Ivy Bridge

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Single span rubble built vehicle bridge of 1780 with accompanying small gothick turrets. The bridge spans the Shimna River as it flows through Tollymore Forest Park, and is located to the E side of the park.

The bridge has a single pointed arch, with rough stone voussoirs. The parapets are also in fieldstone rubble, with coping of mainly large flat stones, and a wide outward splay to each end. Set in the centre of the parapet to the W side is a granite dressed panel with a letter ‘C’ surmounted by a cornet (the monogram of the 2nd Earl Clanbrassil, James Hamilton) with a similar dressed panel to the opposite parapet with date ‘1780’.

At each end of each parapet (but free standing) is set a small square turret with castellated parapet and pyramidal spire. The main body of each turret is finished in rough cast and the faces of each has a pointed arch recess with granite dressings to the arch head. Most of these recesses are window sized but those which face into the river are tall enough for a person to shelter in. The castellated parapets are in stone with the spires in V-jointed ashlar granite. The drive over the bridge is covered in fine gravel.

Historical information

The Ivy Bridge was built in 1780 by James Hamilton, the 2nd Earl of Clanbrassil. Like most of the other decorative structures added to the Tollymore Park estate during this period, it was probably influenced by the designs of Thomas Wright of Durham a friend of both James and his father, the 1st Earl. The bridge is shown on the 1834 OS map and marked as ‘Ivy Bridge’. The origin of the name (apart from the possible plant reference), is uncertain.

The rough cast render to the turret faces may have been applied in fairly recent times, one suspects they were originally harled.

TOLLYMORE PARK
In late Medieval times Tollymore and the townlands surrounding it were under the lordship of the Magennis family of Upper Iveagh. In 1611, Brian MacHugh Magennis received royal confirmation of his ownership of the area when he was given a grant of seven and a half townlands (including the land which now contains the park), from King James I. Tollymore remained in the Magennis male line until c.1685, when Bernard Magennis died childless and the estate passed to Bernard’s sister, Ellen.

Ellen was married to William Hamilton and on her death her inheritance passed to their son James. His son, also called James (who inherited the estate in 1701), was created Viscount Limerick in 1719 and Earl of Clanbrassil (of the second creation) in 1728. James, who is popularly remembered under his initial title of Lord Limerick, initiated the development of Tollymore as a naturalistic landscape demesne in c.1720 by enclosing much of the land to form a deer park, commencing large scale tree planting and building a hunting lodge and the ‘Old Bridge’. He also rebuilt the parish church at Bryansford, the small estate village to the north of the park (named after his ancestor, Brian Magennis). In c.1750 he began the construction of a larger house, probably taking advice on its design from his friend, English architect Thomas Wright, who visited Ireland in 1746-47, staying at ‘Tullymoor Park’ in September of the former year. Dr. Pococke, in his ‘Tour of Ireland’ of 1752, comments that his lordship had completed two rooms of his new ‘pretty lodge’ by that date and had also built ‘a thatch’d open place to dine in’ on the south side of the Shimna River. Just to the north of the house the ‘Clanbrassil’ Barn was added in 1757, with the Horn Bridge built (to the south) around the same time.

Lord Limerick died in 1758 and was succeeded by his son (also named James), who extended the new house and continued the tree planting begun by his father. In the 1780s he erected the Barbican gate at the eastern entrance of the park, the gothick gate at the Bryansford entrance, the hermitage, the gothick follies and steward’s lodge on the Hilltown Road, and a number of bridges within the park including Ivy Bridge, Parnell’s Bridge and Foley’s Bridge, the last named after his wife, Grace Foley. These additions (which also appear to have been Thomas Wright influenced), as well as the planting, made Tullymore one of the most attractive estates in Ireland. Bernard Scalé’s 1777 map of Tollymore gives some indication of the picturesque appearance of the park during this period with a rolling landscape, much planting, meadows, rivers, streams, and walks through the woods. An advertisement offering lodgings in Bryansford village from The Belfast News-Letter of 26 April 1785, made much of the lodgings ‘most pleasing prospect of the Right Hon. Earl of Clanbrassil’s much admired demesne, which is beautiful to the sight and extensive to the bounds’ and whose wholesome air and ‘herbage on which the goats feed makes it much frequented by ladies and gentlemen for the recovery of lost health’.

James, 2nd Viscount Limerick and 2nd Earl of Clanbrassil died without issue in 1798 and the park passed to his sister Anne, the wife of Robert Jocelyn, 1st Earl of Roden. Their son, Robert 2nd Earl of Roden, who inherited the estate in 1802, built the Bryansford and Barbican gate lodges (the latter now demolished). He also erected the obelisk monument to the east of the house, in memory of his second son, James, who met an untimely death in 1812. The earl and his successor, Robert- the 3rd Earl, further developed Bryansford itself, making it ‘a pleasing place of residence for those persons that like a quiet retreat’. A Roman Catholic Church was built at the eastern edge of the village in 1820, school houses in 1823 and 1826, with some labourers’ dwellings and the large dower house (‘The Nest’) around the same time. The 3rd Earl also constructed a water powered saw mill within the demesne, and, in 1865, added another small lodge to the east. He enlarged Tollymore House itself, by adding an additional storey to the wings and a tall (and somewhat incongruous) French chateau style roof to the original central block.

Tollymore Park remained solely in Roden hands until 1930 when the 8th Earl sold two thirds of the land to the Ministry of Agriculture for afforestation purposes. In 1940 the remaining third was bought by the Ministry and during World War II Tollymore House and part of the grounds were used by the Army. After the War the house fell into a state of disrepair and was demolished by Lord Roden in 1952. In 1955 Tollymore, the first state forest to be designated a Forest Park, was opened to the public. It has continued to be developed for timber production, recreation, conservation and education purposes since then, and though the ‘big house’ itself may have disappeared, most of the park’s 18th and early 19th century, gates, bridges and lodges have survived.

References- Primary sources
1 PRONI MIC.147 Roden Papers
2 PRONI D.465 Roden Papers
3 PRONI D.2647 Roden Papers
4 PRONI T.2647 Roden Papers
5 PRONI T.3438 Roden Papers
6 Walter Harris, ‘The ancient and present state of the county of Down’ (Dublin 1744)
7 Dr. Pococke, ‘Tour in Ireland’ (Dublin 1752)
8 Map of Tollymore Park by Bernard Scalé (1777) [?Original in possession of Lord Roden]
9 ‘Taylor’s and Skinner’s Maps of the roads of Ireland’ (Dublin 1777), map 8
10 Thomas Milton, ‘Seats and demesnes of the nobility in Ireland’ (Dublin 1782-93)
11 Linen Hall Library ‘Belfast News-Letter’ 26th April 1785
12 R. Lewis, ‘The post chaise companion or traveller’s directory through Ireland’ (Dublin 1786)
13 Rev John Dubordieu, ‘Statistical survey of the county of Down’ (Dublin 1802)
14 A. Atkinson, ‘Ireland exhibited to England…’ (London 1823)
15 PRONI OS/1/3/43, 49 OS maps 1st ed. 1834, Co Down sheets 43 and 49
16 ‘Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland vol.3: Parishes of County Down I’, ed. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams (QUB 1990)
17 PRONI VAL/1A/3/43, 49 Valuation maps, Kilcoo (c.1836)
18 PRONI VAL/1B/362 First valuation records, Kilcoo (1836)
19 Samuel Lewis, ‘Topographical Dictionary of Ireland’ (Dublin 1837)
20 ‘Parliamentary gazetteer of Ireland’ (Dublin 1843-44)
21 ‘Belfast and Province of Ulster Directory’ Vols.1-21, 1852-1900, (Belfast, Henderson [1852-65], Belfast News-Letter [1865- ])
22 Maps of Lord Roden’s Co. Down estate (c.1855) [Originals in possession of Lord Roden]
23 PRONI OS/6/3/43/3, 49/3 OS maps 1st rev.1859, Co Down sheets 43 and 49
24 W McComb, ‘Guide to Belfast and adjoining districts…’ (Belfast 1861), pp.160-162.
25 PRONI Second (Griffith’s) valuation records, Kilcoo (1863) [in print]
26 Alexander Knox, ‘History of Co. Down’ (Dublin 1875).
27 George Henry Bassett ‘County Down Guide and Directory’ (Dublin 1886), pp.137-139.
28 UFTM W.A. Green collection WAG 1, 564, 565 Photographs of Tollymore Park etc. c.1900
29 Robert M. Young, ‘Belfast and the Province of Ulster in the 20th century’ (Brighton 1909), p.201

Secondary sources
1 ‘Archaeological survey of Co. Down’ (Belfast HMSO 1966), pp.86, 177-178.
2 EHS Records of the first survey of buildings of historical and architectural interest in Tollymore ward (1972-)
3 P.J. Rankin, 'Historic buildings, groups of buildings, areas of architectural importance in the Mourne area of South Down', (Belfast UAHS 1975), pp.11-19.
4 ‘Tollymore Forest Park’ (HMSO c.1980)
5 Mark Bence-Jones, ‘A guide to Irish country houses’ (rev. ed. London 1988), p.274.
6 F. Hamond and T. Porter, ‘A tour of the Mournes’ (Belfast ?1991)
7 Mícheál B, Ó Mainnín, ‘Place-names of Northern Ireland vol.III- The Mournes’ (QUB 1993), pp.97-101, 114.
8 J.A.K. Dean, ‘The gate lodges of Ulster- a gazetteer’ (Belfast UAHS 1994), p.97-98

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

A. Style
B. Proportion
C. Ornamentation
H-. Alterations detracting from building
J. Setting
K. Group value

Criteria for listing: historic interest

X. Local Interest

Evaluation

Single span rubble built vehicle bridge of 1780 with splayed parapets and accompanying small gothick turrets. Like the other gothick structures added to Tollymore Park during this period, this bridge is probably based on the designs of Thomas Wright of Durham.