The story goes that being enchanted with East Cowes Castle, in the Isle of Wight, which belonged to, and had been designed by, Mr. Nash, Lord Gort decided to erect a similar building on the shores of his beautiful lake. It is strange that the present Lord Gort now lives in East Cowes Castle, from which the design of his ancestor’s castle in Ireland was borrowed.
The first Viscount Gort adopted his nephew, Colonel Vereker, as his heir.
This soldier so distinguished himself at the battle of Coloony that he and his heirs were granted supporters to the family arms and allowed to adopt “Coloony” as their motto.
When the 3rd Viscount Gort succeeded to the estates they were heavily encumbered, and the famine of 1848 completed the ruin of the family.
The castle was sold for £17,000 to Mrs. Ball, Superioress of the Religious Order of Loretto, Dublin. She turned it into a novitiate house and opened a school. After a few years the community was recalled, and the castle was again put up for sale. This time it was purchased for £24,000 by the first Lord Gough.
Two pieces of ordnance which he captured in India are mounted at the entrance.
The present Viscount Gough is Resident British Minister at Dresden.
Fahey, “History and Antiquities of Diocese of Kilmacduagh.” Blake Foster, “The Irish Chieftains.” Parliamentary Gazetteer. Ward’s Guide to Limerick, Clare Coast, and Lower Shannon.
This fortress is situated in West Muskerry, County Cork, about twenty miles from Cork City, on the bank of the River Sullane, the ford of which it was evidently built to command.
Various derivations are given of the old name Macromp. Some authorities state that it signifies the “Plain of Crom,” the supreme deity of the ancient inhabitants of Ireland. Smith says the name came from a crooked oak under which travellers used to pass, but it seems more probable that it simply meant “a crooked plain,” and referred to the undulating country round.
In Smith’s History of Cork he describes the building as consisting of two square towers about 60 feet high connected by a large modern building. Windele, however, says that the present residence is a huge square mass of masonry which formed the keep of the original castle.