Overview
Mulroy House was built by one of the most hated landlords in Irish history, and designed by a man best known for workhouses. It stands at the head of a low, sheltered peninsula on Mulroy Bay, just east of Carrickart in north-west Donegal: a two-storey Tudor-Revival mansion with a crenellated tower, steep slate roofs and mottled grey-and-pink granite walls. The catch is that it is a private home – you cannot go inside, and the driveway is private. What you can do is walk the shore from Carrickart for a distant look at it across the water, which is a pleasant enough hour but not, on its own, a day out.
A hated landlord and his house
The house was commissioned in the 1860s by William Sydney Clements, 3rd Earl of Leitrim. The Clements family held some 54,000 acres across four counties, making them the second-largest landowners in Donegal, and Mulroy was built less as a family home than as the administrative headquarters for those estates. The 3rd Earl was notorious for the mass eviction of his tenants, and in April 1878 he was ambushed and killed in Cratlagh Wood, not far from here – one of the most infamous landlord killings of the era.
The estate passed to his nephew, Robert Bermingham Clements, the 4th Earl, who took a very different line: he rehoused displaced families, invested in local infrastructure, and ran a steam-ship service from Milford to Glasgow via Derry to move estate produce. Under him, Mulroy became a proper country seat. His son, the 5th Earl, and the countess turned to gardening, beginning an ambitious planting scheme in 1936. After Lady Leitrim died in 1984, the estate passed to a nephew of the countess, the Hon. Hedley Strutt, and then to his nephew, the present Lord Rayleigh, who lives there still.
Architecture and design
The original block was designed by George Wilkinson, an architect better known for Irish workhouses and asylums – which is why an early critic thought the exterior “a little hard and institutional for a private residence.” Built in 1865–66 for £5,782, it was a modest three-bay, two-storey house with a central porch.
Around 1890 the 4th Earl commissioned an extension that more than doubled its size. The architect is not recorded for certain, but the work is generally attributed to Thomas Drew, who designed nearby Holy Trinity Church in Carrickart. The additions brought a recessed three-bay wing, a three-storey crenellated tower and a run of gabled dormers, giving the finished building the look of something grown over centuries when in fact it went up in two 19th-century phases. The snecked granite and pink stone dressings are best seen from the grounds.
Gardens and grounds
The 5th Earl and countess’s planting brought rare and hardy species to this Atlantic-facing site, and it is still tended today by the horticulturist Uel Henderson. Rhododendrons planted along the drives in the 1930s are now joined by magnolias, eucryphias and other exotics, and the estate is one of the few places to host the rare Killarney fern. A walled garden sits north-west of the house and a kitchen-garden courtyard to the south-west, a hint of its former self-sufficiency. Shelter belts, some dating from the 1860s, were badly damaged by Hurricane Debbie in the 1960s but have been replanted. To the west stands Winter House, a former steward’s residence of around 1900, extended in the 1930s.
Walking the estate and coast
The grounds are private, but the public roads and shore paths give good access. A short, marked trail from Carrickart runs along the shoreline towards the house’s front gate, with open views across Mulroy Bay – good for birdwatching, photography and a bit of tide-dependent shoreline poking about. The mature trees make for a shaded walk even in summer, with the grey bulk of the house as a focal point across the water.
Practical information
Mulroy House is a private family home with no public opening hours or tours. You are welcome to look at the exterior from the public road and to walk the coast nearby.
- Location: R245, Rawros, about 3 km east of Carrickart, County Donegal.
- Access: the estate driveway is private; use the public road and footpaths.
- Parking: free street and layby parking in Carrickart village.
- Facilities: none on the estate; cafés, toilets and shops are in Carrickart.
- Etiquette: it is a lived-in home, so respect posted signs, keep dogs under control and stay on public paths.
Nearby
- Holy Trinity Church, Carrickart – a Victorian church by Thomas Drew, built with help from the Clements family.
- Rosapenna Hotel and Golf Links – a coastal resort originally developed by the 4th Earl to bring tourism to the area.
- Slieve League – among Ireland’s highest sea cliffs, a drive south-west along the Donegal coast.
- Glenveagh National Park – mountain trails, wildflower meadows and a lakeside castle.
Heritage status
Mulroy House is on the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage (Reg. No. 40901712) with a Regional rating, recognised for its architectural, artistic, historical and social interest – one of the better-preserved Victorian estates in Donegal. If you are driving the R245, it is worth pulling in to photograph the façade and walk the shore path; just do not expect to get past the gate.