Bowen's Court

Bowen's Court was a historic country house or Anglo-Irish big house near Kildorrery in County Cork, Ireland.

House

The house was built in the 1770s by Henry Cole Bowen (died 1788).[1] The Bowen family were minor Irish gentry, of Welsh origin- traced back to the late 1500s- resident in County Cork since Henry Bowen, a "notoriously irreligious" Colonel in the army of the regicide Cromwell, settled in Ireland.[2][3] In 1786, it was referred to as Faraghy, the seat of Mr. Cole Bowen. It was held at one time by Mrs Eliza Bowen, when it was valued at £75. The house was attacked during the Irish Rebellion of 1798. Bowen's Court remained the Bowen family seat until 1959. The last owner was the novelist Elizabeth Bowen. She had a nervous breakdown in the 1950s and abandoned Bowen's Court leaving unpaid wages and bills, then sold it and stayed with friends and at hotels, before she rented a flat in Oxford.[4] Bowen's Court was purchased, then demolished, by a developer in 1959.[5]

Book

Elizabeth Bowen wrote a history of the house, entitled Bowen's Court, in 1942 and it is featured in her 1929 novel The Last September.[6]

References
  1. "Houses: Bowen's Court". Ireland: NUI Galway. Retrieved 7 June 2014.
  2. A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Ireland, Bernard Burke, Harrison & Sons, 1912, p. 64, "Bowen of Bowen's Court" pedigree
  3. "Bowen, Henry | Dictionary of Irish Biography".
  4. Glendinning, Victoria (7 February 2009). "I am in your keeping". Lives and letters. The Guardian.
  5. Bol, John. "Demolition of the reputation of a writer". The Irish Times. Retrieved 19 January 2021.
  6. "Elizabeth Bowen". Encyclopædia Britannica. 7 June 2014.

52.24454°N 8.46123°W / 52.24454; -8.46123


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