Macha’s Twins
Benburb Manor in County Tyrone – red brick, chamfered bay windows, high gables – is like a suburban Belfast villa on steroids. It was built in 1887 to the design of the prolific architect William Henry Lynn when he was in his late 50s. The house is a more restrained version of Castle Leslie and that County Monaghan mansion isn’t exactly externally ostentatious. Perhaps breaking away from his professional partner Sir Charles Lanyon allowed Wills to rationalise his style. Or maybe it was just tight purse strings of his client James Bruce, a Belfast businessman. Stone bands are the only tiny flash of exuberance. James had bought the estate from Viscount Powerscourt 11 years earlier.
Benburb is now a wonderful asset to the community, a hidden highlight of this far flung edge of Ulster. In 1949 the house was bought by the Servite Fathers as a priory. This has broadened into the Benburb Centre, a “house of healing and reconciliation”. Over the years poets (Seamus Heaney) have taught and artists (John Vallely) have wrought works and theatre directors (Tyrone Guthrie) have sought solitude here.
The village – all one street of it or maybe two at a push – is lined with delightfully quaint estate cottages. On a balmy Sunday morning in Benburb, there’s the clink of coffee cups in the stables courtyard café; the singing of hymns from the open door of St Patrick’s; the prayerful footsteps of visitors on retreat treading through the forest; the rush of water far below; and the sound of silence at the Hermitage.
“The Benburb Manorial Estate. Descriptive Particulars of Sale, with Plans and Conditions of Sale, of an Exceedingly valuable and highly important Freehold Manorial Domain containing altogether about 9,290 A. 1 R. 25 P. A splendid Investment in rich Agricultural Land, of which it may be said hardly one Acre is uncultivated. It is also exceedingly well adapted to Residential Purposes, and many Sites for the construction of a Mansion as a central and appropriate Residence for so important an Estate. Benburb is, with the exception of a few Acres, all within a Ring Fence, and is situate between the Towns of Armagh on the South, Dungannon on the North, Moy on the East, Auchnacloy and Caledon on the West, within 40 miles of Belfast, well served by lines of Railway, so as to render it accessible from the parts. The lands are chiefly in arable and grass, well watered and undulating, and the Property as a whole does not differ materially from a well circumstanced Estate in the English Midlands, excepting that the cultivation of Flax here receives primary attention. It is intersected by good hard Roads, and divided into convenient Farms with excellent buildings and cottages.
The Village of Benburb is a neat and clean dependency, and is quite of a model character. The ancient Castle and the Manor of Benburb are included, and the whole Property produces more than £9,000 per annum, which magnificent Rent Roll, lately adjusted under a friendly arbitration (where it will remain until another increase is required), offers a specially well secured Income. The Sporting is excellent, and is reserved to the Landlord. Hunting can be obtained within a short distance. The Blackwater bounds a considerable portion of the Estate, and is a capital Salmon River; and as a whole it is confidently offered as a splendid Investment in Land, adapted to the large Capitalist who seeks such an outlet for his money to produce a higher return than can be found in the soil of England.
To be sold by Auction, by Messrs E and H Lumley at the Mart, Tokenhouse Yard, Lothbury, London, on Tuesday, the 22nd day of August, 1876, at two o’clock precisely – in One Lot, unless an acceptable offer be previously made by Private Contract. John Sloan, at the Village of Benburb, will show the Property. Printed Particulars of Sale, with Conditions and Plan, may be obtained of Robert Dixon, Esq, Solicitor, No.5, Finsbury Square, London; Messrs S S and E Reeves and Sons, Solicitors, No.17, Merrion Square East, Dublin; George Posnett, Esq, Enniskerry, County Wicklow; at the Imperial and the Royal Hotels, Belfast; the Gresham and the Shelburne [sic] Hotels, Dublin; the Charlemont Arms Hotel, Armagh; Morris’s Hotel, Dungannon; the Imperial Hotel, Cork; at the Auction Mart, London; and of Messrs Edward and Henry Lumley, Land Agents and Auctioneers, 31 and 32, St James’s Street, Piccadilly, London.”
