Clogher Palace (subsequently known as Clogher Park), Clogher, County Tyrone 

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. 85. “Porter/LGI1912 and sub Baird/IFR) The former Palace of the (C of I) Bishops of Clogher; a restrained cut-stone Classical mansion of 1819-23, begun by Lord John Beresford, afterwards Archbishop of Armagh, while Bishop of Clogher (see Waterford, M/PB); continued by the next Bishop, the ill-fated Hon Percy Jocelyn (see Roden, E/PB), who was unfrocked for sodomy 1822 and ended his days as a domestic servant.; completed by Bishop Jocelyn’s successor, Lord Robert Tottenham (see Ely, M/PB). Centre block of three storeys over a high basement, with lower wings. The entrance front, standing back from the street of the town beside the Cathedral, has an enclosed portico of fluted columns. The garden front, overlooking the large demesne, is of six bays in the centre block, which has a high arcaded basement. After being given up by the See, it became the seat of T.S. Porter and was known as Clogher Park. It is now a convent.”

www.nihgt.org/resources/pdf/Register_of_Parks_Gardens_Demesnes-NOV20.pdf

CLOGHER PARK, County Tyrone (AP MID ULSTER 10) T/011 
REGISTERED GRADE A 
Episcopal walled demesne of 17th-century origin with surviving registered 18th-century parkland 
(registered area 128.4 aces/52ha) located on the south-east side of the Main-street, Clogher, lying 
6.7 miles (10.8km) south-west of Ballygawley and 19 miles (30km) north-east of Enniskillen. The 
present house (Listed HB 13/02/002A + entrance and lodge), which replaced an earlier 18th 
century house, ceased being a bishop’s palace in 1850 when the diocese of Clogher was united to 
that of Armagh. The building is constricted by the road through the village on the north side, the 
cathedral to the west and a steep slope on the south side. The park and demesne spreads out 
from the former palace to the east and south, incorporating undulating land that includes a 
significant hill with a well-known hillfort (SMR7/TYR 050:033). The main entrance is north of the 
palace off Main Street, while the secondary entrance is south of this. Both have gate lodges— 
Front Lodge and South Lodge respectively. The demesne, whose landscape park (the present 
registered area) retains an elegance of proportion with good mature planting, was laid out in the 
eighteenth century and once covered 560 acres (226ha) extending to the north, east and south, 
with a deer park (110.5 acres/44/7ha) in the south-east. The demesne with the former palace, the 
hillfort, the cathedral, the former monastic site and the town, forms once of richest heritage areas 
in Ulster and is of enormous archaeological importance. St. Macartan’s Cathedral as been an 
ecclesiastical site since at least the 11th century, with traditions stretching back to the early 
Christian period. The original palace may have been the work of Bishop Richard Tenison (1642-97, 
incumbent from 1690/91) who in 1696 wrote that he was ‘now building a hermitage at Clogher, 
where I will…end my life in religious retirement.’ According to Canon Leslie, Tenison’s successor, 
Bishop St. George Ashe (1657-1717/18), ‘repaired the See House and improved the See lands’. His 
successor, John Stearne (1660-1745), an individual who was renowned for his charity and 
hospitality and features often in Swift’s correspondence, rebuilt the cathedral in 1744 and may 
also have made alterations to both the house and its grounds, as the 1833 OS Memoirs noted he 
‘expended 3,000 pounds in building and improvements’. The present building, which is a relatively 
plain Classical ashlar faced block of three-storeys over a basement, fully exposed on the east or 
garden side was built for Bishop Robert Tottenham in 1820-23, to designs of Sligo architect 
William Warren with David Henry of Dublin, contractor. It incorporates an eastern wing said to 
date from 1779 and a western wing built around 1817. The seven-bay garden facade a fully- 
exposed arcaded rusticated basement, which projects beyond the façade to form a terrace. The 
coach and stables ranges were located south-west side of the palace, and included houses for a 
steward, a gardener and a gate keeper’s lodge. The unusually large walled kitchen garden 
however was located nearly 500m south of the palace, adjacent to what used to be a public road 
on the perimeter of the demesne. It has a trapezoidal shape (4.81 acres/1.95ha); the 1830s OS 
map show it had at that time a ‘hot house’ against the north wall. The walls survive and the 

Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes of Special Historic Interest (NI) – November 2020 
garden is now under grass. The garden is not shown on James Leonard’s survey of the demesne in 
1745 and was probably added by Bishop Robert Clayton (1695-1758), who also walled the 
demesne. Prior to Bishop Clayton’s improvements to the demesne in the 1745-58 period, the 
park had been given a formal landscape by John Stearne, who was bishop between 1717-1745. A 
series of wide formal terraces were created immediately below the garden front of the house, 
crossed at right angles by a straight path with steps that lead down to a circular formal water 
basin at the bottom of the hill. Aerial images suggest the hill below these terraces was dissected 
by a series of parallel paths in the sloping lawn. Mrs Delany, who came here in August 1748, said 
there were ‘four beautiful swans’ on the basin. She also said that the ‘steep hill’ immediately 
beyond the pond was ‘covered with fir’, noting that Mrs Clayton was ‘going to make a grotto’ in 
the side of it. There is no evidence that he di, but an ice house was made in this little wood above 
the basin (Listed HB13/02/012). The formal layout below the house also included a long 
rectangular canal which extended 100m north of basin, meeting what appears to have been 
another long water basin angled north-east south-west, a feature which appears on LiDAR images. 
Mrs Delany notes that when she was there in 1748 the bishop was ‘very busy’ making the 
demesne ‘very pretty’, but not with formal but ‘irregular planting’ in the new naturalistic style 
then becoming fashionable. The Clogher demesne never had any extensive woodland planting; 
Clayton added the narrow perimeter belts to the on the west and small blocks of woodland and 
clumps throughout the demesne. It was probably he who naturalised the basin and canals below 
the house and removed the terraces and formal paths, so that the natural ‘lawn’ swept up to the 
house windows. His successor Bishop John Garnet (1709-82), completed the planting, notably in 
the deer park which he added to the south-east of the demesne. The date of the decoy pond in 
the demesne east of the house has not been established, but it was probably added by Clayton 
and appears to be a single pipe decoy. The very fine mature lime clumps around a beech 
encircled fort were probably planted by Clayton and while many parkland trees have been felled 
over the past century, there are still a number that are now ageing, while a few new trees have 
been added near the pond. Not many changes took place t the park in the 19th century. A Moss 
house, shown on the 1830s OS map in a small wood on the eastern perimeter of the demesne 
was probably erected in the early 19th century when these structures were fashionable. In the 
early 1820s Robert Tottenham in 1820-23is said to have also spent £300 on the installation of a 
hydraulic ram ‘invented by Montgolfier’ which threw water ‘to the height of 110 feet, supplying 
the town, palace and offices. He also built the front gate lodge (Listed HB 13/02/002B) when the 
palace was being rebuilt; it is a small, but memorable single-storey Classical Style gabled dwelling 
in render and sandstone with a symmetrical frontage dominated by a large Tuscan portico with 
pediment. The South Lodge, set back from the road to the south, is late 19th century and is an 
asymmetric one and a half-storey house with a steeply-pitched overhanging gabled roof. In 1850 
the diocese of Clogher was united to that of Armagh, and, now redundant, the palace and 
demesne were sold by the church to Rev. John Grey Porter (1790-1873) of Belle Isle, Co. 
Fermanagh, whose father, John Porter (1751-1819) had actually served as Bishop of Clogher from 
1797 until his death. Porter renamed the property ‘Clogher Park’ and after their marriage in 
1851, leased it to his third daughter, Elizabeth (d.1902), and her husband, John William Ellison 
(later Ellison McCartney, 1818-1904), MP for Tyrone 1874-85. The property was eventually 
bequeathed to Thomas Stewart Ellison McCartney (1854-1946), who assumed the name Porter by 
Royal License in 1875. In 1922 he sold the house and grounds to the R.C. Diocese of Clogher, 
apparently much to the chagrin of some of the local Orangemen, who seem to have regarded this 
as something of a security risk, the estate being close to the recently-established border with the 
Irish Free State. The house and its attendant outbuildings were subsequently converted for use as 
a convent by the Sisters of St. Louis, who remained there until the late 1960s. After this the house 
and 19 acres of grounds were acquired by the Sisters of Mercy, Enniskillen, who in conjunction 
with local health authorities established a residential home (‘St. Macartan’s, Clogher’, opened 
1978), with new buildings built on the site of the outbuildings to the south-west. SMR: TYR 58:33 

Register of Parks, Gardens and Demesnes of Special Historic Interest (NI) – November 2020 
hill fort rath, 59:55, 59:80, 59:90 all enclosures, 65:12 souterrain, 65:13 enclosure, 65:14 large 
enclosure and 65:20 church site? Private. 
 

https://theirishaesthete.com/2025/08/08/clogher-palace/

A Good Showish Figure

Aug8by theirishaesthete

To the immediate east of St Macartan’s Cathedral in Clogher, County Tyrone stands the former bishop’s palace which was likewise rebuilt in the early 18th century by the Rev Dr John Stearne. Mrs Delany visited the place in August 1748 when it was occupied by Stearne’s successor, Robert Clayton and his wife, and while she thought the garden  ‘pretty with a fine large sloping green walk from the steps to a large basin on water, on which sail most gracefully fair beautiful swans,’ she was less satisfied with the house, describing it as ‘large, and makes a good showish figure; but great loss of room by ill-contrivance within doors. It is situated on the side of so steep a hill that part of the front next the street is under ground and from that to the garden you descend fifty stone steps which is intolerable.’ In consequence, while the seven-bay entrance front is of three storeys, the six-bay garden front is of four storeys. As seen today, the old palace is the result of work undertaken here by Lord John George Beresford, bishop in 1819-20 and then Lord Robert Tottenham. Following the union of the diocese of Clogher with the archdiocese of Armagh in 1850, the property was sold and became a private residence. The interiors are rather plain, the most striking feature being the staircase, the ceiling of which is painted with six cherubs: these represented the children of Thomas Stewart Porter who inherited what was then called Clogher Park in 1903. The house subsequently became a convent for the Sisters of St Louis, but is now a residential care home.

https://lordbelmontinnorthernireland.blogspot.com/2013/08/clogher-palace.html

THE parliamentary gazetteer of Ireland, dated 1844, remarks

“The diocese of Clogher affects to have been founded by St Patrick,  rather earlier than that of Armagh; but the authorities respecting its pretended early origin are even more suspicious than those respecting the city’s antiquities.”

“The diocese of Clogher very long remained complete, uniform, and separate, before the passing of the Church Temporalities Act; but it is now united to the diocese of Armagh.”

“The dignitaries of the cathedral … are the Dean, benefice of Clogher; the Archdeacon, benefice of Clontibret; the Precentor, benefice of Enniskillen; the Chancellor, benefice of Galloon; and the prebendaries of Kilskeery, Donacavey, Tyholland, Devenish, and Tullycorbet.”

The see stretches 78 miles from north-west to south-east by a breadth of 25 miles.

The diocese comprises some portion of five counties, viz. Fermanagh, Tyrone, Monaghan, Donegal, and Louth.

THE BISHOP’S PALACE, Clogher, County Tyrone, is a large and handsome edifice adjacent to the Cathedral, on the south side of the village, and consists of a central block with two wings.

The entrance, on the north front, has an enclosed portico supported by lofty fluted columns. 

It is built throughout of hewn freestone, and standing on elevated ground commands extensive views over a richly planted undulating country. 

It was built by the Most Rev and Rt Hon Lord John George de la Poer Beresford, Archbishop of Armagh, when he was Bishop of Clogher.

The building was completed in 1823 by the Right Rev Lord Robert Ponsonby Tottenham, Bishop of Clogher.

Attached to the palace was a large and well-planted demesne of 566 acres, encircled by a stone wall; and within it are the remains of the royal dwelling-place of the princes of Ergallia, a lofty earthwork or fortress, protected on the west and south by a deep fosse; beyond this, to the south, is a camp surrounded by a single fosse, and still further southward is a tumulus or cairn, encircled by a raised earthwork.

Mark Bence-Jones describes the house as a restrained, cut-stone classical mansion of 1819-23, begun by Lord John Beresford (Lord Bishop of Clogher 1819-20; Lord Archbishop of Dublin, 1820-22; Lord Archbishop of Armagh, 1822-62; Bishop of Clogher again in 1850).Building work continued under the next prelate, the Rt Rev and Hon Percy Jocelyn; and was finally completed by Lord Robert Tottenham between 1822-50. The former episcopal palace has a centre block of three storeys over a high basement, with lower wings.
The entrance front, which stands off the main street, has an enclosed portico of fluted columns.

The garden front, which overlooks the demesne, consists of six bays in the central block, which has a lofty, arcaded basement. 

The walled demesne was set out for the 18th century bishop’s palace.

The present house, entrance and lodge replaced an earlier 18th century house and is a very fine one, though constricted by the road through the village of Clogher on the north side, the cathedral to the west and a steep slope on the south side.

It was designed by Warren and built between 1819 and 1820, possibly retaining earlier wings.

Although the house is no longer a bishop’s palace, the landscape park retains an elegance of proportion and planting that compliments the house.

There are very fine mature lime clumps around a beech encircled fort.

Parkland trees have been felled and many are now ageing but a few new trees have been added near the pond.

Mrs Delany visited the previous house in 1748 and commented on the steep slope, a basin of water with swans and expressed delight at a proposed grotto.

In a later era of garden history, there is a mention in Robinson’s Garden Annual & Almanac of 1936.

436 acres were sold by the Church of Ireland in 1853 for a private residence and during the 1970s the site was a convent.

There is a deer park, now farmland, and a walled garden that is used for agricultural purposes.

An Ice House remains, as does the man-made pond and indications of earlier water features.

There are two gate lodges: a classical one by Warren ca 1820 and a later lodge of ca 1890.

In 1850, a very curious coincidence occurred.

In that year the bishopric of Clogher was merged with the archbishopric of Armagh (which it remained until 1886). 

In 1874, Clogher Palace was bought by the Rev Canon John Grey Porter, who sold it to his kinsman, Thomas S Porter, in 1922.

Thus Mr Porter had seized the opportunity to buy the now abandoned palace and demesne, and re-named it Clogher Park.

Paradoxically, Bishop Porter himself had had nothing to do with the building of Clogher Park House: it had been built, in the period 1819-1823, by the three bishops who succeeded him.

It was presumably his son, the Rev John Grey Porter, who made the alterations to the building of 1819-23 which were noted by Evelyn Barrett.

She describes Clogher Park as having, 

‘… a pillared portico above a flight of steps and two wings added in Victorian times [presumably by the Rev. John Grey Porter]. Classic restraint was relieved by a balcony running the length of the south front …, in summer smothered in purple clematis and red and yellow climbing roses …, like the warmth of a smile on the formal façade.’

By his will, made in 1869 and subsequently much embellished with codicils, Porter left BELLE ISLE, Clogher Park and effectively all his landed property to his son and heir, John Grey Vesey Porter, with the proviso that his widow should enjoy Clogher Park for her life, together with the very large jointure of £3,000 a year.

The Rev John Grey Porter presumably lived at Clogher Park, when not at Kilskeery, until his death in 1873, when he was succeeded there by his widow until her death in 1881.

The demesne comprised 3,468 acres of land in 1871.

By 1890, it was the seat of John William Ellison-Macartney, MP for County Tyrone, 1874-85, who had married Porter’s third daughter, Elizabeth, in 1851.

Eventually, Clogher Park was to pass to the Ellison-Macartneys’ second son, and their occupation of the house must have been a grace-and-favour or leasehold arrangement anticipating this outcome.

This supposition is made the more probable by the fact that their second son, Thomas Stewart Ellison-Macartney, had assumed the name Porter as early as 1875.

The Roman Catholic Church purchased Clogher Park in 1922. According to this article:

I helped to prevail on Bishop McKenna, of Monaghan, to buy Clogher Palace and grounds for £20,000 [£886,000 in 2010], as it was the ancient seat of St. Macartan, patron of the diocese. 

This enraged the Orangemen, and as it is within the Tyrone border, the day after the Bishop took possession, it was commandeered by the Belfast Specials without notice! 

To bring an injunction the Bishop would have to sue in Belfast, and they have got a military authorization, ex post facto. The malice of this is deplorable. 

Clogher Park House is now a residential care home.

I’m seeking old images of Clogher Palace for the blog.

First published in August, 2011.