Archives | Cartlann Chill Dara
Drogheda Estate
Identity Statement
Repository Code: IE 2036
Archive Reference: KCA/E/DROG
Title: Marquis of Drogheda Rentals
Creation Dates: 1875-1888
Extent Medium: 2 volumes
Context
Administrative History: The town of Monasterevin, Co. Kildare (in Irish: Mainistir Eimhín, with variant English spellings including Monasterevan and Monastereven) derives its name from the monastery founded here by St. Emhin, or Evin, in the sixth century. The monastery fell into ruin and was re-founded as a Cistercian monastery, Rosglas, towards the end of the twelfth century by Dermod O’Dempsey, Lord of Offaly. In 1541, after the Reformation, the Abbey, now known of as the Manor of Monasterevin, was surrendered to King Henry VIII. In 1613 Sir Adam Loftus received a grant of the Manor and Moore Abbey became known as the House of Monasterevin until around 1780. The house and estate passed into the hands of the Earls of Drogheda through the marriage in 1699 of Charles Lord Moore to Jane Loftus, heiress of the Loftus estates, following the death of her brother. Their son, Edward, became the fifth Earl of Drogheda. The present house, built in 1767 by Field Marshal Sir Charles Moore, 6th Earl and 1st Marquess of Drogheda, is one of only two surviving examples of mid eighteenth-century Gothic in major Irish country houses which are not old castles which have been remodelled. Henry Francis Seymour Moore, 8th Earl and 3rd Marquess of Drogheda (1825–1892), was an Irish peer, styled Viscount Moore until 1837. He was the only son of Lord Henry Seymour Moore, a younger son of Field Marshal 1st Marquess of Drogheda, and Mary Parnell, daughter of Baron Congleton, a great uncle of the Irish nationalist leader Charles Stewart Parnell. His father died a few days after his birth in August 1825; Henry became Marquess of Drogheda in 1837 at the age of twelve on the death of his uncle, the 2nd Marquess, inheriting 19,000 acres. In 1847 he married Mary Stuart-Wortley, daughter of Baron Wharncliffe, and they lived at Moore Abbey where they took a great interest in the estate, local schools and the Church of Ireland. Lord Drogheda served as Lord Lieutenant of Kildare from 1874 until his death in 1892. The couple had no children so on his death the Marquessate became extinct; the title Earl of Drogheda passed to a cousin, Ponsonby Moore (ninth Earl). Henry Charles Ponsonby Moore succeeded his father as 10th Earl in 1908, and married Kathleen Pelham Burn in 1909. Following their divorce in 1921, he leased the house to John Count McCormack, tenor, from 1925 to 1937. Moore Abbey was sold to the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary in 1940; it is now the headquarters of the Muiriosa Foundation.
Content and Structure
Scope & Content: This collection contains two rent books of the Drogheda estate; the first volumes is a Marquis of Drogheda Rental book recording arrears and rents due in 1874 and 1875 for the Manors of Fontstown and Monasterevin in Co. Kildare, and Maryborough , Mountmellick and Mellifont in Co. Laois (KCA/E/DROG/1). The second volume is a Marquis of Drogheda Rent book (KCA/E/DROG/2) recording arrears and rents collected for the Monasterevin and Mountmellick estates commencing 03 February 1879 on an almost daily basis, and under the Arrears Act from April 1883. The Arrears of Rent (Ireland) Act 1882 empowered the Land Commission to cancel arrears of less than thirty pounds due by tenants. It was introduced following the Kilmainham Treaty, an agreement reached in May 1882 between Prime Minister Gladstone and Irish nationalist leader Charles Stewart Parnell. The government agreed to settle the 'rent arrears' question allowing 100,000 tenants to appeal for fair rent before the land courts, thereby winning abatement for tenant rent-arrears at the height of the Land War in Ireland.
Arrangement: Two bound volumes arranged chronologically.
Conditions of Use and Access
Access Conditions: Full Access
Conditions Governing Reproduction: Permission from archivist required.
Creation Dates: 1875-1888
Extent Medium: 2 volumes
Material Language: English
Allied Materials
Copies Information: The two digitised volumes can be viewed here. The County Archives acknowledges the support of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport, and Media under the Commemorations fund (2024).
Publications: Monasterevin, A parish and its people on the eve of the millennium, Carville, Geraldine (1999).
Monasterevin parish, Co. Kildare: Some historical notes, Eileen Ryan (1958).
The family of Moore, Countess of Drogheda (1906).