Ballyclough, Kilworth, Co Cork – demolished
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. 20. “(Bury-Barry/LGI1958 and sub Bury/IFR) A two storey house with mildly Gothic C19 front of seven bays…the greater part of the house has been demolished.”
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.
“A large two storey gable-ended house with a Gothic Revival garden front of early 19C appearance. In 1814 the seat of Colonel Bary. Demolished.“
Detached three-bay two-storey former country house, dated 1904, now in use as private house, having porch projection to front of middle bay, slightly recessed south bay having lean-to addition to front, tower-like north bay, canted-bay window to north elevation and recent pitched roof extensions to rear and to south. Pitched slate roofs with cast-iron rainwater goods having decorative hopper head with raised date, and rendered chimneystacks. Render copings to porch gable and to north bay, former with ball finial. Limestone pinnacles and crenellations to tower-like north bay. Rendered walls with render plinth course. Square-headed window openings, first floor having replacement uPVC windows and render sills and ground floor having coade stone surrounds and fixed windows. Square-headed mullioned window over entrance doorway with coade stone label-moulding, raised date and surround, with stained glass. Tudor arch entrance doorway with coade stone label-moulding and surround and having half-glazed timber panelled door. Three-bay two-storey outbuilding to west, having pitched slate roof with cast-iron weather vane to east gable, painted lined-and-ruled rendered walls, square-headed door and window openings, and segmental-headed vehicular entrance. Walled garden to north having rubble limestone masonry walls with render coping and entrance to south wall having cast and wrought-iron gate.
Appraisal
This structure is the remains of Ballyclough House, which was partly demolished in the mid-twentieth century. Built as an extension in 1904, this building served as a ballroom for the main house. The Gothic Revival design of the house is reflected in this structure through the use of features such as crenellations and finely carved limestone pinnacles. The entrance bay is enlivened by coade stone label-mouldings and opening surrounds. The date plaque and rainwater goods add context to the site. The site includes the remains of an extensive limestone walled garden with an ornate cast-and wrought-iron gate and provides historical context as an integral part of the maintenance of a country house.
The Buildings of Ireland. Cork City and County. Frank Keohane. Yale University Press: New Haven and London. 2020.
p. 233. Ballyclogh Castle, 5 storey tower house…Renovated c. 1869 by William Atkins but now derelict.
Farmyard to medieval Ballyclogh Castle, built c. 1800, having seven-bay two-storey south range, six-bay two-storey west range and multi-bay lean-to north range. South range having gables, but now roofless, partly rendered coursed stone walls, square-headed window openings having remains of some two-over-two pane timber sliding sash windows, one multi-paned metal window, elliptical-arched vehicular entrance and camber-headed doorway having stone voussoirs, and projecting porch to north elevation with double-leaf timber battened door. West range attached to west end, also with gables and now roofless, having pointed arch window opening to first floor with tooled stone surround, pointed arch door opening to south end east elevations with render surrounds and some timber battened fittings, and segmental-arched vehicular entrance and round-arched door opening to east elevation with stone voussoirs. North range attached to north, having lean-to corrugated-iron roof, partially collapsed coursed rubble walls, square-headed window and door openings having red brick block-and-start surrounds. Courtyard divided in two by recent corrugated-iron flat-roofed open-sided structure. Square-plan gate piers having wrought-iron gates. Recent farmyard to north of site.
Appraisal
This farmyard served Ballyclogh Castle in its latest phases. Its various buildings display some good craftsmanship, especially in the vehicular entrance arches and other doorways.
Family tree, see Redmond Barry 1705-1741.
Barry (later Bury-Barry) of Ballyclough and Lisnagar
his family claimed kinship to the senior line of the Barry family, who became Barons Barrymore and later Earls of Barrymore (and who will be the subject of a future post), but the connection cannot now be established. They were already in possession of the Rathcormac estate in Co. Cork in the time of Redmond Barry (d. by 1690), with whom the genealogy below begins. The head of the family was distinguished by the honorific title ‘The McAdam Barry”, but again the origin and significance of this has been lost.
Redmond Barry married twice and had one son by each marriage. The elder son, Col. James Barry (1659-1717), inherited the Rathcormac estate, to which the ‘pocket borough’ of Rathcormac was attached, allowing the family to have a seat in the Irish parliament whenever they wished. Col. James sat in the Jacobite parliament in Dublin in 1689 and as a result was outlawed after William III secured control of Ireland, but he subsequently made his peace with the new regime, and the outlawry was reversed so that he was able to return to parliament and to hold local office again. It was probably at this time that the family adopted the Protestant religion, although that is not certain. Col. Barry was succeeded at Rathcormac in turn by his sons James (1689-1743), who probably built or rebuilt Lisnagar House, and Redmond (1696-1750), but since none of his four sons produced any children, his estates passed in 1750 to the descendants of his half-brother, Redmond Barry (d. 1739). This Redmond had inherited his mother’s family estate of Ballyclough at Kilworth (Co. Cork), which was clearly viewed as a lesser property, not least because it did not include a parliamentary seat. Ballyclough passed to Redmond’s son, also Redmond Barry (c.1705-41), who did not long survive his father, and then to Redmond’s son, James Barry (1739-93), who was then an infant and still very young when he also inherited the Rathcormac estate and Lisnagar House in 1750. The combination of the two properties gave the family a brief period of greater prosperity, reflected in the socially advantageous marriage of James’s sister in 1752 to St. Leger Aldworth, later 1st Viscount Doneraile, and in his own marriage to an heiress. For reasons which are unclear, in 1775 the Lisnagar-Rathcormac estate was sold, leaving only the smaller Ballyclough property in the family’s hands. On James’ death, this descended to his elder son, Redmond Barry (c.1766-1812), a lawyer and agricultural improver, who played a leading role in the local militia during the troubled years of the late 1790s. When he died without issue, the estate passed to his younger brother, Maj-Gen. Henry Green Barry (1769-1838), who was a career soldier.
At the time of his unexpected inheritance, Henry Green Barry was stationed in the West Indies, but he managed to arrange a transfer home by 1813, although he did not finally leave the army for several years afterwards. It was probably he who rebuilt Ballyclough House to provide accommodation for his large family of six boys and seven girls. When he died in 1838 he must have felt confident that the succession to the estate had been secured. However, none of his six sons produced any legitimate issue, although his third son, Sir Redmond Barry (1813-80) – who made a notable career as a judge, educationalist and librarian in Australia – sired four acknowledged illegitimate children. His son and heir, James Barry (1805-81), married Olivia Drew, who had inherited Mocollop Castle (Co. Waterford) from her brother in 1839, but they had no children. James seems to have struggled financially in the difficult years of the 1840s when the famine made rents difficult to maintain and to collect, and he fought a constant battle against damp at Ballyclough. In the end, he gave up trying to live there, and moved to his wife’s house at Mocollop. When he died in 1881, Ballyclough passed to his younger brother, St. Leger Barry (1816-88), who was also childless. On his death, the estate passed to his great-nephew, James Robert Bury (1875-1963), who was the grandson of Henry Green Barry’s eldest daughter, Letitia. As a condition of the inheritance, he took the additional name Barry by royal licence in 1889. He had been brought up in Kent, and as a young man had travelled widely. On his return to England he arranged for Ballyclough to be modernised, and a ballroom was added in 1904. In 1906 he married an English girl and brought her to live at Ballyclough, but the First World War took him away again and with the climax of the Irish struggle for independence he obviously decided that it was not safe for the family to remain in Ireland. Accordingly, he bought a modest house in Surrey to which the family moved in about 1918 or 1919, and Ballyclough was abandoned. Some sources report that it was burned by the IRA in 1920 but I have not been able to confirm this. At all events, the estate was subsequently sold and most of the house was demolished, leaving only the 1904 ballroom, which was converted into a modest house, reusing some salvaged elements of the remainder of the building. As a coda to this story, in 1934 Mrs Bury-Barry inherited Elvington Hall near York, and the family moved there from Surrey soon afterwards. Elvington was eventually sold in 1957.
Ballyclough House, Kilworth, Co. Cork
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| Ballyclough House, Kilworth: a Victorian photograph of the main front (Image: Irish Architectural Archive) |
A mildly Gothic two-storey early 19th century house of seven bays, with gables, large and unconvincing battlements, casement windows under hoodmoulds, and a pair of buttresses framing the windows at either end, which was probably built (or rather rebuilt) for Sir Henry Green Barry after he retired from the army c.1820. The house is said to have suffered from an acute damp problem, and despite re-roofing and refurbishment in the 1850s or 1860s it is said to have been abandoned on that account in 1877. A further refurbishment took place after James Bury-Barry came of age in 1896, probably at the time when a ballroom was added in 1904. Major Bury-Barry was still resident in 1911 but later, when the Irish independence struggle led to increased violence against the Anglo-Irish community he moved back to England, and the house is said to have been used as a military garrison. One account says it was burnt by the IRA in 1920, but I have not been able to confirm that. Certainly the greater part of the house was pulled down in the mid 20th century, but the ballroom added in 1904 remains and has been converted into a house which includes an impressive neo-Jacobean staircase, no doubt salvaged from the demolished part of the building and much re-arranged.
Descent: Sir Nicholas Purdon, kt.; to grandson, Redmond Barry (d. 1739); to son, Redmond Barry (c.1705-41); to son, James Barry (1739-93); to son, Redmond Barry (c.1766-1812); to brother, Maj-Gen. Henry Green Barry (c.1769-1838); to son, James Barry (1805-81); to brother, St. Leger Barry (1816-88); to great-nephew, Maj. James Robert Bury (later Bury-Barry) (1875-1963)…
http://irishantiquities.bravehost.com/cork/ballyclough/ballyclough.html
Ballyclogh Castle
Map Reference: R494021 (1494, 1021)
Ballyclogh Castle is a tower-house with square bartizans at opposite corners. It is five storeys high. There is an entrance at ground level and a second entrance at first floor level reached by an external stairway. The floors appear to be in place but are badly damaged. The spiral stairway seems to be intact. The building appears to be in use as a store and the interior is not normally accessible. The interior walls are plastered and the castle seems to have been inhabited until modern times. There are good chimneys and some mullioned windows. The ceiling of the ground floor room is vaulted. The castle was built by the Barrys and forfeited by them in 1641. It was then granted to the Purdons.
Irish Historic Houses 