House - fortified house

The National Monuments Service's description

Ballymageraghty, a territory of the Mageraghty chieftains, was leased from the Crown in 1577 by Sir Nicholas Malby, president of Connaught, and granted to him in 1579. He built a house here, described as a castle or stone fortalice with a watermill (RO039-061004-) in 1584 (Connellan 1962-3, 4) when it was tenanted by Thomas Ruttledge (Cronin 1980, 112). Situated on a rise on the S bank of a W-E section of the River Suck at a point where the river turns S c. 60m to the E. (Conboy 1988)
Sections of two hexagonal towers (int. dim. c. 12m) survive, each consisting of one wall surviving complete to four storeys with a fireplace at each floor, and parts of the adjacent walls. The towers would have been c. 30m apart, projecting E from the main house, of which nothing survives. When Sir Charles Coote acquired the land in 1616 he built a second fortified house (RO039-061002-) just to the W.

Compiled by: Michael Moore

Date of upload: 24 August 2010

References

Cronin, T. 1980 The Elizabethan colony in Co. Roscommon. In Murtagh, H. Irish midland studies: essays in commemoration of N.W. English, 107-20. Old Athlone Society.

Conboy, T. 1988 Castlecoote and Castlecoote House. Journal of the Roscommon Historical and Archaeological Society 2, 62.

Connellan, A.M.J. 1962-3 Ballygeraghty and Castlecoote. Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society 30, 3-6.