Castle - unclassified

The National Monuments Service's description

In 1620 Nathaniel Fox was granted lands under the commission for the Plantation of Longford, including the ‘castle, town and lands of Rathreagh and Corfobrelaghes’ (Cal. pat. rolls Ire., Jas I, 467). A castle is indicated in ‘Rathreogh’ on an early 17th-century map of Ardagh barony (BL, Cotton MS Augustus I.ii.25). In 1837 O'Donovan recorded that ‘The castle of Rath-Riabhach stood near the present house of Foxhall, and the name is retained in the parish of Rathreagh’ and that ‘there was no trace of the memory of the ancient castle there in the memory of Edmond Burke, who knew the great-grandfather of the present Mr. Fox’ (OSL, 46, 50). According to Lewis (1837 vol. 2, 507), ‘the site of the old castle of Rathrea is Foxhall, the residence of R.M. Fox, Esq.’. Its precise location has not been identified. Fox Hall house has been levelled and no visible surface trace of the castle survives around it or among the 18th and 19th-century outhouses and demesne walls.

Compiled by: Patrick F. O'Donovan

Date of upload: 4 November 2012

References

Lewis, S. 1837 A topographical dictionary of Ireland, 2 vols. London. Lewis and Co.

British Library, Cotton Manuscripts, Augustus I. Charts of the baronies of Granard, Rathcline, Longford, Ardagh, Shrule and Moydow, County Longford. London. (microfilm, NLI p. 1364)

Cal. pat. rolls Ire., Jas I - Irish patent rolls of James I: facsimile of the Irish record commissioners' calendar prepared prior to 1830, with foreword by M.C. Griffith (Irish Manuscripts Commission, Dublin, 1966)

OSL - Ordnance Survey Letters. Letters written by members of the Ordnance Survey's 'Topographical Department' (T. O'Conor, A. O'Curry, E. Curry, J. O'Donovan and P. O'Keeffe) sent to headquarters from the field (1834-41). MSS in Royal Irish Academy.