Kirkistown Castle

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

Large three storey rectangular (c.9.5m x .5m) split rubble tower house of 1622 situated on a flat plain less than half a mile from the E coast of the Ards peninsula and topped with a tall battlemented parapet which projects slightly beyond the main walls . Alterations were carried out to the castle c.1800 when large pointed arch windows with gothick frames were inserted to the ground, first and second floors on the NE and NW sides, large buttresses and a porch added to the SE entrance and the interior renovated. The castle is currently being restored.

SE elevation has large two storey buttresses, with a crenellated ‘porch’ built into the centre buttress with a central pointed arch doorway. Above this porch is a smaller centred crenellated structure with central pointed arch opening. NE elevation has large pointed arch windows with brick dressings slightly to the right of centre on the first and second floors each with fixed light gothick frames. There was a similar window to the ground floor, but this has now been blocked. There are three small narrow stairwell windows to the far left at various levels with ogee arched heads to the lower two and a semi-circular arch to the uppermost. The NW elevation matches the NE, except that there are no small stairwell windows. The SW elevation is dotted with seven small narrow windows with flat arch heads to the four uppermost, a pointed arch head to the one just below these and ogee arches to the lowest two. The castle originally had an attic level but this was removed some time ago and there is a concrete roof, with a slight pitch above the second floor. There are holes for drainage at the bottom of the parapet and a large rectangular chimney stack which rises above parapet level. Two large structural metal straps encircle the building at first floor. The castle was once surrounded by a bawn with two small two level round flankers to the S and W and a gateway to the SW. The roofless flankers are still substantially intact and part of the SW, SE and NE walls are still standing. There is a fully restored two storey, rubble built, gabled barn/store [?of c.1800] next to the S flanker, and an extended and modernised house [?originally eighteenth century] inserted into the SE wall (NE of the barn).
SMR No. DOW 25:7.

Historical information

This castle was built in 1622 by Roland Savage of Ballygalet. It remained in the Savage family until c.1660s when it was sold by James Savage to Captain James McGill ‘of Ballymonestragh’ [?Ballyministragh near Killinchy]. McGill also bought much land in the area, built a windmill (possibly that still visible on the nearby golf course) and generally improved the castle and its surroundings. In 1683 William Montgomery, as well as praising McGill for his investing in the area, described the castle as ‘in good repayre’ and ‘who’s late erected garden walls are washed with a pleasant fresh logh near the sea’, the ‘fresh logh’ referring to land on the east side of the castle now drained.

In 1744 Walter Harris described the castle as ‘surrounded by a high wall and strongly built’, however, he also added that ‘contained within the circuit of it’ was ‘a good dwelling house’ in which the then owner, Lucy McGill (Captain James’ granddaughter) was living. If we assume that the phrase ‘within the circuit of it’ meant within the walls, then there must have been a house within the ‘bawn’ at this date. Could this house be the much altered dwelling still standing to the east of the castle?

By the beginning of the nineteenth century Kirkistown castle had passed into the hands of Lucy McGill’s granddaughter, Mary, who married William Montgomery (of Greyabbey). By this stage, the fabric of the building appears to have been in a very poor state (perhaps because the McGills had abandoned it for the nearby dwelling house) and Montgomery began to effect repairs to the property, enlarging windows, renovating the interior and, perhaps, constructing buttresses and the barn. When Montgomery died [?c.1830], however, the work was not completed and his son and heir a minor, thus work came to a halt, the OS Memoirs noting in 1837 that the structure had a ‘half-finished roof and broken windows’ and was reverting to its ‘former state of ruin’.
In 1840, Montgomery’s widow Mary granted use of the castle to the Cloughey Presbyterian congregation, in order to hold services whilst the church was under construction. It is not clear what became of the castle after the congregation had taken up residence in their new church, but Alexander Knox, writing in 1875 remarked that though the property was in the possession of Mr. Hugh Montgomery and had been restored and returned to its former use as a dwelling house. It continued to be used as such by the Montgomery family up until the beginning of the twentieth century. The castle was sold to the Brown family in recent times, who in turn passed it on to state care.

KIRKISTOWN CASTLE is a state care monument and was never a listed property.

Kirkistown Castle is currently being repaired and restored by the Department of the Environment.

References- Primary sources
1 Montgomery’s MSS ‘History of the Ards’ (1683), p. 6-7. [Original MS in the Linenhall Library, Belfast].
2 Walter Harris 'The Ancient and Present State of The County of Down' (Dublin 1744), p. 67.
3 [?PRONI] Map (1767) used as front cover for successive editions of the 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society' (1977-97).
4 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st Edition, 1834, Co. Down 25.
5 PRONI VAL 1B/35 1st valuation, Ardkeen, c.1835.
6 Ordnance Survey Memoirs of Ireland Vol.7: Parishes of County Down II, ed. Angelique Day and Patrick McWilliams (QUB 1991), p. 2
7 PRONI Ordnance Survey Maps, 1st revision, 1860, Co. Down 25.
8 PRONI 2nd valuation, Ardkeen, c.1863.

Secondary sources
1 G.F. Savage-Armstrong 'A genealogical history of the Savage family in Ulster, being a revision and enlargement of certain chapters of “The Savages of the Ards”' (London 1906), pp.335-36. [Savage-Armstrong remarks that according to local tradition the small house within the courtyard was the one in which Lucy McGill resided.]
2 'Archaeological Survey of County Down' (Belfast 1966), pp. 238-41.
3 Elizabeth J.C. Lyttle ‘Kirkistown Castle’ in 'Journal of the Upper Ards Historical Society No.7' (1983), pp. 18-19
4 A.J. Hughes and R.J. Hannan 'Place-Names of Northern Ireland Vol. Two, County Down II- The Ards', pp. 15-16.
5 EHS SMR Dow 25:7.

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

Impressive three storey tower house of 1622 with flankers and bawn walls, altered during the early nineteenth century The windows to the NW and NE sides of this castle have been enlarged and the attic section removed. To the SE side are large buttresses.