Lisheen Castle

Lisheen Castle stands in Lisheen, Moyne, Ireland, and its buildings were created and modified by successive local landed families.

In the later 18th century the site contained a Georgian country house erected by George Grace. In 1770 John Lloyd acquired lands that included Lisheen and nearby townlands, and he divided those holdings among his five sons. Frederic Lloyd received the townlands that included the house built by Grace and established his family there toward the end of the century.

From the 1810s Frederic Lloyd undertook a progressive rebuilding for his son and heir, John Lloyd, transforming the earlier residence into the present castellated Tudor‑style country house. The house appears in early 19th‑century documentary records and by the 1830s was described as an imposing castellated residence; a report from 1841 noted that John Lloyd was then building a new castle.

After the death of John Lloyd’s wife in 1853, he emigrated to Canada. In 1856 Charles Henry Lloyd inherited Lisheen and its lands; on his death in 1887 the property passed to his eldest son, Charles Edward Lloyd. Charles Edward emigrated to Australia and the house was let to tenants. Around the late 1890s a broker let the residence to Henry Hamilton at an annual rent of £80, and household goods were dispersed for sale; the Hamilton family occupied the house roughly between 1896 and 1903. Under the Wyndham Land Act of 1903 most of the estate farms were sold to tenants while 57.2 hectares around the house were retained, and the house itself continued to be let.

In 1918 E. F. Lloyd placed the house on the market. On 5 February 1918 William Bray O’Brien purchased the Lisheen estate for £3,740. William Bray O’Brien’s wife was Kathleen Lloyd. Their daughter Camilla married John Francis O’Meara, who subsequently received Lisheen Castle as a wedding gift. On the night of 29 June 1921, during the Irish War of Independence, the house was set on fire by members of the Irish Republican Army. The sole resident at the time was the caretaker, Patrick Sweeney; attackers broke a salon window, introduced petrol into that room and set the interior alight. In October 1921 John Francis O’Meara received compensation of £15,000 for the loss.

Following the burning the house remained unoccupied for many decades. In 1960 the Land Commission took the estate and divided the lands, an action that removed the surrounding park. Around 1971 a visitor from Canada named Carol Lloyd found much of the building’s structure still standing, contrary to expectations of total collapse. In 1994 Joan and Michael Everard bought the ruined estate and began a program of repair in 1996. Restoration work concluded in December 1999, and the restored building was made available as holiday accommodation beginning 1 May 2000; one account describes the renewed house as operating as a luxury hotel.