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| The interior enclosure of the Castle. You can just see the slab towards the bottom and to the left of the tower. |
" The ancient Castle of Grannagh in the Barony of Iverk, County of Kilkenny, is supposed to have been built 500 years ago; it was formerly a strong fortress and the residence of the proud and puissant Earls and Dukes of Ormond who there held their Baronial Courts and lived in all the pomp and splendor of fewdal(sic) magnificence. This venerable fabric was in part demolished during the civil wars of unhappy Ireland and the spoliating hands of a thoughtless neighbouring peasantry had nearly completed the destruction when George Roache (sic) Esq., a native of the City of Limerick, the present inheritor and proprietor of the estate, whose opinions on the subject of antiquities were at complete variance with those of his elder brother, the late John Roache (sic), repaired the walls in 1837". This wooden board has long since disappeared but was replacde by a slab fixed to one of the inside walls of the ruin. This slab still exists but is very difficult to read. However it was transcribed circa 1907 or 1909 and the transcription appeared in The Journal of the Association for the Preservation of the Memorials of the Dead Vol VII. The wording is somewhat similar but perhaps more diplomatic though not entirely so:-
"The Ancient Castle of Granagh(sic) in the barony of Iverk, in the county of Kilkenny is supposed to have been erected about 500 years ago; it was formerly a strong fortress and the residence of the proud and puissant earls and Dukes of Ormond, who held there their baronial court, bred in all the pomp and splendor of feudal magnificence. This venerable fabric was in part demolished in the civil wars of unhappy Ireland and the spoliating hands of the thoughtless neighbouring peasantry had nearly completed its destruction when George Roche Esqr ..........(some lines deliberately obliterated here)............. being desirous of preserving from total ruin the feeble remains of this once proud monument of the architectural skills of the ancient Irish caused this new wall on the other side to be built at considerable expense and all the breeches in the old one to be filled up under the superintendence of Edward Rorke, a mason of the city of Waterford, 24th December 1827".
This second notice on the walls of the ruin is somewhat at variance with the original wooden notice although we have no idea of what the erased lines on the stone might have said. At least the spelling of this particular Roche family is correct on the stone slab but the dates vary.
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| The stone slab attached to one of the inside walls of Grannagh Castle, now difficult to read. However the erased and obliterated section is clearly visible in this photograph. What on earth did it say to cause its removal? Probably we shall never know now but.it obviously offended someone. Possibly the long suffering George Alexander Waters, executor of George Roche. |
John O'Donovan made enquiries concerning the above named brothers and found them to be both brothers of William Roche Esq., Member of Parliament for Limerick and the difference in their opinions on antiquities amounted to this, that John, whilst amassing a fortune of nearly quarter of a million of money neglected to prevent the dilapidation of Grannagh Castle, whilst George who succeeded him in this part of the property made some trifling repairs in and about it.
That however is not quite the whole story.
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| View of Grannagh Castle from the banks of the River Suir |
John Roche's will was proved in 1826 and in it he left his brother George what amounted to £8000 including this estate in Kilkenny. This Roche family was based in Limerick but had claimed the ancient Fermoy peerage. It was Thomas Roche, uncle to both William, John and George Roche, who had acquired the Grannagh estate originally. Thomas had been sent out work in Rotterdam as an agent for his merchant family in Limerick at the tender age of 20 years He registered as a Burger in Rotterdam on 2nd December 1756; this enabled him practice a trade or profession in that city. The very same day his first venture was to send a cargo of wine to Limerick and to arrange for a return cargo to Rotterdam of 135 tons of Irish beef, butter, tallow and hides. He was extremely successful and became a very wealthy man. When he died unexpectedly in 1788 he had just purchased two estates in Ireland, taking advantage of The Catholic Relief Acts which allowed Catholics to purchase land on leases for up to 999 years; one of these estates was Grannagh castle and lands, which eventually his nephew George Roche inherited.
George Roche, the subject of the slab at Grannagh, had been educated in Revolutionary France and had been influenced by those ideas and had become somewhat eccentric. On his death bed his old friend, bosom companion and distant cousin, retired naval surgeon George Alexander Waters said to Roche "Sir I can do no more for you, you must now look to your Saviour" and got the reply "That is all Leather and stuff" (a nineteenth century phrase along the lines of "stuff and nonsense" or meaning "that is all rubbish"). George Alexander Waters, executor of his Will, also managed Roche's finances and said of him that he found it difficult to stretch his £2000 a year income, a very considerable sum of money in those days for a bachelor, from one year's end to the other, so you may imagine he lived in some style. In his Will, George Roche provided for his house to be maintained in perpetuity, with his body in a glass fronted coffin, placed upright in the hall of his house to prove to all comers that there was no such thing as the Resurrection. His executor ignored this and had him decently buried but not before the footman and butler had cleared the house of all valuables and money and had made it hot foot to Cove to board the next ship to America. That ship was never heard of again and was believed to have been burned at sea with loss of all hands.
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| Interior view of one of the ruined towers |
Although this is somewhat outside our intentions for this blog there is what purports to be a true ghost story attached to George Roche of Grannagh Castle. After Roche's death his house at Tramore, Waterford, called Sweet Briar Park was been let to some sisters, ladies of reduced circumstances, who kept a small school there. After the death of the executor, George Alexander Waters himself, his daughter, Eliza, met the eldest of these ladies, a Mrs Goodwilly, and after the customary platitudes, she asked how they were getting on at Sweet Briar Park. She was taken aback to hear, "Oh Miss Waters, you no doubt know everyone hereabouts; can you tell us who is the old fashioned gentleman we see at times in the dusk in our greenhouse? When we come in he raises his hat, and goes out without a word. We do not quite like it, but he is so polite and does us no harm". Miss Waters reported as a most matter-of-fact and level-headed woman, asked for the description of this intruder and recognised it, including the colour of the coat, the vest and knee-breeches, as an exact description of the late and eccentric George Roche. Not wishing to alarm the ladies and with admirable savoir-faire she said "Oh! yes, we know him, he is quite harmless". Make of that what you will. Perhaps George Roche was still hanging around annoyed at the fact that his wishes to be placed in a glass fronted coffin in the hall of the house, had been ignored. However he does not seem to have been an angry or frustrated ghost, if ghost he was! (Journal of the Cork Historical and Archaelogical Society Vol XXXIV No 130 1929. The Waters Family of Cork).
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| The sad remains of a once fortified castle wall fronting the River Suir |
Hello, not sure if you'll pick this up but would like to get further information about some of the graves you've written about, mainly Morris family. Would I be able to contact you directly? Thank you
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