Castle Taylor, Ardrahan, Co Galway  – 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. 75. “A massive tower-house with C18 tracery windows, to which a three storey house was added in early c19. The early C19 house was plain except for a stepped battlement and a pair of ables with blind tracery at one side of its front’ it has a curved bow at one end. The home of John Shawe-Taylor, a prominent figure in the Irish Revival at the beginning of this century. Sold 1930s or 40s by his son, Michael Shawe-Taylor; subsequently 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.

p. 69. “…built by the Taylors, incorporating a superb tower house. Now a ruin.”

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

p. 135. Portrait of Captain John Shawe-Taylor… while this man was a member of the upper classes, he was also a catalyst of change in the early 20^th century in Ireland. He was well-connected, being a cousin of the famous art-collector Hugh Lane, and a nephew of Lady Gregory of Coole Park. He has been described as an aristocratic nationalist who wanted to bridge the gap between landlords and their tenants. John Shawe-Taylor succeeded in bringing these two fractious sides together, helping to build the foundations of the eventual Land Act of 1903, which allowed tenants to purchase their land. In 1908, when John was painted by William Orpen, it woudl be only three years until his life was extinguished at the young age of 45. It as his early death that threw the affairs of the Castle Taylor estate into disarray. …Today Castle Taylor is a ruin and the unremarkable grave of John Shawe-Taylor in Ardrahan churchyard bears little testament to the character and foresight of this great man. 

The ancestral home of John Shawe-Taylor was Castle Taylor of Ardrahan in Galway, not far from Roxborough, the birthplace of Lady Gregory. Her sister Elizabeth Presse, John’s mother, married Walter Shaw-Taylor in Nov 1864. Walter was the son of Francis Manley Shawe who succeeded to Castle Taylor on the death of his uncle Lt Gen Sir John Taylor. Francis assumed by Royal License dated 1844 the additional name of Taylor. [rather, according to The Peerage, Lt Gen John Taylor was Francis Manley Shaw’s wife’s father]. 

p. 136. The ancestral home in Galway, Castle Taylor, was originally known as Ballymacrath and it was always expected that John [T-S], as the elder son, would inherit the estate. …his brother Francis, who was sometimes known as Frank, became aggrieved in later years that the wills made by his father and brother resulted in him being unable to inherit the Castle Taylor estate. 

The castle in Galway began life as a three-storey 16^th century tower house. Over the years, with numerous improvements, the building was enlarged and eventually had a substantial country house attached to it. In 1818 the architect David Laing produced a design for General Sir John Taylor for a spacious mansion that incorporated the original tower house.  It is the robust construction of the tower house that has stood teh test of time and today the more modern extension is languishing in a fragile state. The attractive gate lodge, built around 1820, still guards the entrance to the estate in relatively good order. In the grounds of the castle there was a walled kitchen garden, constructed around 1860, which would help ensure that a house of this size was self-sufficient. Outbuildings were improved in the 1890s when Francis Fitzadelm Presse designed new stables that were erected for Walter Shawe-Taylor with fittings specially designed by Musgrave & Co, Belfast, with air-pump ventilators by Boyle & County. Francis Presse, an architect and brother-in-law of Walter, was the sixth son of Dudley Presse of Roxborough by his second wife, Frances, who came from Castle Corr near Inishshannon in County Cork, and the younger frother of Elizabeth and Augusta (Lady Gregory). In the 1901 census, the castle was listed as having 28 rooms. It is occupied by Walter Shawe-Taylor, who is now a widower, and his six servants. [p. 137]  

p. 137. John Shawe-Taylor came to be recognised nationally when in Sept 1902 he wrote a letter, which was published in the newspapers, calling for a conference to settle the Irish Land Question. He appealed for representatives of the landlords and tenants to meet in a civilised conference and discuss the issues at stake. He felt this would result in a united and national effort to settle the land issues that plagued landlords and tenants at the time. Shawe-Taylor hoped this stategy would bring to an end the agitation which was preventing the economic development of Ireland. At the time of his appeal, John was politically unknown but, as a result of his letter, teh following month, the Earl of Mayo brought the matter before teh Irish Landowners Convention and proposed a motion that such a conference was desirable. The motion was rejected and received opposition but this did not stop a Land Conference Committee beign formed, consisting of the Earls of Dunraven, Meath and Mayo, Viscount Powerscourt, Lord Castletown, Sir Algernon [p. 138] Coote adn others. The Committee sent out papers to 4,000 landlords of which 1,128 voted for and 578 against such a conference. From this ballot, representatives were chosen to represent the tenants and landlords. They met at Molesworth Street in Dublin in December 1902 and deliberated for two weeks with John Shawe-Taylor acting as Honorary Secretary. In Jaunarly 1903, the conference presented its report, and its recommendations were incorporated into the Wyndham Act of 1903. The report had advised that a massive scheme of land purchase with the assistance of Treasury loans be extended to tenants to buy their farm holdings from the landlords. Under this act, tenants were offered favourable terms to buy and there were inducements for landlords to sell. In January 1903 after the report was issued, Captain Shawe-Taylor undertook a five-week tour of America to promote the merits of his actions in Ireland and he met President Roosevelt. 

While John did not court media attention he woudl again be featured in the press in 1905 when he took action to defend the reputation of his cousin Hugh Lane. At this time a row had broke out over a painting by Jean-Baptiste Camille Corot called “Peasants by a Lake.” Some said it was not actually an original work by Corot but was a painting of a lesser known Huguenot artist, Geza Meszoly, as it bore a striking resemblance to a much larger canvas by him. 

p. 139. The picture was one of four paintings presented by the Prince of Wales to support the establishment of a gallery of modern art in Ireland during a visit to Dublin in Feb 1905. The Prince of Wales’s gift included two works by Corot: an early example of his work and one of his later paintings. Hugh Lane was the dealer selling the panting, and some said he was trying to pass of f the work of another artist as an original Corot; no sooner had the Prince of Wales left Ireland than the rumours began to circulate… 

p. 140. In 1906, John hoped that, based on his earlier successes, a political career would materialise. He stood as a Devolutionist for the parliamentary representation of Galway city but was defeated. AFter this he set about encouraging native industries [p. 141] and organised exhibitions of the work, hoping that this woudl lead to economic betterment of his tenants.  

p. 141. Sir Hugh Lane was born Cork in 1875 but raised in England. He became a successful art dealer whose interest in Ireland was cultivated by his aunt, Lady Augusta Gregory. He had wanted to create a national portrait gallery in Ireland as, according to Lane, “so many celebrated men have not been painted or modelled while living.” This idea of painting the eminent figures of Ireland began in 1901 when he went to an exhibition organised by Sarah Puerser, which included the work of John Butler Yeats. He commissioned John, father of the poet William and painter Jack, to paint 25 portraits of a number of distinguished Irish people. Yeats worked slowly and had completed just five portraits in the series by 1907 when he moved to New York. Yeats was replaced by Orpen, who continued painting the series of portraits. Orpen was experiencing financial difficulties and agreed to a fee of £10 per canvas. He found that the commission did not exert his talents but the interactions with the subjects, such as Michael Davitt, interested him. [The portrait of John Taylor-Shawe by Orpen was a gift of Lane to the Municipal Gallery of Modern Art, now the Hugh Lane Gallery, in 1908).  

p. 143. John… died in London in 1911 after a brief illness….he suffered an internal haemorrhage after medical treatment in Heidelberg and lapsed into a coma and died. 

p. 143. With John’s early death, the ramifications of Walter’s will [i.e. his father] became apparent. At this time Walter was 79 and was living in teh castle with his son Frank and his family. In September, Walter recorded in his diary that he woudl not remake his will until after the probate of John’s will had been processed. He todl Frank that he intended to remake his will and made adequate provision for him and his wife and their children. However, he did not, despite having adequate time after the grant of probate of John’s will before his own death the following year in 1912. It was said taht after the death of his wife Elizabeth, in 1896 he was committed to a mental asylum “for a short period, his hold on life temporarily damaged.” It appears that Eliza [Persse] had been the dominant force in the management of the estate during her lifetime and that after her death Walter was possibly overwhelmed without her guiding hand. Their son Frank now became involved in the day-to-day running of the estate. 

p. 144. [John’s will left all to his wife, Amy Eleanora, and their children.] Upon Walter’s death the residue of his assets and the Castle Taylor estate passed to Amy Shawe-Taylor, who was named as the universal legatee of her husband. It was the following paragraph that ensured that his living son, Frank, would not inherit his family’s estate: “I hereby devise all my real estate…unto my elder son, John Shawe-Taylor, his heirs…” She acted as trustee until her son Michael came of age. 

Frank had believed that the estate woudl pass to him following his brother’s death, his father having assured him he woudl rework his will in his favour.  

p. 145. Frank inherited lands at Ballymabilla in teh Barony of Kilconnell… In 1920, Frank told a group of locals who wanted him to sell his land that “You will never see a perch of my land.” On 3 March 1920 he was shot while on his way to the fair in Galway. The Castle Taylor estate now rested in the hands of trustees waiting for 13 year old Michael to come of age. 

p. 147. In 1917 Amy was the chief organiser of a local branch of the Red Cross in Ardrahan whose sole purpose was the knitting of socks and the making of shirts for British soldiers. At the second meeting of the Red Cross, a protest was held against Irish girls making socks and shirts for English soldiers, and the branch was disbanded. By 1919, Amy had let Castle Talbot and gone to England and in October 1923 Lady Gregory recorded in her journal that Amy was at Coole and was arranging an auction for Castle Taylor. 

In June 1929, Lady Gregory drove to Castle Taylor to have lunch with Michael, who had now come of age. She recorded that he had carried out a great deal of improvements to Castle Taylor… However, his mother still wished that he might enter the army or take up a job in the city. Despite teh work carried out, Michael’s aspirations of running a financially viable country estate suffered a considerable blow. In July 1929, a number of shots were fired over a 15 minute period at CAstle Taylor when Michael was present in the castle with his grandmother, Mrs. Norman. Michael was the last member of the family to live in the castle.  

[The castle was eventually inherited by (Walter) Michael Shawe-Taylor. He left Ireladn in 1950 when a number fo shots were fired over the Castle. He died afterwards in Trinidad (or Grenada) in 1957.] In June 1951 a sale of furniture was carried out by Joyce, Mackie adn Lougheed, Auctioneers and Valuers, at Castle Taylor under the instruction of W.M. Shawe-Taylor on 5 July 1951. ..The castle was eventually purchased by a local landowner who dismantled it and sold the materials. Today the ruins of Castle Taylor dominate the landscape; however, while the walls of this great building survive, very little of the interior does. The robust 16^th century tower stands as it has done for generations while the later 19C house surrounding it is slowly crumbling. The steward’s house, which belonged to the complex of building situated to the rear of the castle, is still in use and has been beautifully maintained.”