Ballyragget Cas. — Ballyragget

On the E bank of the River Nore, on the S side of the town of Ballyragget (KK010-001----). The tower house is N of centre within a roughly square bawn (KK010-001002-). Carrigan (1905, vol. 2, 92) refers to a popular tradition which, ‘ascribes its erection to Mairgread ni Gearoid [Margaret Fitzgerald], who married Pierce Ruadh, Earl of Ormond, about 1485, and died in 1542; and a bench of stone, in the watch-tower, on the castle’s top, is known as “Mairgread ni Gearoid’s chiar”’. While not crediting her with the building of the tower house, Lewis (1837, vol. 1, 162), notes that this castle ‘had been a favourite residence of the celebrated Lady Margaret Fitzgerald, Countess of Ormonde, who is said to have frequently issued from the castle at the head of her armed retainers, to ravage the property of such of the neighbouring families as she deemed to be her enemies’. In 1580 Richard Butler, the youngest son of Piers Rua, the nineth Earl of Ormond, was raised to the peerage and given the title of Viscount Mountgarret (Nolan 1979, 45). Richard had inherited Ballyragget which became the principal seat of this junior branch of the Ormonds (ibid.). In the late 16th century the tower house appears to have undergone some alterations, with the insertion of a fireplace by Grissel, wife of Edmund, the second Viscount Mountgarret at fourth-floor level (Harbison 1991, 66). Lewis (1837, vol. 1, 162) describes how, in 1600, ‘the town was garrisoned by the forces of Sir George Carew, Lord-President of Munster, when the sons of Lord Mountgarret, to whom it then belonged, were in rebellion against the crown, and had engaged with O’More to arrest the Earl of Ormonde’. The garrison consisted of, ‘thirty foot [soldiers] left in a ward in Mountgarret’s house, called Balliragget’ (O’Grady 1896, vol. 1, 26). The castle and bawn are depicted on the Down Survey (1665-6) parish map of ‘Donogmore’ and the accompanying terrier records, ‘At Bellaraggitt a Castle and Bawne’ with Lord Mountgarrett, Irish Papist, listed as proprietor. Following the Rebellion of 1641, Mountgarret’s lands were confiscated and Ballyragget fell into the hands of a Cromwellian called Axtell, who apparently, while resident in the castle, entertained himself by hanging Catholics and Protestant Royalists from a lime tree on Ballyragget’s fair green (Lyng 1946-7, 18). At the Restoration Axtell was himself hanged and Ballyragget was returned to the Mountgarrets (ibid., 19). The Butlers continued to live in the tower house until 1788 when a new residence, Ballyragget Lodge, was built within the demesne, c. 200m to the SW of the castle. In 1798 the castle served as a British military post (Killanin and Duignan, 1967, 104). In 1813 the Butler estates of Ballyragget became the property of their cousins, McMurrough Kavanaghs of Borris (Lyng 1946-7, 22). According to Lyng (ibid., 23), ‘Last year [c. 1945] the castle and grounds and Ballyragget Lodge were disposed of to Mr. Carey who has brought new life to the baun [bawn] with his “Castle Hatchery.”’, this may provide a date for when the nesting boxes were quarried into the masonry of the castle. In the 1950s/60s the castle was used as a lumber store (Lyng 1956-7, 40). A five-storey tower house (ext. dims. 13.2m x 9.4m) built of limestone rubble, roughly coursed, with a base-batter. The fenestration consists mainly of round-headed single light windows and flat or round-headed two-light windows, though most of the latter have been broken out and re-built. Some of the flat-headed two-light windows have external hood-mouldings. The tower house has a relatively modern slated roof. There first, second and third floor had relatively modern wooden floors, but these are now partially collapsed and no longer safe to walk on. There are garderobe chambers in the NW angle of each of the four upper floors, all fed into two garderobe chutes, which exit side by side at the N end of the W wall. There was a building abutting the E face of the tower house, as evidenced by two lines of corbels which project out from the external E face, one above ground-floor level and the other above first-floor level, with a flat-headed doorway at first-floor level giving access from the E chamber into this building. The upper line of corbels continues around the E end of the S face. Entered via a pointed doorway in the E wall, the external rebate of the doorway has a yet-hole at the apex and on the N side. The entrance leads to a lobby, probably protected by a loop opposite but this has been broken out. S of this lobby there is a guard-room and to the N there is another lobby which gave access to the ground-floor chamber via a pointed doorway. Another doorway N of this lobby leads to the spiral stair which rises in the NE angle up to roof level. The ground floor was lit by three loops, in the N, S and W walls respectively, only the blocked-up round-headed loop in the N wall survives. There are three wall-cupboards, to in the S wall and one towards the E end of the N wall. The spiral stair leads to a first-floor chamber accessed through a pointed doorway. This chamber, resting on a wooden floor, is lit by a window in the N and S wall, and S end of the W wall, all broken out and re-built. There is a large segmental-headed fireplace in the S wall, with large well-cut limestone voussoirs, which was later slightly infilled with red brick to create a small opening. A garderobe chamber is entered via a flat-headed doorway on the N side of the W window embrasure, it is lit by a narrow loop in the W wall. The second-floor chamfer, resting on a wooden floor, is entered through a pointed doorway and lit by a two-light window at the W end of the S wall, a broken out and re-built window in the W wall and a blocked-up two-light window in the N wall. There is a depressed three-centred fireplace of polished limestone in the S wall, the central partially infilled with stone to create a smaller fireplace. A small mural chamber is accessed from the S side of the W window embrasure, lit by an angle loop. There is another mural chamber in the NW angle, accessed from the W side of the N window embrasure. It is lit by an angle-loop and by an unusually long and narrow cross-loop in the N wall, more typical of a 13th-century loop. A third chamber, in the E wall, not floored, is accessed from the main chamber. It is lit by a window in the E wall Entered from the spiral stair at third-floor level, there is a chamber along the E wall with a pointed vaulted roof, the floor of which does not survive. It is lit by a round-headed single-light window in the E wall and another in the S wall, broken out. The main third-floor chamber, with a wooden floor, is accessed from the spiral stair via a lobby lit by a window in the N wall. Entered through a flat-headed doorway, this chamber was lit by a window, within an embrasure, in the S end of the W wall, broken out and re-built. An opening at the W end of the N wall gives access to an L-shaped garderobe, lit by a window in its N and W walls. The main chamber is covered by a pointed vault with good survival of wicker-centring. A later brick-lined fireplace and flue have been inserted in the N wall. A pointed doorway gives access from the spiral stair into the main third-floor chamber. This was lit by a flat-headed two-light window, mullion missing, at the E end of the N wall, another in the centre of the W wall and a blocked-up window at the W end of the N wall and another in the centre of the N wall. The latter is blocked by an inserted chimney flue. There is a pseudo-four-centred polished stone fireplace centrally placed in the S wall. It is inscribed with the date 1591 and the initials G M [Grissel Mountgarret], within two heraldic shields, 15 over G in one and 91 over M in the other. There is a garderobe chamber in the NW angle, accessed from a doorway W of centre in the N wall. It is lit by a single-light window at the N end of the W wall. There is another small mural chamb