discuss Irish problems.” Plunkett hoped that Irish people from all backgrounds would gather in the large drawing room of the house to debate the future of the country. As a result, members of the Irish acendancy mixed with Ireland’s future statemen while also enjoying the company of the leading lights of the artistic and literary scene. In the short life of the house (about 16 years), its guests included George Bernard Shaw, John and Hazel Lavery, Michael Collins, Oliver St John Gogarty, W.B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, Violet Martin of Somerville and Ross fame, Sir Roger Casement, H.G. Wells and George Moore. It was around the large fireplace in the drawing room that animated conversations took place, mainly about Ireland and its future. In 1913 Sir George Bernard Shaw was a gust of Sir Horace at Kilteragh while on a visit to Dublin. It was during this visit that he discussed Sir Hugh Lane’s proposal of situating a muncipal art gallery on the Liffey, which prompted Shaw to quip, “Has Hugh Lane ever smelt the Liffey?” 

p. 57. In the 1911 census, Kilteragh is listed as having 14 rooms and 28 windows in the front of the house. Here the 56 year old Horace is livign with his “wife” Ellie Pilkington, two visitors and five servants. The listing of Ellie Pilkington as his wife must have been a practical joke as Sir Horace still lists himself as single and having never married. Emplyed at this time were a butler, cook, two housemaids, kitchen maid, farm steward, ploughman, yard man, chauffeur and head gardener. The butler at Kilteragh, Curtin, ws though to be an excellent example of his profession, although he did have one failing: he always thought it necessary to taste the wine before serving it to Sir Horace’s guests. On one occasion he became so engrossed in the wine tasting that he became drunk and the guests in the drawing room were left wanting. 

By 1915, Sir Horace no longer saw the need to maintain such a large residence, which appeared lavish and unnecessary in the austere times of the First World War. He reduced the number of rooms in daily use, planning to divert the money saved to good causes. However, he shortly came around to the belief that entertaining influential persons in Kilteragh would be far more beneficial to Ireland and soon the whole house was in operation again. In 1916, Horace’s old friends and neighbours from Killeen Castle, the Fingalls, spent Easter at Kilteragh. On the Sunda, they heard the sensational news that Roger Casement had been captured on the Kerry coast trying to land guns from a German submarine. The next day life continued on as normal in Kilteragh adn a party left the house heading for the Leopardstown Races. Sir Horace remained in the house and later rang Dublin Castle only to be informed that civil unrest – the 1916 Rising – had broken out. He drove into the city during the Easter Rising and came under attack from snipers in Merrion Square. The car was fired upon and badly damaged. Tommy Ponsonby, his nephew [who lived at Kilcooley, Co Tipperary], was injured, but only the extremities of Plunkett’s coat were pierced by bullets. 

Sir Horace’s health was always a concern. In 1916 he was seriously ill for seven weeks after being accidentally burnt while undergoing treatment by x-rays; he recuperated in his Foxrock residence. In Feb 1919, while on a trip to America to promote Home Rule in Ireland he fell ill, and in April 1919 The New York Times recorded that Sir Horace had undergone a serious operation and would be confined to bed for a number of weeks. Sir Horace was still involved in publich life and in 1917 he was elected to the Chair of the Irish Convention. In 1919 he founded the Plunkett Foundation in Ireland and the UK to promote and develop agricultural cooperatives and rural community enterprise. 

New Year’s Day 1920 saw the press reporting that Sir Horace had died in Michigan, but this turned out to be a mistake caused by a journalist’s badly written shorthand. His obituary appeared in some newspapers and Sir Horace was less than pleased with what some of his contemporaries had to say about him, especially those who said he had no sense of humour. This premature death notice was an omen that set the tone for the rest of Horace’s life in the 1920s as the political scene in Ireland became more unsettled. In 1921, a trench was dug outside Kilteragh to hamper travel to Dublin; in 1922 the farmyard was raided for tools and an attempt was made to take Sir Horace’s motor car. These attempts on the security of Kilteragh were a foretaste of the disaster that was to befall the house. It was not only Kilteragh that suffered attacks but also the creameries that he had helped establish. Conor Cruise O’Brien said taht Sir Horace Plunkett “lived to see his creameries burnt by the English and his house by the Irish.”  

In December 1922 the Constitution of the Irish Free State was adopted and Sir Horace was nominated to the Seanad. As a direct result of the nomination, his home in Foxrock now became a target. Towards the end of 1922, Sir Horace left for America on behalf of the Irish Free State. During this visit he intended to procure a collection of books on agriculture published in America. Sir Horace again found Kilteragh was fast becoming too large for his needs and, being a public-spirited individual, considered presenting the hosue to the nation and building a small bungalow in the grounds. On a cold windy night in January 1923, the house was attacked at one o’clock in the morning by a groupof Republicans who forced in the door of the pantry. Gerald Heard, Sir HOrace’s private secretary, and the chauffeur, who were present in the house, had heard loud explosions earlier that night in the distance, which they later found out were the homes of other senators being blown up. Heard had removed the fuses from the main electrical distribution board in Kilteragh to make it difficult for the group that entered teh house to navigate it without any light. The Republicans ordered the occupants out and an explosive mine was placed in the fireplace of the hall. When it detonated, it blew out all the doors and windows, caused  [p. 58] walls and ceilings to collapse and left parts of the house structurally unsound and dangerous. Trying to do what they could to save the house, Sir Horace’s secretary and chauffeur put out a few small fires that had started. The following morning a scene of devastation greeted the workmen who were dispatched to shore up what remained of the house and board up the windows to prevent looting. Pieces of windows, blinds and furniture littered teh drive in front of the house. Unbelievably, a number of people had already gathered and begun removing trees and other shrubs from the gardens as if the explosion had been a starting pistol. Free State troops protected the house until 2am the following morning and, believing that the house was no longer under any threat, they left the grounds. The raiders from the night before were watching the house and returned to complete their task and set the house ablaze. Two members of the Civic Guard who had been on duty at 2:15am reported everything to be correct and they returned to the barracks. By 3am, people living nearby were awakened by the noise of the fire and could see the glow of flames against the night sky. Mr Heard had been sleeping in a room in the house that had been undamaged the night before. He was awakened by stones being thrown at the window and by means of a rope he was rescued. When they went to get a hose that had been used to put out the fire the previous morning, they found it had been slashed with knives. Heard began to rescue what he could from the library which was already on fire. Very little was saved and, as the sparks and ashes from the fire were sent skywards, a library of 1,700 books and an art collection of 200 paintings were incinerated. Some furniture from the west wing of the house was rescued. However, great efforts had to be made to stop the looters from descending a second time. The blaze lit up the night sky and one witness recalled that the corks of the wine bottles in the basement began to pop before the roof collapsed. 

p. 59. The intense heat that the fire generated cracked the walls of the house and by daylight very little remained. 

Sir Horace had thought that this day might come and after the fire his secretary cabled him in America with a very apt and previously agreed code word: “Extinct.” Sir Horace who was in Madison, Wisconsin, remakred that “While the hous eis a very fine one, the occurrence is not so regrettable as it would have beeen the wrecking of some poor man’s one-room dwelling.” He was, however, heartbroken and for years could not visit what remained of his home. On the same night as the destruction of Kilteragh, the houses of a number of Senators and Dail members were also destroyed, together with the homes of judges, the State Solicitor and the manager of Independent Newspapers. Numberous outrages were reported throughout the country. When Kilteragh was burnt down it houses a vast collection of correspondence from leading British and American statesmen. It was estimated that the frescoes and various paintings by “A.E.”, Jack Yeats, Hone and 18^th century Irish artists that perished in the fire were worth £10,000 (over £600,000 today). 

In Feb 1923 Sir Horace returned from America on the White Star liner Cedric and arrived in Liverpool. Here it was reported that he said, “I am practically homeless,” and “All that remains is my little office in Dublin. I suppose my crime is that I went to America on behalf of the Free State.” Few of his possessions were saved except a few photographs at Plunkett House. He went on to say, “I had, too, the brightest, healthiest home. All pleasure and, I fear, health is gone.”.. In Oct 1923 Sir Horace resigned from the Seanad. W.B. Yeats, also a senator, recorded that “the establishment of every technical school and agricultural college in this country is the result of his efforts… he organised, I think, 180,000 farmers into his organisation.” 

A claim was lodged for the loss of Kilteragh and its contents amounting to £28,122 for the building and £4,844 for the contents. It was later settled in total for £18.819. The ruins of Kilteragh were sold and Sir Horace abandoned Ireland and moved to England. Two years later in 1925, Kilteragh House was rebuilt. Elements of its original style were incorporated with one major difference: the enormous rambling house was divided into six separate residences and the beautiful formal gardens to the rear of the building became communal to the properties. The house, now known as Kilteragh Pines, is located off Westminster Road in Foxrock and is surrounded by other houses built in later years. 

Sir Horace settled in England in a house similar in character to Kilteragh, which was named Crest House. Furniture and other articles that had been rescued in the fire in Dublin were moved to his new home. …He died in 1932 at his home in Weybridge in Surrey, aged 77… He left a year’s wages for staff and £4000 for Daisy Countess Fingall. 

p. 60. Note that Michael Collins dined at Kilteragh his last night in Dublin, three days before he was shot in Cork. He was brought there by Hazel Lavery, wife of the painter. G.B. Shaw was there that night also.