Coolbawn House, Coolbawn Demesne, near Enniscorthy, Co Wexford – ruin
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. 90. “(Bruen/IFR) An impressive Tudor-Revival pile faced in granite ashlar, built ca 1830s for Francis Bruen to the design of the younger Frederick Darley. Symmetrical front; alternate triangular and curvilinear gables; many finials; massive central porch tower, with mullioned window and carved tracery over doorway. Screen walls with curvilinear battlements prolonging the facade on either side, one of them with windows lighting a range behind it. Monlithic stone mullions in windows; grand staircase of stone in hall to right of entrance. Extensive office court, with gables and finials, at right hand side of house. Burnt ca 1914, now a ruin.”
Featured in The Wexford Gentry by Art Kavanagh and Rory Murphy. Published by Irish Family Names, Bunclody, Co Wexford, Ireland, 1994.
p. 64. Bruen of Coolbawn.
In The Carlow Gentry Jimmy O’Toole noted that the Bruens were descended from James Bruen of Chester, hwo came to Ireladn with the army of Oliver Cromwell and who was granted lands in Co Roscommon. Henry Bruen came to Carlow having been an official in the Quarter Master General’s office in the U.S. where he made his fortune. The story, given great credence by the family’s political enemies later, was that he was responsible for supplying coffins, which he had designed with false bottoms. They were therefore recyclable!
By the first quarter of the 19C the Bruens had amassed over 20,000 acres in Carlow and 7000 acres in Wexford. Their connection with Wexford began sometime in the early part of the 19C as Burke’s Irish Family Records states that John Bruen the second son of Col Herny Bruen who bought Oak Park in 1775, was living in Coolbawn prior to his death in 1828. Teh Bruens were liberal minded landlords who had a reputation for treating their tenants well and Henry Bruen voted for Catholic Emancipation. He was also opposed to the tithe system which he decribed as “badly devised and tending towards the production of much evil.”
John Bruen died unmarried and the Coolbawn estate passed to his brother Francis. Francis became a Justice of the Peace and MP for Carlow. He married Lady Catherine Anne Nugent, 2nd daughter of the Earl of Westmeath, but they had no family so when Francis died in 1867 the estate passed to his nephew the Rt Hon Henry Bruen of Oak Park.
p. 66. Like his uncle, Henry became JP for Carlow and was High Sheriff of Carlow and Wexford at various times and was MP for Carlow from 1857-1880. His mother was Anne Wandesford Kavanagh of Borris.
The Bruens were a very high profile political family. Henry Bruen, John’s brother, rubbed shoulders with Robert Peel (with whom he was at school in Harrow), and Daniel O’Connell. Bruen supposed Catholic emancipation and was opposed to the tithe system. He was involved in policital life for over 40 years and was an opponent of Daneil O’Connell in the Repeal days. In fct he won a momentous victory of Daniel O’Connell Jr in the election of 1841.[see Jimmy O’Toole’s book]…The Torys put out a pamphlet entitled “The Reign of Terror in Carlow” which reported strange goings-on in Leighlinbridge, where voters were tied and imprisoned on a barge and the local band was employed to drown out their moans.
p. 68. Captain Henry Bruen’s wife left his for a Montenegran Prince, Milo Petrovic-Njegos with whom she set up house in Roundstone, Co Galway. … The bulk of the Captain’s estate went to his first cousin Francis Bruen, then livign in England.
p. 69. Oak Park and Coolbawn had gone by the 1920s and Patricia’s children, Dennis Arthur, Henry David, Ronald Anthony and Norman Rudyerd inherited whatever estate remained.
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.
Detached five-bay two-storey over basement country house with dormer attic, built 1823-39, on a T-shaped plan centred on three-bay two-storey breakfront with single-bay two-stage projecting “tower” on a square plan. Vacant, 1883. In occasional use, 1911. Sold, 1917. Burnt, 1923. Now in ruins. Roof now missing with paired granite ashlar octagonal chimney stacks on cut-granite cushion courses on granite ashlar bases having stringcourses below “slated” capping supporting remains of yellow terracotta octagonal pots, lichen-spotted cut-granite coping to gables on pinnacle-topped cut-granite octagonal kneelers with pinnacles to apexes, and concealed rainwater goods with cast-iron downpipes. Part creeper- or ivy-covered granite ashlar walls on overgrown plinth with pinnacle-topped granite ashlar octagonal piers to corners centred on battlemented parapets having lichen-spotted cut-granite coping; part creeper- or ivy-covered granite ashlar surface finish (“tower”) on overgrown plinth with pinnacle-topped granite ashlar octagonal piers to corners centred on Irish battlemented parapet on trefoil-detailed panelled frieze having lichen-spotted cut-granite coping. Central door opening in square-headed recess with overgrown threshold, cut-granite doorcase having engaged octagonal colonette-detailed reveals with “bas-relief” hood moulding. Square-headed window opening in quadripartite arrangement (first floor) with cut-granite mullions, and flush surround having moulded reveals with hood moulding. Square-headed flanking window openings in tripartite arrangement with cut-granite mullions, and cut-granite surrounds having moulded reveals. Paired square-headed window openings in bipartite arrangement with cut-granite mullions, and flush surrounds having moulded reveals with hood mouldings. Interior in ruins including (ground floor): central hall; double-height staircase hall (west) with remains of cantilevered cut-granite staircase on a dog leg plan; and reception room (east). Set in overgrown grounds with wrought iron “estate railings” to perimeter.
The ivy-enveloped shell of a country house erected to a design by Frederick Darley Junior (1798-1872) of Dublin (Fraser 1844, 184-6) representing an important component of the early nineteenth-century domestic built heritage of County Wexford with the architectural value of the composition, one ‘locally known as “Bruen’s Folly” so much money was spent on its erection’ (The Irish Times 2nd March 1923, 6), confirmed by such attributes as the deliberate alignment maximising on panoramic vistas overlooking gently rolling grounds with a mountainous backdrop in the distance; the symmetrical frontage centred on a tower-like breakfront recalling the contemporary Belleek Manor (1825-31) in County Mayo; the construction in a ‘fine white granite procured on the neighbouring mountains’ demonstrating good quality workmanship; the diminishing in scale of the multipartite openings on each floor producing a graduated visual impression; and the elongated pinnacles embellishing a multi-gabled roofline ‘so elaborately ornamented…it may be very justly said to be overloaded with ornaments’ (Lacy 1852, 246). Although reduced to ruins during “The Troubles” (1919-23), the elementary form and massing survive intact together with fragments of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior, including the remnants of a cantilevered staircase. Furthermore, a nearby gate lodge (see 15702407) continues to contribute positively to the group and setting values of an estate having historic connections with the Bruen family of Oak Park, County Carlow, including Francis Bruen MP (1800-67); the Right Honourable Henry Bruen MP (1828-1912), one-time High Sheriff of County Wexford (fl. 1883); and Lieutenant Henry Bruen (1856-1927), one-time High Sheriff of County Wexford (fl. 1909).
Irish Historic Houses 