Walled Garden and Towers

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

The walled garden to the Northwest is bound by a storey-height wall that forms a parallelogram. The wall is built of rubble stonework with irregular capping in parts. In other parts it is re-built in regular brickwork with cut-stone quoins.

In the East wall is an elliptical-headed archway; it has ashlar stone surrounds and voussoirs. The arch is surmounted by a vermiculated keystone. The keystone is inscribed ‘A.D. 1832.’ The walled garden is set on a level grassed terrace to the west of the courtyards (HB09/11/013 B & C) On the outside of the north wall is a short range of lean to buildings comprising potting sheds and stores; walling as before and timber door and windows.

To the east of the enclosure, on the edge of the terrace, is another related feature consisting of two brick and rubble stone round-towers in a picturesque style linked by a wall joined to the corners of the outbuildings (HB09/11/013C) to form another small walled garden (of no interest.) The one to the south is in three stages with the top two rising above the garden walls; ground floor is rubble stone, the remainder is brick. The first floor has two tall gothic openings on opposite sides while the shorted top floor has very small openings, also gothic; all surmounted by a castellated parapet fo9nished in stone copings and edgings with hit-and-miss brick detailing below. The northern tower is squat and of brick; it comprises a ground floor with four gothic doorways, two containing modern wrought iron gates; above is a parapet with small gothic openings over those below; all surmounted by a castellated parapet as before. The linking walls are rubble stone with roughly squared sandstone quoins and bartizans of rubble and sandstone to the corners of the north section of walling.

Setting:
The demesne is located to the Southeast of Cookstown. The walled garden is to the north west of the main courtyard and accessed by a winding grass path from the modern forecourt to the north of the courtyard. The entrance to the demesne is off Mountjoy Road to the North via a long circular drive which slopes around the West of the walled garden and enters the courtyard at the South. There is also a more grand entrance (HB09/11/013F) of the Castlefarm Road to the west which must have originally been the main entrance but which is now kept locked. The demesne is well-wooded and some of the original landscape features survive.

Historical information

The walled garden is shown on the OS map of 1833-34, and includes a date stone of 1832. The decorative folly towers are shown on the OS map of 1853 and are much in keeping with the later baronial additions and embellishments to the house, made by the 4th Earl of Castle Stewart in 1860.

Stewart Hall (or Stuart Hall), the country house these former outbuildings once served was built c.1760 by Andrew Thomas Stewart (Viscount Castle Stewart from 1793, Earl Castle Stewart after 1800). Beginning as a typically uncomplicated rectangular Georgian block, the building was extended in 1860 by means of the addition of a somewhat ill-conceived Baronial tower to the south-east, with a castellated parapet applied to the original section in an effort to lend the whole unity. The property badly damaged by a bomb in 1974, and demolished in the 1980s and replaced by the present bungalow.

The outbuildings themselves appear to be largely contemporary with the house, the distinctive quarter circle plan form shown on the OS map of 1833-34, and the first valuation of 1835 grading most of the complex as ‘old’ at that date. Their dimensions are recorded in the same valuation as, 87ft x 17½ x 11, 44 x 21 x 16, 80 x 17 x 11, 40½ x 23 x 17½, 61 x 18 x 10, 69 x 17½ x 10, 56½ x 21½ x 16, (deduct archway 9 x 22½ x 10), 58 x 21½ x 16½, 54 x 11 x 6 (a ‘newer’ structure), 27 x 9½ x 8 (also more recent), 41 x 14½ x 7, 88 x 20 x 9, 56½ x 13 x 7, 31½ x 13½ x 7, 56 x 21 x 13, 35 x 20 x 9, 44 x 13½ x 7 (‘houses outside garden [?offices]’), 33 x 13½ x 10, 44 x 13½ x 7, with the house itself measuring 90 x 55 x 30, with 8ft high cellars.

The date of the highly unusual private Presbyterian meeting house or ‘chapel’ contained within the complex is uncertain. It is not marked on the OS maps of 1833-34 or 1853-57, but noted for the first time on the OS map of 1906, and only mentioned by the valuers in 1923 (‘chapel and farm offices’); however the valuers were never interested in religious buildings as a rule, as these were exempt from rating. Thus, going on this evidence, it appears to have brought into being at some point in the later 1800s, and is therefore the work of the 4th or 5th Earls of Castle Stewart.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI D/1618 Castle Stewart Papers, 1587-c.1960
1 PRONI VAL/1A/6/47 OS map, Co. Tyrone sheet 47 with valuation
references, 1833-34(-35)
2 ‘Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland…vol.20’ eds. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams, (QUB, 1990), p.15 (1834)
3 PRONI VAL/1B/621A-B First valuation, Ballyclog parish, 1835
4 PRONI VAL/2A/6/47B OS map, Co Tyrone, sheet 47- with valuation references, 1853-57
5 PRONI VAL/2B/6/25C Second valuation, Ballyclog parish, 1857
4 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1A Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1860-63
6 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1B Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1864-80
7 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1C Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1881
8 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1D Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1882-96
9 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1E Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1897-1911
10 PRONI OS/6/3/47/3 OS map, Co. Tyrone sheet 47, 1906
11 PRONI VAL/12B/37/1F Annual valuation revision book, Ballyclog ED, 1912-29
12 VAL/3C/7/5 First general revaluation of Northern Ireland, Ballyclog ED, 1936-57

Secondary sources
1 Rowan, A.J., ‘North west Ulster’, (London, 1979), p.489
2 EHS Garden file relating to Castle Stewart

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
D. Plan Form
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest
V. Authorship

Evaluation

The walled garden survives in good conditionwith well-executed detailing and is still imposing in scale. The related garden features of romantic towers and bartizanned walls are an interesting and notable survival. Together they form an important surviving portion of a significant house and estate. Along with the courtyard and entrances, the group is somewhat eclectic in character and is a noteworthy collection of estate structures.

General comments

HB09/11/013 has been split into its constituent parts, not all of which are listed.