Lisheen House (or Seafield House), Co Sligo – 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. 185. “(Phibbs/LGI1912) In 1798, William Phibbs built Seafield, overlooking Ballysadare Bay, as a dower house for his son, Owen. It was Gothic, but the stables and cowsheds were joined to it in the Palladian manner. Owen Phibbs, who lived mainly in Dublin, used Seafield only as a summer retreat; but his son, William, came to live permanently at Seafield in 1842, and in that year began building a much larger house about 200 yards away from the old one, which was allowed to fall into ruin. The architect of the new house was the Sligo born John Benson, who was afterwards knighted for designing the building for the Dublin Exhibition of 1853. It was Classical, square, of two storeys, with a roof carried on a cornice. Entrance front of seven bays; framing bands at the corners of the front, on either side fo the centre bay and above the first floor windows; continuous entablatures below the windows in each storey. Entrance door recessed behind a Grecian temple or tomb doorway with two Ionic columns. Entablatures on console brackets over ground floor windows. Adjoining front of five bays, the centre three bays behing recessed. Framing bands and entablatures under the windows as in the entrance front; triangular pediments on console brackets over the two outer ground floor windows. Cast-iron verandah filling the recess between the end bays. Large hall, ballroom and library. Long gallery on first floor, lit by skylights, which subsequently became known as the Museum, having been filled with objects ranging from Egyptian mummies to Syrian swords and daggers collected by Owen Phibbs, son of the builder of the house, an archaeologist of note. The house was infested by a particularly malicious poltergeist, which gave it such a bad reputation that Owen Phibbs, on succeeding to it in 1904, changed its name from Seafield to Lisheen. Later in the present century, in an attempt to get rid of the poltergeist, the family handed over the house to a party of Jesuits for some weeks, who celebrated mass in it each day during their stay. D.W. Philbbs sold the house 1940, and it was immediately afterwards 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. 

https://archiseek.com/2012/seafield-co-sligo/

1842 – Seafield, Co. Sligo 

Architect: George Papworth Also known as Lisheen, and now almost completely ruined. Reputed to be haunted, the house was abandoned in the 1920s after repeated attempts to rid the house of its presence failed. 
 
 
In Blake, Tarquin. Abandoned Mansions of Ireland. Collins Press, Cork, 2010. 

https://lordbelmontinnorthernireland.blogspot.com/2014/10/lisheen-house.html

THE PHIBBSES WERE MAJOR LANDOWNERS IN COUNTY SLIGO, WITH 10,507 ACRES 

 
 
The earliest record of this family is found in a list of names of subscribers to a loan raised in 1589, during the reign of ELIZABETH I, to defray expenses incurred during the arming of the country at the time of the threatened Spanish Armada. 
 
The name there appears as PHILLIPS, as it also does in the official list of High Sheriffs for County Sligo, as late as 1716, where Matthew Phibbs, of Templevaney, is styled Matthew Phillips. 
 
Of this family two brothers came over to Ireland as soldiers about 1590. 
 
From records now existing in Trinity College, Dublin, they are found on half-pay, in 1616 and 1619, under the name of PHIPPS, a name that some of the younger branches of the family resumed about 1765. 
 
Of these two, William settled in County Cork, in the south-west of which county the name existed as ffibbs. 
 
The elder of the two, 
 
RICHARD PHIPPS, who served under Sir Tobias Caulfeild, and was pensioned as a maimed soldier in 1619, settled at Kilmainham, Dublin, where he died in 1629, and was buried at St James’s Church. 
 
He had issue, 
 

RICHARD, of whom presently; 
John, living in County Sligo, 1663; 
Edward; 
Hester; Jane; Sarah; Rebecca. 

The eldest son, 
 
RICHARD PHIBBS or FFIBS, of Coote’s Horse, who was granted land in County Sligo, 1659, and served in Captain Francis King’s troop of horse in Lord Collooney’s regiment. 
 
He died in 1670, and was interred in St John’s Church, Dublin, having had issue, 
 

MATTHEW, of Templevaney; 
William, of Grange. 

The elder son, 
 
MATTHEW PHIBBS, of Templevaney, and afterwards of Rockbrook, County Sligo, High Sheriff in 1716, had issue, four sons and two daughters, 
 

WILLIAM, of Rathbrook and Rathmullen; 
Richard; 
Robert; 
Matthew; 
Anne; Margaret. 

Mr Phibbs died in 1738, and was succeeded by his eldest son, 
 
WILLIAM PHIPPS or PHIBBS (1696-1775), of Rockbrook and Rathmullen, married, in 1717, Mary, only daughter of John Harloe, of Rathmullen, by whom he had twenty-one children, including 
 

Harloe; 
Matthew; 
WILLIAM, of whom presently; 
Mary; Anne; Joanna; Rebecca; Eleanor. 

The second surviving son, 
 
WILLIAM PHIBBS (1738-1801), of Hollybrook, High Sheriff of County Sligo, 1781, wedded, in 1768, Jane, daughter of Owen Lloyd, of Rockville, County Roscommon, by whom he had ten children, of whom 
 

William, 1771-2; 
William, 1773-97; 
OWEN, of whom presently; 
Susan; Mary. 

Mr Phibbs was succeeded by his only surviving son, 
 
OWEN PHIBBS (1776-1829), of Merrion Square, Dublin, High Sheriff, 1804, who espoused, in 1798, Anne, daughter of Thomas Ormsby, of Ballimamore, County Mayo, and had issue, 
 

WILLIAM, of Seafield; 
Ormsby; 
Owen; 
Elizabeth; Jane; Maria. 

Mr Phibbs was succeeded by his eldest son, 
 
WILLIAM PHIBBS (1803-81), of Seafield, County Sligo, High Sheriff of County Sligo, 1833, 11th Light Dragoons, who married, in 1840, Catherine, daughter of George Meares Maunsell, of Ballywilliam, County Limerick, and had issue, 
 

OWEN, his heir; 
George; 
William; 
Catherine; Anne; Edythe Frances. 

Mr Phibbs was succeeded by his eldest son, 
 
OWEN PHIBBS JP DL (1842-1914), of Lisheen (name changed in 1904), High Sheriff of County Sligo, 1884, Lieutenant, 6th Dragoon Guards, who wedded, in 1866, Susan, daughter of William Talbot-Crosbie, of Ardfert Abbey, County Kerry, and had issue, 
 

BASIL, his heir; 
William Talbot; 
Owen; 
Darnley. 

Mr Phibbs was succeeded by his eldest son, 
 
BASIL PHIBBS, (1867-1938), of Corradoo, Boyle, and Lisheen, High Sheriff of County Sligo, 1905, who married, in 1899, Rebekah Wilbraham, youngest daughter of Herbert Wilbraham Taylor, of Hadley Bourne, Hertfordshire, and had issue, 
 

GEOFFREY BASIL; 
Denis William; 
Richard Owen Neil; 
Catherine Meave. 

Mr Phibbs was succeeded by his eldest son, 
 
GEOFFREY BASIL PHIBBS (1900-56), of Lisheen, 
 

Born in Norfolk; Irish Guards; worked variously as demonstrator in College of Science; librarian; factory-worker in London and school-teacher in Cairo;worked with Nancy Nicholson at the Poulk (Hogarth) Press. 

Mr Phibbs married Norah McGuinness in London. 
 
He subsequently changed his name to TAYLOR, following his father’s refusal to “allow his wife over the threshold”. 
 
He lived in a Georgian house in Tallaght, County Dublin. 
 
Denis William Phibbs inherited the house and some of the lands, which he sold to Isaac Beckett of Ballina for £1,400 ~ less than one third of the original construction price. 
 
Beckett later sold the house to a builder, John Sisk. 
 
In 1944, the Becketts sold the lands they owned to George Lindsay. 
 
Other lands on the Phibbs estate were bought by the Lindsay and McDermott families. 
 

LISHEEN HOUSE (formerly Seafield), near Ballysadare, County Sligo, although now in a ruinous state, casts an impressive presence on the landscape. 
 
Many clues as to its original state survive, including some fine stonework to the facades, chimneys, and openings. 
 
This was clearly a house rich in history and skilfully designed. 
 
The Sligo architect John Benson, who designed the house, was knighted for designing the building at the Dublin Exhibition of 1853. 
 
Lisheen is a two-storey rendered house, built ca 1842, now ruinous. 
 
Symmetrical main elevations, extensive vegetation growth internally and externally; roof collapsed; remains of chimney-stacks survive; section of moulded eaves cornice survives. 

Painted smooth-rendered walling, horizontal banding between floors, plain pilasters to corners, moulded dado, ashlar limestone plinth. 
 
Square-headed full-height window openings, moulded architraves, entablatures supported on console brackets, all evidence of timber windows missing. 
 
No evidence of entrance doors survive; all internal finishes and features removed; remote location in fields. 
 
First published in November, 2012.